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Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

reuters.com

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Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#141

Post by bombcar »

tombert wrote: post #124
Imustaskforhelp wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some grievances with minecraft recently Someone is suing mojang because they break EU/Swedish law (It was a youtube video worth watching) Minecraft bedrock is having some incredibly shitty tactics to move people towards their marketplace while community calling it bugrock I don't think that many people who play Minecraft really appreciate Mojang being bought by Microsoft. Many are oblivious to the fact sure…

I don't own a Windows computer so I only play the Java Edition, which still shockingly gets regularly updates and is very mod-friendly even still. When MS bought Minecraft I assumed that they were going to drop support for the Java version but I was clearly wrong about that. Didn't know about the lawsuit though, I will give that a look.

Mojang and apparently someone at Microsoft who listens are smart enough to know that while most of the Minecraft revenue comes from bugrock, 99% of YouTube content comes from Java.

They need that and the modding community to keep the game alive so that new players buy a copy on phone/console/etc.

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#142

Post by jasondigitized »

Quarrelsome wrote: post #87

> "We're spending significantly more than we're making, and we have to make major cuts to keep the company funded," he said. Sorry, HOW?!? How can a company like Epic games with one of the most successful gaming products of the last few decades be losing money with a product that is so mature? Almost every other games developer would love to be in their position on Fortnite but they've somehow turned that into a loss…

This. You need to fire your CFO immediately if you don't have billions of dollars in cash after the run you just had on Fortnite.

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#143

Post by Imustaskforhelp »

tombert wrote: post #124
Imustaskforhelp wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some grievances with minecraft recently Someone is suing mojang because they break EU/Swedish law (It was a youtube video worth watching) Minecraft bedrock is having some incredibly shitty tactics to move people towards their marketplace while community calling it bugrock I don't think that many people who play Minecraft really appreciate Mojang being bought by Microsoft. Many are oblivious to the fact sure…

I don't own a Windows computer so I only play the Java Edition, which still shockingly gets regularly updates and is very mod-friendly even still. When MS bought Minecraft I assumed that they were going to drop support for the Java version but I was clearly wrong about that. Didn't know about the lawsuit though, I will give that a look.

> When MS bought Minecraft I assumed that they were going to drop support for the Java version but I was clearly wrong about that

Oh they sure wish that but the community loves java and for a good reason actually but their first step towards this was migrating mojang accounts into microsoft accounts as previously bedrock had microsoft accounts iirc and java had mojang accounts and microsoft accounts both but they have now blocked mojang accounts

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_UF_4gZclI (Mojang screwed us, now we're suing them)

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#144

Post by ryandrake »

shimman wrote: post #24
rustyhancock wrote: post #13

Quite stunned that Fortnites 5bn per year isn't enough to keep them going. They've been pull about that much in per year since 2019 AFAIK. I really hope this one have knock ons for Unreal Engine or lead to Unity like licensing. Their indie grants are also quite generous.

Of course it's enough, the problem is greed. They must perform ritual sacrifices to appease the market gods.

To corporations, "enough" is not even a word. Line must go up and to the right, forever. There is not even the concept of "enough."

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#145

Post by darkteflon »

yifanl wrote: post #92
Quarrelsome wrote: post #87

> "We're spending significantly more than we're making, and we have to make major cuts to keep the company funded," he said. Sorry, HOW?!? How can a company like Epic games with one of the most successful gaming products of the last few decades be losing money with a product that is so mature? Almost every other games developer would love to be in their position on Fortnite but they've somehow turned that into a loss…

Because games is simply not a particularly profitable industry. There's a reason why Valve moved on from making games to being a digital landlord.

It’s a power law distribution.

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#146

Post by recursivecaveat »

Quarrelsome wrote: post #87

> "We're spending significantly more than we're making, and we have to make major cuts to keep the company funded," he said. Sorry, HOW?!? How can a company like Epic games with one of the most successful gaming products of the last few decades be losing money with a product that is so mature? Almost every other games developer would love to be in their position on Fortnite but they've somehow turned that into a loss…

I think big media companies are just structurally unable to stop trying to double their revenue. They just keep pushing out more products and over-extend at the same time everyone is losing interest in them. That's how you end up with say the MCU producing at quadruple the old pace and the movies making less than ever. At some point there's just nowhere to go.

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#147

Post by bombcar »

bsimpson wrote: post #121
Anvoker wrote: post #79

Often when I see layoffs like this, I can't help but think "Wow that company has so many employees and yet, in practice, does so little". This perhaps a rather uncharitable sentiment, but I can't help but have it. Yes, Unreal Engine keeps getting improved, more Fortnite content gets produced. But there is a general lack of innovation, one that I find personally painful when I look at Epic's recent-ish track record. N…

I suspect the way you get to that size is having a team of 5 people doing X for Fortnite going "man, we could do our specific job a bit better if we has 7 people." Scale that to a whole corp. Each job is justified in isolation to do a specific thing, at least at the hiring time. I suspect there aren't a lot of people thinking at a high level as you are "we have this many gajillion dollars - what are we betting on?"

Also as you get bigger you need more and more "glue" people, HR, accounting, etc. A five-man team can avoid all that, but you can't take them to 25 and have 5 5-people teams anymore. Some amount is just management.

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#148

Post by yifanl »

duped wrote: post #120
yifanl wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because games is simply not a particularly profitable industry. There's a reason why Valve moved on from making games to being a digital landlord.

It's the leading entertainment industry, beating tv/film/music. If you can't find profit there then you're not doing your job.

If you think Epic Games is unique in doing layoffs this year, I don't think you're paying particularly close attention to the games industry.

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#149

Post by daedrdev »

filoleg wrote: post #111
josephg wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have ~5000 employees. Most game companies are a tiny fraction of that size. Even most AAA games are made by teams of hundreds. Not teams of thousands.

Epic Games does way more than just purely making games. They also have their own Steam competitor (Epic Games Store) and, more importantly, they develop and support Unreal Engine used by tons of other game dev companies. If you want an apples to apples comparison (i.e., other big live-service game companies) in terms of the employee count, you got: Mihoyo (Genshin Impact, Honkai Star Rail) - ~5,000-6,000 Riot Games (…

Epic games store is likely a main culprit as they really have not succeeded while spending tons for free games

Mihoyo literally prints money with predatory gacha

Riot has had several layoffs in recent years

Roblox loses tons of money every year

Re: Epic Games to cut more than 1k jobs as Fortnite usage falls

#150

Post by Imustaskforhelp »

shakna wrote: post #128
Imustaskforhelp wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some grievances with minecraft recently Someone is suing mojang because they break EU/Swedish law (It was a youtube video worth watching) Minecraft bedrock is having some incredibly shitty tactics to move people towards their marketplace while community calling it bugrock I don't think that many people who play Minecraft really appreciate Mojang being bought by Microsoft. Many are oblivious to the fact sure…

I assume you're referring to Kian Brose v. Mojang? [0] A class action, where the EULA was updated without full consent being sought correctly. [0] https://tribune.com.pk/story/2567759/minecraft-faces-a-class...

Yes, relevant video part1 : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5RvoPQZQeM (Suing Minecraft Because They Broke The Law & Pissed Me Off)

part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_UF_4gZclI (Mojang screwed us, now we're suing them)

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