Regardless of the field you work in, there will be times when you are “riding high” and feel like nothing can bring you down. Then, there are the times when you are laid low so badly that you wonder if you’ll ever feel good again. We’ve all had those kinds of days. When you think about the gaming industry, you tend to picture it as a place where “everyone is having fun” as they make incredible titles. When it’s firing on all cylinders, it can give off that impression. However, as Xbox showed both yesterday and earlier in the year, it can also cut the legs out from under you without much warning.
Microsoft laid off 650 people yesterday, and while Phil Spencer tried to pass it off as something that “wouldn’t affect game development or other projects,” it still was felt across the industry. After all, that’s not a small number from any standpoint. Even if they were “redundancies” from the Activision Blizzard merger, which already claimed 1900 jobs earlier in the year, that doesn’t justify what’s happening within the company.
As such, Tech4Gamers notes that the company’s employees’ morale is “very low.” That apparently comes from Tom Warren, who helped write about the layoffs yesterday when they were first announced. They went on to further note that there was serious “confusion” about the company’s future. While that might sound odd, when you think about everything that’s been happening with Microsoft and its gaming division in recent months, can you blame them?
Let’s start with the obvious: the company’s console sales are middling at best. They haven’t even made it to the number for their last console and are getting crushed by the PS5 and the Nintendo Switch. Now let’s go to games. Earlier in the year, Microsoft went from having lots of exclusives to giving some of them away to PlayStation and Nintendo, and then most recently, they revealed the upcoming title starring Indiana Jones will have a PS5 release in 2025! That was supposed to be one of its “big games,” and now it’s only a timed exclusive.
Just as bad, reports are saying that the Xbox Game Pass numbers are “stagnant” and that they’re relying on a big upcoming “Day One” title on the service to help save it, but that’s a huge risk!
When you add all that to the ongoing layoffs, the shutdowns of certain studios, and other issues, you can see why people are nervous about being there right now.
