Recent industry news doing the rounds is from Epic Games, who yesterday publicly shared an email that was sent by Tim Sweeney about laying off 16% of the company. 830 people lost their job due to "spending way more money than we earn" as they continue "investing in the next evolution of Epic and growing Fortnite as a metaverse-inspired ecosystem for creators".
That is a lot of people, and clearly shows that Epic Games have been relying a lot on Fortnite money. While Fortnite is "starting to grow again" Sweeney said it's being driven now by player-made content which has "significant revenue sharing, and this is a lower margin business than we had when Fortnite Battle Royale took off and began funding our expansion".
In the post Sweeney mentioned how Epic has been making efforts to reduce costs like "moving to net zero hiring and cutting operating spend on things like marketing and events" but all of this "ended up far short of financial sustainability" so getting rid of staff was "the only way" they could stabilize.
Epic is also selling off Bandcamp to B2B music company Songtradr, which they only acquired in 2022, as clearly they didn't actually have a business plan for it to sell it off so quickly. They're also spinning off most of SuperAwesome that they acquired in 2020, who say they are acquiring most of it back themselves directly.
Psyonix, maker of Rocket League, was also(1) affected(2) since Epic acquired them back in 2019 and then made it exclusive to the Epic Store.
The developer Mediatonic who made Fall Guys was also impacted by this, since Epic acquired them in 2021 and then made Fall Guys exclusive to the Epic Store. It's not clear how badly they've been affected but Ed Fear (Game Lead) who was laid off showed off a picture on X that showed "Decimated", with many others also posting about being let go so Mediatonic appears to have been hit quite hard by this.
No doubt the exclusives and constant free games on the Epic Store cost a lot of monies.
What do you think to this news? Leave a comment.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Quoting: StoneColdSpiderThat is so not the reason. The reason is the execs are the ones with the power, making the firing choices. "Hmmm . . . should I fire myself, or a bunch of guys I've never met? Decisions, decisions . . ."Quoting: PenglingSeriously, though, this is yet another example of why consolidation is bad for everyone. Why is it never the high-ups who took the company in this direction who lose their jobs for it?Simple....... Its costs more in payouts to fire the CEO or Board or Upper management than it does to fire the office grunts...... Thats why the office grunts are the first to go......
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Quoting: GroganWeird Al is a genius and I love the way he not only did this, but did it with a totally hippie "Peter Paul and Mary" kind of vibe that's totally at odds with the whole corporate culture thing.Quoting: PenglingHow many buzzwords does this guy use? Yikes!
Buzzwords are a pet peeve of mine and as long as the execs can keep coming up with presentations full of them, it won't be them losing their jobs.
Listen to how this flows, he nailed it :-)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyV_UG60dD4
I especially hate IT parroting full of buzzwords. I wish those twits realized how dumb they sound, it's a turn off for me.
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Well, I'm sad for the hundreds of people who lost their jobs.
But if hundreds of people were going to lose their jobs, I'm pleased it's a signal that Epic is doing badly.
As to the Epic store . . . I don't think their cute shallow tricks with the exclusives and free games and this and that were ever going to build that store into serious competition for Steam. I'd go so far as to say it was a bad strategy and playing it straight, building up the store's features and doing things in harder, more high road kinds of ways would have been a better strategy. That said, it still probably wouldn't have worked. Trying to create a major competitor to Steam is really hard, because of network effects and because Valve do a pretty good job. I think Epic's plan was kind of doomed from the start; their belief that with enough money to sink into it they could pull it off was fundamentally mistaken.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 29 September 2023 at 6:00 pm UTC
But if hundreds of people were going to lose their jobs, I'm pleased it's a signal that Epic is doing badly.
As to the Epic store . . . I don't think their cute shallow tricks with the exclusives and free games and this and that were ever going to build that store into serious competition for Steam. I'd go so far as to say it was a bad strategy and playing it straight, building up the store's features and doing things in harder, more high road kinds of ways would have been a better strategy. That said, it still probably wouldn't have worked. Trying to create a major competitor to Steam is really hard, because of network effects and because Valve do a pretty good job. I think Epic's plan was kind of doomed from the start; their belief that with enough money to sink into it they could pull it off was fundamentally mistaken.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 29 September 2023 at 6:00 pm UTC
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I wouldn't even mind Epics exclusivity stuff if EGS itself wasn't so bad.
We were rightfully joking about how slow Valve is to develop stuff, but oh my, does EGS up the ante on slowness...
We were rightfully joking about how slow Valve is to develop stuff, but oh my, does EGS up the ante on slowness...
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Quoting: Purple Library GuyWeird Al is a genius and I love the way he not only did this, but did it with a totally hippie "Peter Paul and Mary" kind of vibe that's totally at odds with the whole corporate culture thing.
That's melding and mocking two Crosby Stills Nash/Young songs, Carry On and Suite Judy Blue Eyes (but yes, that culture in opposition lol)
That's one of those most clever things Weird Al has done I think.
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StoneColdSpider Sep 29, 2023
Quoting: 14I think your comment on being mega large and soulless has nothing to do with it. Is Amazon mega large? Absolutely. Do they do the same thing you described? No, they don't. Amazon does push existing people to do new and hard things. I bet you would still say Amazon is soulless. I'm not here to convince you otherwise, however my point is what you're highlighting is related to smart or stupid business decisions, not goodwill to humanity.Any company who treats their grunt workers like this and this and this are 100% soulless........
Quoting: PenglingWe need more people like the late Satoru Iwata who, along with other executives, took a pay-cut when poor decisions were made, instead of passing lay-offs down the line.Its sad to see the state of that company right now since his departure.......
Quoting: Purple Library GuyThat is so not the reason. The reason is the execs are the ones with the power, making the firing choices. "Hmmm . . . should I fire myself, or a bunch of guys I've never met? Decisions, decisions . . ."The shareholders have the power to order the board to fire the CEO and they also have the power to clear out the Board of Directors...... But they dont....... Because it would cost to much money to do so in paying out the contracts........ So they allow the CEO and the Board to keep their jobs and fire the grunt workers that cost very little to fire......... And as for private companies they have owners who have the power to fire CEOs and clear out the Board........
Maybe its different in Yankee land???.......
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ElectricPrism Sep 29, 2023
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Epic Games sheds 830 people
HORRAY!!! Everybody liked that!!!
Remember folks, when a company behaves and does shitty things we __ CAN __ vote with our dollar and drive them out of business. We don't have to live in a abusive consumer-dispised world. I can think of no better time than now to help put some of these companies under.
Make room for the MORE worthy!!!
Say NO to subsidizing venture failures!!!
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Quoting: StoneColdSpiderBecause they're all the same people and they all know what game is being played. So, the people with the direct power to fire CEOs are boards of directors. People on boards of directors are typically executives on other companies; most of these people sit on multiple such boards. The CEO the directors are evaluating sits on some of their boards of directors. It all interlocks. They do their best to avoid being rude enough to judge each other, or reduce their performance bonus even if they just ran the company into the ground, let alone sack them.Quoting: Purple Library GuyThat is so not the reason. The reason is the execs are the ones with the power, making the firing choices. "Hmmm . . . should I fire myself, or a bunch of guys I've never met? Decisions, decisions . . ."The shareholders have the power to order the board to fire the CEO and they also have the power to clear out the Board of Directors...... But they dont.......
As to the shareholders themselves, there are currently three basic kinds of shareholder structures. There's the kind where there are many shareholders and no small group really controls it, which are increasingly rare. These are hardly ever activist, certainly not about overriding boards of directors with respect to CEOs; the small shareholders don't know enough about what's going on and they don't know each other so it's hard for them to organize. There's the kind controlled mostly by one or a few major shareholders. Major shareholders are of course very rich; they hang out with CEOs, not with line workers, and they think roughly the same way, particularly since CEOs are also significant shareholders. And, there's the kind that are controlled by Blackrock or similar funds. These funds are run by . . . CEOs who are on various boards of directors.
It has nothing to do with what would cost money or what would work, it has to do with who's in what class.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 29 September 2023 at 11:29 pm UTC
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CEO's do get sacked though. In this case, we're also talking about the founder who still has most shares in a private company. He is at the helm. Think of Apple and Microsoft similarly.
At this point, I think any major leader in the US, corporate or not, will get heat from this forum. Next time there's an article like this one, the convo will be repeated and people will think they're holier-than-thou when they've never had to handle such large decisions and risk.
Companies are for-profit, ya know? Go to church if you want more of a family feel. Companies are not your family.
At this point, I think any major leader in the US, corporate or not, will get heat from this forum. Next time there's an article like this one, the convo will be repeated and people will think they're holier-than-thou when they've never had to handle such large decisions and risk.
Companies are for-profit, ya know? Go to church if you want more of a family feel. Companies are not your family.
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I hate seeing good developers lose their jobs, but I'll never be sad about Epic hemorrhaging money. The end for them can't come soon enough, though I have a suspicion Microsoft will swoop in and buy them if it comes to that. Maybe though, if the "metaverse" nonsense and dead-end lawsuits they keep filing against Apple hurt them badly enough, Microsoft will stay away.
The good news out of all of this is that I can re-create a Bandcamp account and start buying music again, once Epic finish selling it off.
Last edited by sonic2kk on 30 September 2023 at 1:38 am UTC
The good news out of all of this is that I can re-create a Bandcamp account and start buying music again, once Epic finish selling it off.
Last edited by sonic2kk on 30 September 2023 at 1:38 am UTC
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