this post was submitted on 25 Jan 2024
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Yeah, I'm a bit skeptical that this is just about "downsizing" or eliminating redundant positions after the acquisition. Based on what I've seen on Twitter, a lot of junior, middle, and senior level positions were victims of these cuts, across a ton of different departments. Animators, artists, developers, no one was safe. Apparently like the entire Overwatch lore team was cut - you can't tell me that team has any overlap whatsoever with any existing Microsoft employees.
That gets into the mess of what the reality of "gaming" is. Most people will acknowledge that Call of Duty and... uhm... Halo? Sure, let's go with that. CoD and Halo compete. They are both games in a similar genre. Same with the hilarity of Horizon Zero Dawn meaning that a critically acclaimed open world game is coming out.
But the reality is that CoD and Fortnite compete with Squid Game and Reacher. Breath of the Wild competes with both Elden Ring AND The World Cup. The resource is increasingly time. When people get home from work they generally aren't saying "I am going to play three hours of video games and it will either be Battlebit or CoD". They are saying "I have three hours so maybe I'll watch an episode or two of Demon Slayer or I could do my dailies in Fifa?"
And, in that regard, Overwatch is an increasingly "failed" live service game with an IP that has lots almost all of its good will. Whereas Halo... Master Chief had a sweet ass? But Overwatch DOES compete with the other big live game that MS acquired alongside them... Call of Duty. And so forth.
Its all a giant mess where labor suffers. But... yeah.