Industry closures and downsizing thread.

[Steelmaker]

Someone claiming to be an insider is saying the people who were recently laid off who were part of Sony's Visual Arts team was a direct result of A.I. taking those jobs. I'm afraid that unless governments step in with regulations restricting the use of A.I., we are going to be seeing more and more of this happening, not just in game development but in a LOT of industries. Hell, I worry about it in my own line of work. Basically if you are part of any kind of office "laptop" industry, involving data entry, accounting, reporting and analysis work, etc. You might want to start looking at alternative careers. Because in, I would say 3-5 years time, A.I. is going to be doing all of those jobs!

[NARMAK]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

Someone claiming to be an insider is saying the people who were recently laid off who were part of Sony's Visual Arts team was a direct result of A.I. taking those jobs. I'm afraid that unless governments step in with regulations restricting the use of A.I., we are going to be seeing more and more of this happening, not just in game development but in a LOT of industries. Hell, I worry about it in my own line of work. Basically if you are part of any kind of office "laptop" industry, involving data entry, accounting, reporting and analysis work, etc. You might want to start looking at alternative careers. Because in, I would say 3-5 years time, A.I. is going to be doing all of those jobs!

It's getting to be "funny" how many studios from AAA level have recently been caught using AI for even marketing and other images and until they couldn't ignore the deafening call outs, feebly admitted a BS "apology" and the truth is a LOT of these companies training their AI models have pretty much done so using the very same methods that would be considered illegal such as torrents of ebooks, movies etc. Or even scraping many APIs on the Internet for training data and so on.

Although i truly want to be an optimist and believe that all these things after teething problems could be used for good of the majority. History has consistently shown otherwise and that its all about greedy minorities hoarding more just because they can.

So a part of me does want to see the anarchy this can cause on the other side of the coin. Let AI ravage all the job markets. Make robots who basically do everything and create other robots who maintain and just make it a completely closed loop. Now, once we get this "closed loop" where AI does everything and humans have nothing. Who are corporations going to sell to when nobody can earn a dime to buy anything. Seems like they're cresting an Ouroboros Snake for themselves.

Human civilisation has become a little too domesticated over recent years imo to where governments aren't actually stepping in to protect people as they should. It's about who puts the dollars on their pockets.

[dyne]

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/eidos...850543616-TzUD

Eidos-Montréal: "Today, we informed our studio staff that we are going to let go up to 75 valuable members, as one of our mandates is coming to an end."


Pretty sure they were announced as doing contract work on the new Fable title.

[heyadol]

Originally Posted by dyne

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/eidos...850543616-TzUD

Eidos-Montréal: "Today, we informed our studio staff that we are going to let go up to 75 valuable members, as one of our mandates is coming to an end."


Pretty sure they were announced as doing contract work on the new Fable title.

Aren’t they also working with The Initiative on Perfect Dark?

[dyne]

Originally Posted by heyadol

Aren’t they also working with The Initiative on Perfect Dark?

Yup

[Zivouhr]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

Someone claiming to be an insider is saying the people who were recently laid off who were part of Sony's Visual Arts team was a direct result of A.I. taking those jobs. I'm afraid that unless governments step in with regulations restricting the use of A.I., we are going to be seeing more and more of this happening, not just in game development but in a LOT of industries. Hell, I worry about it in my own line of work. Basically if you are part of any kind of office "laptop" industry, involving data entry, accounting, reporting and analysis work, etc. You might want to start looking at alternative careers. Because in, I would say 3-5 years time, A.I. is going to be doing all of those jobs!

That could be true. Jobs where you really have to make more crucial judgment calls on different situations that can really affect the customer tend to be more safe I'll say, when an AI computer might make a lot of mistakes in those situations. But automated tasks, just punching in data, that can easily be done by a computer instead.

Factory jobs, I wonder if robots are cheaper in the long term than workers and their health insurance costs? I think some robots are working alongside factory people, but it's a sign of things changing.

On topic of AI Gaming development, I think AI could probably make it easier to develop games soon for smaller teams, allowing them more time to focus on better gameplay and story is the hope.

[dyne]

https://www.ign.com/articles/ea-cuts...100-at-respawn

EA Cuts Around 300 Roles, Including Roughly 100 at Respawn.

"wider cuts largely impacted EA's Experiences team, which includes groups such as EA's Fan Care team and various others working on customer support and marketing

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...uverify%20wall

One of the cancelled Respawn projects is a Titanfall game code-named R7 (extraction shooter).

[NARMAK]

Originally Posted by dyne

https://www.ign.com/articles/ea-cuts...100-at-respawn



https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...uverify%20wall

One of the cancelled Respawn projects is a Titanfall game code-named R7 (extraction shooter).

That's pretty annoying tbh. Titanfall hasn't quite hit the big recognition it probably could have got but i've always wanted more in that game world and the last game was quite a long while ago.

It sucks they couldn't keep it alive even if it had to come out down the line.

[Nunab18]

Originally Posted by NARMAK

That's pretty annoying tbh. Titanfall hasn't quite hit the big recognition it probably could have got but i've always wanted more in that game world and the last game was quite a long while ago.

It sucks they couldn't keep it alive even if it had to come out down the line.

And EA didn't do Respawn any favors when they launched Titanfall 2 in a timespan where Battlefield 1 came out the prior week and Call of Duty Infinite Warfare came out the week after...

[dyne]

https://www.ea.com/games/ea-sports-w...lopment-update

Codemasters WRC Team pausing development plans on future rally titles. No more content planned for EA SPORTS WRC.

[Zivouhr]

Codemasters, I haven't heard a new game from them in awhile.
They started way back in the NES days with the MicroMachines racing games.

Most of these AAA developers though, suffer from bloat. Too many employees, not enough income to sustain the overhead costs. Probably from the goal of wanting every new game to be a billion dollar maker, instead of working on smaller games every 2 years. Instead, 1 game every 5 to 7 years costs many millions.

Arm you glad to see me, Atlas? | Boston Dynamics - YouTube

Boston Dynamics makes amazing, agile robots, but now is prepared to mass produce them for replacing Factory workers. Will AI soon replace game development staff?

If the game is good, does it matter? To the workers it will, yes. I think indie developers will survive through the competition of AI made games from those who don't know how to program or make video games but have creativity. Still in the early days though.

[dyne]

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/20...hit-by-layoffs

A handful of staff at UK-based studio Playtonic, best known for creating Yooka-Laylee and for forming the indie publishing label Playtonic Friends, are sharing messages on social media as they have been made "redundant" at the developer.

We were first alerted to the news by a Bluesky post from former community manager Steve James, who left the company just two weeks ago (on his own terms).

"Should be a week of happiness and positivity for me but instead I’m sad, angry and concerned for my former colleagues." Steve says "Many talented folks are “at risk” of redundancy at Playtonic, if you see them posting for jobs, please help them out."

On LinkedIn, Steve along with current brand manager at Playtonic Anni Valkama have been sharing posts from former colleagues who are now looking for work.

These include Junior VFX Artist Joupin Ahmed and Assistant Producer Mae Davidson. Alongside them, UI Artists James Feakins is "at risk of redundancy". We hope those affected land on their feet and wish them the best.

Playtonic Friends is just lining up to release Castle Pixel's Cattle Country, a Western life/farm sim. On the main dev side, it's also working on a remake of its very first game, titled Yooka-Replaylee, which is coming to Switch 2.

[dyne]

https://www.ign.com/articles/ea-canc...ffhanger-games

IGN: EA Cancels Black Panther Game, Closes Cliffhanger Studios

"Miele said that these changes, alongside other recent cancellations and layoffs, are being done to "sharpen our focus and put our creative energy behind the most significant growth opportunities.""

[NARMAK]

Originally Posted by dyne

https://www.ign.com/articles/ea-canc...ffhanger-games

IGN: EA Cancels Black Panther Game, Closes Cliffhanger Studios

"Miele said that these changes, alongside other recent cancellations and layoffs, are being done to "sharpen our focus and put our creative energy behind the most significant growth opportunities.""

Just to clarify this isn't the same game as the one Amy Hening is making with Captain America.

It is a shame though because i actually loved the idea of a Black Panther game with an open world Wakanda to explore with dynamic content available from what i read.

Mainly though i'm sick of seeing all these people losing their livelihoods and having their families left on such a precarious position.

[Modren]

I would argue that an executive who can't figure out how to make a profitable game based on a popular superhero whose two movies have made over two billion dollars is bad at his job and should be fired. But he'll probably get a $30 million pay bump instead. Late stage capitalism, baby.

[dyne]

Originally Posted by NARMAK

Just to clarify this isn't the same game as the one Amy Hening is making with Captain America.

It is a shame though because i actually loved the idea of a Black Panther game with an open world Wakanda to explore with dynamic content available from what i read.

Mainly though i'm sick of seeing all these people losing their livelihoods and having their families left on such a precarious position.

Not sure why that would need clarification as EA has nothing to do with that title. Plaion is publishing. And it’s named Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra. And it’s made by Skydance, not Cliffhanger.

[NARMAK]

Originally Posted by dyne

Not sure why that would need clarification as EA has nothing to do with that title. Plaion is publishing. And it’s named Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra. And it’s made by Skydance, not Cliffhanger.

It's because some people don't pay attention and might have confused the two titles tbh. Not going to lie, almost thought the same thing at first glance.

[heyadol]

Originally Posted by dyne

Not sure why that would need clarification as EA has nothing to do with that title. Plaion is publishing. And it’s named Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra. And it’s made by Skydance, not Cliffhanger.

Maybe someone here confused the (canceled) Untitled Black Panther Game with (delayed) Untitled Marvel Game.

[Zivouhr]

EA dumping the Black Panther game team, not a smart move IMO. I would have been interested to see that game.

[Nunab18]

Originally Posted by NARMAK

It's because some people don't pay attention and might have confused the two titles tbh. Not going to lie, almost thought the same thing at first glance.

Yup, I've seen plenty of people confusing the two when this news came up.