Times are tough all around, but the video game industry has been hit pretty hard this year. Anyone who’s been keeping an eye on the news will have seen the amount of layoffs and closures that have happened. Numbers estimate that around 9,000 jobs have been lost in 2023.
That’s according to Game Industry Layoffs (as spotted by VGC), a website that’s been tracking the figures since January. The most recent entry as of the time of publication is for December 8, revealing that indie developer Triple Topping Games lost around 10 employees.
Unity saw the most losses, with three entries on the list totaling 1,165 job losses; a significant chunk of the ~9,000 being shown. Looking at the list really hammers home just how bad things have been this year, with some notable names cropping up multiple times.
[Shakes fist at Embracer Group]
The website will no doubt be updating its information soon, given that The Day Before studio has just announced it’s closing for good. Given the unanimous negative feedback of its long-awaited post-apocalyptic game, some may not be too sorry to see the developer go.
However, for the most part, it’s been sad to see so many people in the video game industry lose their jobs. Very recently, it was confirmed that Embracer was closing down TimeSplitters studio Free Radical Design. As a result, fans are left certain that the dormant FPS series will no longer be getting a revival.
With AAA and independent companies seeing losses in 2023, it feels like an uncertain time to be a developer. The fact that layoffs have affected the likes of Twitch shows that even those not directly involved in video game production aren’t safe.
