If Marvel Rivals Can't Escape Layoffs, Who Can?

There are a couple of justifications that we often hear when layoffs happen at a game studio. In ’s case earlier this year, 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:the studio needed to restructure as production on the newest Mass Effect was in the very early stages and didn’t require as big a team. In other cases, like the closure of 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Ubisoft Leamington, it’s about ensuring “long-term stability”. Sometimes, there’s no reason given, like 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:with Star Citizen.

Generally, the underlying cause is just that a game just isn’t making enough money, and the longevity of a studio can often hinge on a single project making the big bucks. But developer NetEase has just 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:laid🦄 off several members of its team in Seattle, and as far as we kn๊ow, none of the above reasons apply.

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In fact, Marvel Rivals is one of the most successful games to come out of 2024, in a time where live-service games are almost automatically doomed to fail. That’s not an exaggeration. We’ve seen countless live-services launch and quickly collapse in the last few years – , , , and , just to name a few. Entire teams have lost their jobs because these games failed – we even saw 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:Arkane Austin completely shut down.

If NetEase Isn’t Spared, What Will Be?

But against the odds, Marvel Rivals didn’t just survive, it thrived. It didn’t just have 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:a huge launch, but managed to 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:hold on ꦡto an impressive number of those players after the fact. It’s unclear just how much money the game has made, but ꦗsafe to say the game isn’t suffering by any means. And despite this roaring success, developers are still being laid off.

To be clear, we don’t know the reason behind these layoffs, nor do we know the exact scope of them or the teams affected. We do know that at least one team based in Seattle, Washington, which focused on level design, gameplay mechanics, and more, has ♏been laid off.

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Bungie cinematic director John Ebenger he’s heard that the company is pulling all investments out of North America 💜given the current political climate – we recently saw the Chinese-owned TikTok briefly banned in the United States, which might indicate precarity for Chinese companies operating in the country. Perhaps the decision was more about politics than economics in this case. Either way, it’s a sad state of affairs.

We don’t know how true this is – NetEase hasn’t released an official statement, and the developers who wer💯e laid off didn’t state if the company gave them a reason. A more cynical read would be that this was the plan all along: get the game off the ground, then cut the team down to a skeleton crew who can keep the content coming while making the game look more profitable. Considering we don’t know yet if other teams, inside or outside the US have been impacted by layoffs, I’m hesitant to say definitively one way or the other.

Either way, I feel bad for the developers who somehow have to churn out season afte🔯r season of content with less support. And if nothing else, this reinforces the false notion that 𓆏developers are disposable, a tool to reach success with and then toss out. Even a successful game won’t guarantee devs job security, so what will?

Even Players Are Mad About The Layoffs

Layoffs are always hard on developers, but it turns out that players are becoming increasi𒐪ngly sensitive to the impact of these job losses as well. On Steam, a scroll through recent reviews will reveal a surprising number of negative comments, largely centered on the layoff of the Seattle team.

One , “I can’t support this game after what they did to their dev team.” , with a recorded playtime of over 100 hours, says, “Entire design team and Lead dev fired because... *checks notes* They made to [sic] much money. Stop playing until they get their jobs back. Let them know!” Yet another , “Congrats to the Suits running Netease on vaporising all good will I had before I could spend൩ any money. 10/10, Long live the indie devs.”

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I have to say, it’s beautiful to see players using negative Steam reviews for good 168澳洲幸运5开奖网:instead of evil for once. Will it have any impact? Prob🐓ably not – recent reviews are still sitt🦋ing comfortably at a Mostly Positive rating as I write this, and it’s not likely that NetEase is going to give developers back their jobs just because of a couple of bad reviews on Steam.

Layoffs are, unfortunately, a fixture oꦜf working in game development – nobody’s job is safe, not even if you make a hit game that makes a vulgar amount of money. But at least it’s nice to see that players care en🎀ough to say something about it, even if it’s just because NetEase’s layoffs are uniquely confounding.