Following a Bloomberg report, Epic Games has confirmed that it will be laying off around 16% of its workforce; or some 830 employees.

"For a while now, we've been spending way more money than we earn, investing in the next evolution of Epic and growing Fortnite as a metaverse-inspired ecosystem for creators," Tim Sweeney said in an email to Epic employees. "I had long been optimistic that we could power through this transition without layoffs, but in retrospect I see that this was unrealistic."

Sweeney also mentioned that Epic is looking to sell the independent music storefront Bandcamp and spinning off SuperAwesome, a branch that specializes in creating safe online experiences for children.

SOURCE

 

[lordofcombo]

I guess Tim sweeney's math is not mathing.gonna cut him some slack,he's a very nice man and a philantrophist.

 

[tech3475]

So does this mean no more free games and paid exclusivity?

 

[lordofcombo]

I didn't even know epic had thousands of employees.thought they were max 200 employees.

 

[Bladexdsl]

awwww their shitty fortnite micro transaction sales from TWEENS must be dropping

 

[Spring_Spring]

Why did they buy bandcamp anyway. So useless.

 

[Phearoz]

Holy shit! 830 employees is 16%???

 

[whitesword7]

I mean its either this or they need to charge more from unreal engine.

seeing people reaction to the unity fiasco, I’m pretty sure the unreal engine game dev prefer this outcome instead.

this is of course pretty sad that people lose their job, but the reality is money doesn’t grow on trees

 

[The Catboy]

Turns out having your entire business model be, “fuck Steam,” isn’t very sustainable

 

[boot3]

Why did they buy bandcamp anyway. So useless.

Most bizarre crossover of all time honestly.

 

[Kwyjor]

I never even heard about the acquisition of Bandcamp. (I had some weird idea that was owned by Apple..? Maybe I was getting it confused with Garageband.)

Epic Games has confirmed that it will be laying off around 16% of its workforce

I've seen a lot of reference to the layoffs, but this is the first time I've seen someone note that it was 16% of the workforce. Hooray for context!

I saw a rather thoughtful analysis noting that the last few years (with the pandemic and so on) were big boom times for the industry and a offered a big chance to expand, and that this is just the ordinary contraction of the market.

 

[DKB]

(I had some weird idea that was owned by Apple..? Maybe I was getting it confused with Garageband.)

lol I was thinking the same thing.

 

[AkiraKurusu]

Good - get fucked, Epic. You're no GOG or Steam, when it comes to your shitty storefront, and I exclusivity-purchasing is damn-near unforgivable.
Plus, what do your game devs even do apart from working on that childish Fortnite battle royale? Are they working on anything actually worthwhile?

 

[Jayinem]

Do the 16% include people designing games or janitors?

Post automatically merged: Sep 30, 2023

Good - get fucked, Epic. You're no GOG or Steam, when it comes to your shitty storefront, and I exclusivity-purchasing is damn-near unforgivable.
Plus, what do your game devs even do apart from working on that childish Fortnite battle royale? Are they working on anything actually worthwhile?

Why is there always hostility towards Epic every time they're even mentioned? What did they do? (I'm sure it's something I Just didn't hear about)

 

[GengarsGhostlyGiggles]

holy shit, is that corporate memo basically saying we've reached peak media being passed around legit ?!
Unreal's layoffs, Unity's weird revenue schemes, Netflix's 1 million usd Ai consultant job, the hollywood writers strike , etc

 

[Flame]

Maybe less free games. More pay your staff?

 

[Xzi]

Somehow I doubt it's coincidence this happened right after Epic was ordered to pay out for fraudulent Fortnite charges. God forbid the dumbasses at the top who were responsible for those decisions take a pay cut, nah let's just fire all of Mediatonic instead.

Maybe this will have devs re-thinking Epic buyouts in the future. Such a shit company.

 

[GengarsGhostlyGiggles]

Somehow I doubt it's coincidence this happened right after Epic was ordered to pay out for fraudulent Fortnite charges. God forbid the dumbasses at the top who were responsible for those decisions take a pay cut, nah let's just fire all of Mediatonic instead.

Maybe this will have devs re-thinking Epic buyouts in the future. Such a shit company.

seriously, game devs should also be switching from unity AND unreal to open source engines asap

 

[Plstic]

I hope bandcamp goes to somebody good or they can buy themselves from underneath them

 

[tech3475]

Why is there always hostility towards Epic every time they're even mentioned? What did they do? (I'm sure it's something I Just didn't hear about)

At least some of it likely stems from their use of third party exclusivity, in particular they did paid exclusivity for stuff already announced for Steam whilst they were lacking rather basic features by modern standards like a shopping cart, cloud saves, etc.

Had they just launched EGS with the free games, regular discounts and slowly built up the service there would IMO probably be allot less hostility towards them.