Electronic Arts Inc. is laying off hundreds of workers and canceling a Titanfall game that was in development at its Respawn Entertainment subsidiary.
Between 300 and 400 positions were eliminated, including around 100 at Respawn, according to a person familiar with the cuts. The company had about 13,700 employees at the end of March 2024.
“As part of our continued focus on our long-term strategic priorities, we’ve made select changes within our organization that more effectively aligns teams and allocates resources in service of driving future growth,” Justin Higgs, a spokesman for the Redwood City, California-based company, said in a statement.
Big companies profit from the labour of hardworking creatives. I’m just wondering how a company of their size can make good games with an incompetent leadership.
I’m saying making games with budgets like theirs should be a dream and the results should be insane, but it’s up to management to make it happen. Instead they choose to rid themselves of talent and pocket the money.
Yeah, you would think they’d be given the space to make something amazing, but the execs ruin it for everyone with insane deadlines, constant layoffs, and forcing devs to put in questionable moneymaker mechanics.
There’s been a constant squeeze in tech for years now. You’re always expected to be faster and more efficient at each interval and it never eases up. I’d be happy to wait longer for a game if it means the devs aren’t stuck in a grueling loop that burns folks out and drains the end result of its soul.
On top of that, games are insanely hard to make. So many system configurations and variables that can wreak havoc.