Over 50% of video game layoffs have been in California, says Game Changers award recipient

The games industry has been wracked by layoffs in the last few years, but over half of all layoffs have been in California, with North America overall the worst hit region.

That’s according to Amir Satvat, who spoke to The Game Business on the topic. Satvar was the first recipient of the Game Changers award at The Game Awards 2024 for his work assisting laid-off employees across the industry.

“Over 70 percent, and in some years 75 percent, of the layoffs have been in North America,” said Satvat. “North America used to have 30 percent, 35 percent, 40 percent of the open roles, and that number is now down to 25 percent.”

Globally, employment in the games industry has increased since before the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, though that depends on region. While Asia has seen an increase in jobs, North America has seen its workforce in AAA studios cut by 15 to 20 percent.

“And here’s another stat,” added Satvat, “over 50 percent of the cuts globally have been in California. California AAA is like the epicentre of the difficulty.

“There is opportunity, but it may be that if you want to stay in the industry, being open to going to some of these places like China, like Japan, not forever, but for some amount of time, that’s going to become a larger part of the equation.”

The most high profile layoffs recently were from Microsoft back in June, which included the cancellation of Perfect Dark from the California-based The Initiative, though developers were affected on both sides of the pond.

So far this year, an estimated 4400 people have been laid off globally in the games industry.

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