Underneath my yellow skin

Tag Archives: layoffs

Gaming, layoffs, physical discs, and me (part four)

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I’m back to talk once again about Xbox and what the fuck is going on in the industry. Xbox has big main villain vibes, but it’s not just them. It’s not even mainly them. They are just the most obvious symptom of an evergreen disease–corporate greed. That’s the disease. It’s always the disease. It probably always will be. That’s part and parcel of America; it’s built into the fabric of American society. We just take for granted that we are at the whim of our corporate overlords, and there is nothing to be done about it. Oh, and here is the post from yesterday in which I talked about how deluded (and heartless) the C-suite at Microsoft is when talking about Xbox profits.

I read a work blog, and any time the conditions of the American workforce is brought up (especially the fact that our healthcare is tied into our employment), Europeans pour in to tell us how appalling it is and how they can’t believe it. I mean, true, but we don’t need to hear/read it every time. We know it’s gross and terrible, but it’s not as if we can just move countries on a whim. Or overhaul our entire employment system with a snap of the fingers.

Journalism is dying out in general. Gaming journalism, in particular, is on its way out, too. And life as a gaming dev is hard AF. I don’t see how in good conscious I could encourage anyone to go into the gaming industry today*. Then again, it’s not like there are a ton of industries I would encourage anyone to go into, anway. But, especially not anything entertainment and/or journalism related.

Things are dire in this realm. People in the industry are feeling pretty bleak. There are some saying that it’s going to get lower before it goes higher. Others are not seeing a light at the end of the tunnel. Every day, it’s just bad news after bad news.

Which, come to think of it, is much like the regular news as well. *Sigh*

One thing I will say is that the physical discs issue–by the way. They didn’t even tell their partners that they were doing that until they dropped the news to the public. And, yeah. That did not go over well. Sony really thought they were just going to drop that and let it wash away. (I use Sony and PlayStation pretty interchangeably in this post for complex reasons I don’t want to get into here.)

To be honest, so did I. I mean, what was there to do? PlayStation in the past pretty much just did whatever the fuck they wanted to do with little to no pushback. Given that Xbox has floundered for several years, essentially giving PlayStation free rein. I wrote free reign at first, which works, too (meaning that PlayStation is acting pretty much as a dictator). And, really. They slid it in while the Xbox turmoil was going on, so they probably thought they would be able to go unnoticed.

Well, joke’s on them. There was such an uproar about it; I was quite surprised. It was loud. It was angry. It was sustained. I thought it would wash away in a day or two, but no. People were furious about it, and, weirdly, it’s the one thing that actually bolstered me. The reaction, I mean. I had been so beaten down by the news (gaming and general), I was numb. Everything sucked. Nothing was going to get better. Why bother?


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Gaming, me, and all is bad; part three

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In the gaming industry, there is a saying I keep hearing. “Put out a bad game–get laid off. Put out a great game–get laid off. It doesn’t matter.” Sometimes, people will add, “Put out an OK game–get laid off.” The point is that no one is safe. It doesn’t matter how well your game does–you can be on the chopping block.

The biggest example of this is id Software–the developers of the DOOM and Quake games (both of which are considered the grandparent of the first-person shooter). They have been consistent with their games coming out and being warmly received. Their last DOOM game came out last year to much fanfare, and it had an update this year.

In Xbox’s current brutal ‘off with their heads’ rampage, they laid off 136 employees at id Software. The co-founder of id Software (who has long since left), John Carmack released a milquetoast statement that said nothing and included a tasteless and, quite frankly, cringeworthy remark. He would have been better off not saying anything at all, quite frankly. Greg Miller from Kinda Funny Games and Tamoor Hussain from Gamespot talked about it passionately on KFG, and I’ve included the clip below.

With Obsidian, they did not get laid off, but they got yanked off the Forsworn sequel they were working on and told they were doing the new Fallout. This is where mixed emotions come in. No one was asking for a new Forsworn (or rather, very few people), and everyone was clamoring for a new Fallout. The last game in the main series (Fallout 4) came out in 2015! No wonder people are hungering for more.

In addition, there is a Netflix Fallout series going on, and it would have been a perfect time to have a new Fallout game come out. This is Bethesda I’m talking about, by the way. They are the ones who own the Fallout name, but Obsidian made what is arguably the favorite in the series–Fallout New Vegas.

The CEO of Microsoft has said that since being hands off hasn’t worked, it’s now time to be hands on (I’m paraphrasing). I can’t say that I disagree with the premise. Bethesda has two IPs that are basically printing money, and they haven’t done anything major with either series in several years (and, no, Elder Scrolls, I’m not including the countless time Skyrim has been remastered, remade, repackaged, and put on different devices).

On the other hand, it feels really tyrannical to order a team to make a new game that is not the one they intended to make. Yes, even though they have made one before. They were in the middle of making a sequel to their latest game! To be ordeerd to stop that and do something completely different, well, that would not sit well with me.

Everyone is angry about it, and rightly so. It’s been a bloodbath, and the worst part is not knowing when or if it will stop. Also, are any of the upper C-suite taking paycuts? I think not. They can’t do without their third home in Martha’s Vineyard, now can they?


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Steam Next Fest aagain, and other (grim) industry news

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I want to talk more about the Steam Next Fest because I played a demo that actually didn’t completely frustrate the fuck out of me (yes, I know that’s damning with faint praise, but I’m just happy that I could actually play it and that I enjoyed it more than it frustrated me).

Before I get to that, though, there was another layoff in the industry, and it’s one that hurt personally. Briefly, IGN bought Eurogamer in May, 2024. Once they did, the changes were immediate and obvious. I don’t know anything about what happened in the background, but from a fan’s perspective, it really sucked.

Now, let me back up a bit more than that. I only cared about the video side of Eurogamer. I started watching when it was Johnny Chiodini, Aoife Wilson, Ian Higton, and Chris Bratt. I hung through it when Chris Bratt left. They added another member for a bit, but she did not work out. Then Johnny left. Did they leave while the other member was there? I’m not sure. Anyway, Zoe Delahunty-Light joined the team. I’m not going to lie. I struggled with her at first, but then I came to appreciate what she brought to the team. It was Aoife, Ian, and Zoe for quite a while, and it was good. Then, Aoife left to work for Larian Studios. Ian and Zoe held it down while bringing in occasional freelancer. One of them was Jim Trinca, and he eventually became the third fulltime member. This was in October of 2024 (so Google tells me). I stopped watching for the most part once Aoife left, but I always wanted them to do well.

Side note: Huh. Apparently, there was a fourth person added later–Alix. I can’t find out who that is in my light research, so I’m just going to leave it at that.

Fast-forward to two days ago. IGN announced that they had cut the whole Eurogamer video team. Even though I hadn’t watched them in quite some time and the industry is littered with layoffs left and right, it still hit hard. I don’t know if it’s because I’m nostalgic for the days I used to watch them on the regular or what, but it really bothered me.

I mean, obviously, it’s terrible that they lost their jobs. I don’t want to undercut that point. It’s awful, and I really feel for them. Especially Ian as he’s been there from the start. It’s a grim time in the games industry, and I honestly don’t know how anyone does it. I understand why anyone who is a games journalist would find a different job.

Back to the Steam Next Fest. It seems almost hollow talking about it in light of the news I previously mentioned, but there’s no way to not make it awkward.

I finally played a demo of a game that I then put on my wishlist. Hm. I was going to say what it was, but I’m not sure I’m going to do that. Why? Because I don’t like to be negative about a game before I’ve even played it. Ok, I have done that in the past, but that’s the rule I made up for myself right now. I’ll review it when/if I play the actual game.


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