Video game studios have been laying off workers for several months, the trend is not going to be reversed and the larger the companies, the higher the figures. Microsoft thus laid off 1,900 employees at the start of the yeara few months after having bought Activision-Blizzard-King.
In an interview with Polygon, the person responsible for XboxPhil Spencer, returned to this landmark decisiontrying to explain the reasons that push studios to lay off en masse in recent months:
I will say that what concerns me most for the industry is the lack of growth. And when you have an industry that’s expected to be smaller next year in terms of players and dollars, and you have a lot of publicly traded companies that are in that industry that need to show their investors growth – because otherwise, why does anyone own a share of the stock if it’s not going to grow? – the aspect of the business which is then scrutinized is the cost aspect. Because if you don’t increase revenue, then the cost aspect comes into question.
We are a business. I have said it many times. I don’t have the luxury of not having to run a profitable and growing business within Microsoft. And we are today. But… I think about my friends in the industry who have been displaced and lost their jobs and how simply, I don’t want this industry to be a place where people can’t, with confidence, build a career . That’s why I keep coming back to the question: how is this industry getting back to growth?
The video game industry experienced enormous growth in 2020, notably thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic and the confinements, the figures were very good then, which is no longer the case today, while inflation continues to rise and that households prioritize more useful spending before spending money on consoles and video games. The cost of producing games is only increasingshareholders want results and ask the studios to find money, this involves layoffs.
Phil Spencer does not provide an answer to his question regarding the return to growth, but he is certain that the industry will recover, while being concerned about the human impact that these painful layoffs will have in the future. Concerning Xboxthe manufacturer detailed its strategy for the future, including game ports first party on competing consoles.
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Read also: Xbox: Microsoft consoles soon to be shunned by third-party publishers?
| Clint008 Editor – Tester |
