Do you know where the game devs were laid off? I know some folks at Beenox.
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Kotaku: Activision Blizzard begins massive layoffs (Offering "Comprehensive Severance Packages" to affected)
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Yeah, they're spiraling down. I wouldn't be surprised if a Battle Royale mode is introduced.
Activision in a nutshell:
"We're making record profits, so we're laying everyone off"
"Destiny blew away sales records, but didn't meet our expectations so we let Bungie go"
I feel bad for From Software getting into business with them.
"We're making record profits, so we're laying everyone off"
"Destiny blew away sales records, but didn't meet our expectations so we let Bungie go"
I feel bad for From Software getting into business with them.
I've heard of other stories like this of japanese executives. A great thing to see.
The company needed to rapidly expand a team and did not necessarily hold new FTE hires for that team to the same high standard as the company had historically followed, in order to ramp up quickly.
At some point during this expansion, they realized internally ramping up this team with FTEs they had lowered the bar for would not work, and decided to enter into an engagement with a vendor that could help them with work that didn't need to be fulfilled by FTEs.
By then a bunch of FTEs that would not usually fulfill the usual rigor for the roles they were hired for were on the team, and a couple of years later still could not meet the company's performance standards for FTEs, so there was a mass layoff and these people were let go. It was about 25 people, 50% of the team, and ~10% of the company overall.
It was a unique situation that did not have much in common with this one.
someone in this very thread was scaremongering about iran completely unprompted. the brain worms capitalism give people are so powerful
I'm sure it's a one off negotiated contract. I don't think anyone at From is actually employed by Activision. If anything its just them getting some huge distribution support from one of the biggest publishers in the world. I think they'll be fine.
Only if you happen to be in a cut big enough the company has to legally report it so press gets out.
Sadly smaller layoffs happen all the time and don't get the same treatment. You have to then rely on your network to help.
I've been a part of both types.
Neither is great but It feels better to not be alone and make fast contacts even though those are not garunteed.
That is pennies when trying to live in such a high cost of living area like CA. All the states are horrible at the cutoff maximum benefits. It's sometimes worst than minimum wage.
Maybe you shouldn't troll in a thread about people losing their jobs. Show some common decency.
Unemployment is horrible. When I went through it in Seattle it covered maybe 1/3rd of my expenses.
In CA the cost of living is higher and the unemployment is lower.
Its also based on what you make so if you're not bringing in decent cash in the first place you won't even get max benefits and the benefits in no way are large enough relative to the amount of money made to earn them.
I'm still bewildered by people who defend capitalism. It's a system that has failed spectacularly multiple times within the past 100 years (and continues to do so), across multiple countries on multiple continents, leading to millions upon millions of deaths and untold amounts of suffering.
I'm pretty sure other systems have had similar failures.
Maybe the problem isn't the systems.
I'm also pretty sure I know what the definition of insanity is.
You know, you might want to use a video game publisher for your whataboutisms.
In California, any layoff of 50 or more people requires 60 days advance notice, and the company can be forced to pay up to 60 days wages for the people who weren't given notice. Which means, at least in California, the people laid off likely got two months' of severance pay and health benefits. So there is that. On the other hand, last time I was looking for a job in a widely needed role, it still took me four months to go through the whole process. And I know that not everyone who was laid off from Activision-Blizzard were living in California (Federal requirements aren't as strict, they only kick in if 33% of the company is laid off, or 500 people from one site).
Well, they're not wrong. The issue of greed and expliotation are older than revenue projections.
You know, you had a decent thing going here before you inexplicably decided that full price rereleases and not putting games on sale deserve to be in the same list as glorifying excessive crunch.
yes, and even marx acknowledged that capitalism was a step forward from feudalism. so what?
people will use literally any deflection they can to avoid examining the problems with the system, I think we're close to the full deck in this thread between "that's just how the system works" "old systems were bad too" and "well [other system] scary". i haven't even professed an affinity for any specific other system in capitalism's stead and people are battening down the hatches like they're in danger of being dragged to the gulag, lol. faith in this clearly very bad system runs deep
Fair....I did not mean to equate them, only to point out a problem.
Not really the thread for explaining the issue with economies of scale and capital. Though the historical ones should be obvious.
I'm not deflecting, but, thank you for clarifying. As to faith in the system, its the current way that people get food on their plate (at least the visible way, even though the US captalist economy is very much a mixed economy in reality), so yes, people go with the gut. Again, a lot of successful people are on Era, with the means for free time on a forum/playing games and buying expensive gaming equipment.
Ok. Have you read my other posts or just the last page while firing off?
The basic point I was mostly trying to make is the systems themselves are all fallible. Nearly any system is fallible. When you have the collective power of the elite looking to exploit any system it will fail.
On a side note ITT a lot of folks who probably manage savings the size of their wallets thinking they know how to manage the wealth of 7b companies and sovereign nations.
On a side note ITT a lot of folks who probably manage savings the size of their wallets thinking they know how to manage the wealth of 7b companies and sovereign nations.
Right so why would you want to keep working when you know you're toast? I'd rather collect my unemployment and work on finding a new job. What's the benefit of wasting more time at a place that is cutting you loose?
"And to celebrate, we're paying our CEO and CFO tens of millions of dollars".
The power to sell junk as it were is very powerful, even China has had to accede to that idea.
I don't normally make people's post histories my concern (I'd feel like some sort of weird inquisitor if I went and looked at a person's post history every time I replied to someone). Is there something you want me to be concerned about that wasn't mentioned?
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I think back on Iwata taking the brunt of Nintendo's failings on his own shoulders, and I remember for a fleeting moment, i remember how nice it was to believe in respecting your employees. Kotick and every member of Activision's upper management is a fucking scumbag.
Eat the rich.
Eat the rich.
The problem with this layoff is it won't be as big of a cut to actual development teams; it will be your interns, your customer service etc. Those 800 cut people won't see many land on their feet, most will end up shifting to other sectors.
To all affected Blizzard developers that may be looking at this thread... Tripwire has open positions and is a great studio to work at. You can review and apply at: https://tripwireinteractive.com/#/careers or send me a PM
Today I got laid-off from Blizzard. Because of immigration laws, I have 60 days to get a job or I will get deported. I was the Product Manager for their College OW Esports program, worked for Loot Crate and have an MBA from USC. PLS RT
Have an American college degree, work at very profitable company, lose job, get deported in two months.
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Yeah, its why I included HOTS and was unspecific to esports. Were WoW/OW/HS/Diablo devs laid off? Their statement said they were re-allocating resources to those
Wait, Overwatch is spiralling down? What's happening to it? Is the player count getting that low?
I just, really hate capitalism. If that makes me some weirdo or edgy asshole or something so be it.
I mean developers throughout the Activision Blizzard, not just those teams. Including full development studios. Remember, this has nothing to do with Blizzard as a game studio, it's Activision-Blizzard that was laying folks off.
I wouldn't be surprised if the playerbase has shrunk, but in terms of viewership and mindshare, it's way down. Other games like Fortnite, PubG, etc overtook the shooter genre. CS:GO is an oddity in how well it stays/