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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So, the Tencent money is finally drying up... I just hope they'll release UE as open source before going bankrupt.
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Quoting: 14I wouldn't agree with the extremes you described either. Extremes are never good. Without writing something very long winded, I'm trying to say that we can't expect CEO's to love their employees like parent-child or close relative relationships. The other extreme would be complete disregard of human life. Something in between can happen.Yeah, something in between happened here, obviously. It's not even slightly extreme to expect an employer to value their employees more than a bunch of numbers on a balance sheet. To say that betting the livelihoods of 800+ employees on a gamble that never had much chance of success is callous and irresponsible. Nothing to do with love, parental or otherwise.
People are not so much panning the layoffs, but rather the business decisions that almost inevitably led here.
But don't worry, the ones making these decisions are doing just fine. They deserve every bit of criticism they get, but they won't lose any sleep, or be any less rich. They're well insulated from any real consequences. That's the beauty of big business.
Quoting: 14If Epic was able to avoid their current financial problem, it wouldn't have been out of love, it would have been from smart business decisions with the goal of self sustenance. Most employees would be happy and comfortable knowing their company had a sturdy future.No publicly traded company seeks mere self sustenance. That's seen as failure to grow and scares away investors.
Besides, Epic already has a very profitable product in Unreal Engine and in trying to carve a slice of the game store market with their exclusives, freebies and negative marketing campaigns, they knowingly made a gamble with a very slight chance of success. It's just business as usual: A boardroom full of rich people took a risk and employees are the only ones who suffer for it, but wouldn't have seen any of the payoff in any case. Unless you consider not losing their jobs for someone else's mistake a reward of some kind.
If you still want to continue this conversation, please try to keep a lid on the patronising tone. This is about business ethics and a corporation's responsibility towards their employees and clients. Not about a CEO's feelings or other such nonsense.
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Quoting: tuubiIf you still want to continue this conversation, please try to keep a lid on the patronising tone. This is about business ethics and a corporation's responsibility towards their employees and clients. Not about a CEO's feelings or other such nonsense.Ethics and responsibility play along with expectations from everyone -- employees and investors. When expectations are accurate, emotions follow. You would not continue this thread without some level of emotional attachment, so I don't understand this odd request. Humans can't avoid emotions, and it affects our short-term judgement and decision making.
That said, I don't have anything else to add. It is clear you are passionate on your point of view and will continue an us versus them bitterness.
Last edited by 14 on 2 October 2023 at 6:44 pm UTC
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Quoting: 14I'm saying that feelings aren't the topic of this discussion. Societal responsibility isn't about feelings. Business ethics isn't about feelings. A CEO doesn't make important business decisions based on how they feel. A certain level of professional detachment is expected of them. Of course we all have feelings and they contribute to everything we do, but that's neither here nor there.Quoting: tuubiIf you still want to continue this conversation, please try to keep a lid on the patronising tone. This is about business ethics and a corporation's responsibility towards their employees and clients. Not about a CEO's feelings or other such nonsense.Ethics and responsibility play along with expectations from everyone -- employees and investors. When expectations are accurate, emotions follow. You would not continue this thread without some level of emotional attachment, so I don't understand this odd request. Humans can't avoid emotions, and it affects our short-term judgement and decision making.
Nobody expects Epic's CEO to actually love all of his employees. I don't understand why you'd deem us unserious enough to even entertain that thought. And I'm not against these sorts of corporate shenanigans just because they make me angry or sad. I'm not a child. I'm against them because they're not good for the society or the economy in the long run. That means every one of us as participants in that society. And as consumers and employees in the economy.
Quoting: 14That said, I don't have anything else to add. It is clear you are passionate on your point of view and will continue an us versus them bitterness.I'm not bitter at all, nor am I against businesses or business owners in general. I suppose I just happen to disagree with you on the standard we should hold them to.
I am sorry if I come off as unnecessarily blunt or confrontational. That's not my intention. Social skills, what are they and where can I buy some?
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Quoting: 14It is clear you are passionate on your point of view and will continue an us versus them bitterness.Us versus them is not generally about bitterness, although bitterness often gets involved once the lines are drawn. Ukraine and Russia are not fighting because anyone is bitter, although I am sure plenty of people on both sides are bitter.
As for "us versus them" and CEOs . . . well, if you look at trends in income, wealth and quality of life for the very wealthy and for everyone else, and you look at the policies that have driven those trends, and you look at the groups that have bent considerable effort to securing those policies and pushing the economic theories that profess to support them . . . the conclusion that the very wealthy are a "them", and that no matter what we might think, they're sure against us, becomes difficult to avoid. It is true that if one reaches this conclusion, one may become bitter.
Last edited by Purple Library Guy on 2 October 2023 at 11:52 pm UTC
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Quoting: Purple Library GuyYour defense of the bitterness makes sense, I won't invalidate it, but it doesn't nullify my statement you quoted. I will conclude with that.Quoting: 14It is clear you are passionate on your point of view and will continue an us versus them bitterness.Us versus them is not generally about bitterness, although bitterness often gets involved once the lines are drawn. Ukraine and Russia are not fighting because anyone is bitter, although I am sure plenty of people on both sides are bitter.
As for "us versus them" and CEOs . . . well, if you look at trends in income, wealth and quality of life for the very wealthy and for everyone else, and you look at the policies that have driven those trends, and you look at the groups that have bent considerable effort to securing those policies and pushing the economic theories that profess to support them . . . the conclusion that the very wealthy are a "them", and that no matter what we might think, they're sure against us, becomes difficult to avoid. It is true that if one reaches this conclusion, one may become bitter.
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Quoting: tuubiI respect your ability to disagree without the conversation devolving too much.Quoting: 14I'm saying that feelings aren't the topic of this discussion. Societal responsibility isn't about feelings. Business ethics isn't about feelings. A CEO doesn't make important business decisions based on how they feel. A certain level of professional detachment is expected of them. Of course we all have feelings and they contribute to everything we do, but that's neither here nor there.Quoting: tuubiIf you still want to continue this conversation, please try to keep a lid on the patronising tone. This is about business ethics and a corporation's responsibility towards their employees and clients. Not about a CEO's feelings or other such nonsense.Ethics and responsibility play along with expectations from everyone -- employees and investors. When expectations are accurate, emotions follow. You would not continue this thread without some level of emotional attachment, so I don't understand this odd request. Humans can't avoid emotions, and it affects our short-term judgement and decision making.
Nobody expects Epic's CEO to actually love all of his employees. I don't understand why you'd deem us unserious enough to even entertain that thought. And I'm not against these sorts of corporate shenanigans just because they make me angry or sad. I'm not a child. I'm against them because they're not good for the society or the economy in the long run. That means every one of us as participants in that society. And as consumers and employees in the economy.
Quoting: 14That said, I don't have anything else to add. It is clear you are passionate on your point of view and will continue an us versus them bitterness.I'm not bitter at all, nor am I against businesses or business owners in general. I suppose I just happen to disagree with you on the standard we should hold them to.
I am sorry if I come off as unnecessarily blunt or confrontational. That's not my intention. Social skills, what are they and where can I buy some?
I don't disagree with everything you said 100% forever into eternity, for all circumstances. But it would be a little exhausting to get into the minutia. We're not paid to sit around and philosophize, after all. Or at least, I'm not.
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Quoting: 14Or at least, I'm not.
For some seconds, I thought you'd be able to close this nicely.
Last edited by Eike on 7 October 2023 at 8:25 am UTC
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slaapliedje Oct 4, 2023
Quoting: NouserSo, the Tencent money is finally drying up... I just hope they'll release UE as open source before going bankrupt.Technically the source for Unreal Engine is 'open'. https://docs.unrealengine.com/5.3/en-US/downloading-unreal-engine-source-code/
I'm not sure what the license is, but you can download it and mess with it now. I had a random thought this morning about AmigaOS... if Gateway had just open sourced it back in 2000, I wonder how different the computing landscape would have been...
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Quoting: slaapliedjeMy understanding is it's "source available". You can't fork it or redistribute it.Quoting: NouserSo, the Tencent money is finally drying up... I just hope they'll release UE as open source before going bankrupt.Technically the source for Unreal Engine is 'open'. https://docs.unrealengine.com/5.3/en-US/downloading-unreal-engine-source-code/
I'm not sure what the license is, but you can download it and mess with it now.
2 Likes, Who?
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