Unity, one of the pillars of video game development alongside the Unreal Engine, seems to be navigating troubled waters. Despite its fame, the company behind this graphics engine faces a series of challenges.
Unity, known for its eponymous game engine, is apparently going through a difficult time. To the point that the stability of employment for some of its employees is called into question. This situation follows the controversial attempt to introduce execution fees. Although this is not the main root of the company’s current problems.
Unity in the storm
According to The Verge, which is based on Unity’s third quarter financial report, the company is considering layoffs to improve its profitability. A tightening of the workforce is planned for the following fiscal quarter. And a reduction in office space is also on the agenda, which could result in the closure of certain international sites. Unity plans to make these cuts by the end of the first fiscal quarter of fiscal year 2024.
Despite a third quarter reaching revenue targets, Unity considers its financial performance insufficient and says it is capable of “doing better”. With this in mind, changes will be applied to further boost its income.
If Unity carries out these layoffs, it will follow the trend of several big names in the sector. Such as Telltale Games, Naughty Dog or Bungie, who have already reduced their teams over the past year. These actions have led to more than 6,000 layoffs in the video game industry in 2023. Take-Two, the publisher of GTA 6, recently blamed the mass layoffs on “craze during the pandemic.”
Already under fire from critics
Furthermore, the company has come under heavy criticism for its ‘fulfillment fee’ project aimed at imposing costs on developers each time users install their game. Faced with the revolt of developers, some having sworn to abandon the Unity engine, the company apologized. Obviously under these conditions, the image and confidence in Unity have been seriously damaged.
Unity Technologies, founded in 2004 in Denmark, revolutionized video game development with its Unity engine, launched in 2005, which helped democratize game creation by making the technology more accessible to independent developers. Unity then expanded rapidly, firmly establishing itself as a direct competitor to Epic Games’ Unreal Engine. It’s very simple, just take a look at Steam to see the many projects. It’s simply huge.