When will it end? According to GamesIndustry.biz, Electronic Arts announced today that it will be laying off approximately 5% of its workforce which equates to around 670 people. In a note sent out to EA staff, CEO Andrew Wilson indicated the move is part of the company “moving away from development of future licensed IP that we do not believe will be successful in our changing industry.”
Another sweeping layoff in our decimated industry
The moves are part of a larger restructuring plan at EA which includes the closing of some offices and sunsetting of several live games. According to GameIndustry.biz, major external IP games based on Black Panther and Iron Man remain in development.
This is the second time in the last year that EA has performed restructuring plans resulting in hundreds of layoffs after EA cut 6% of staff in March 2023.
Literally one day ago, Sony announced it was cutting almost 1,000 jobs by cutting its workforce by 8%.
We’re not even a quarter of the way into 2024 and over 7,000 jobs have been lost in the games industry just these last two months. This is immediately after an equally brutal 2023 where over 10,000 jobs were lost. At this point, we’re looking at an industry that will take years to recover as that amount of jobs will not be created overnight, though they seemingly have been eliminated that quickly.