Epic Games Is Laying Off Nearly 900 Employees
thegamer.comEpic Games, the developers of Fortnite and Unreal Engine, is reportedly laying off nearly 900 employees, which accounts for around 16 percent of its entire workforce.
2023 has been one of the most brutal years in the gaming industry for layoffs, with publishers and developers getting rid of employees left right and centre throughout the year. Between Unity, EA, Microsoft, and Sega, just to name a few of the big players, thousands of workers in the gaming industry have found themselves without a job, and it looks like the slew of layoffs isn't slowing down any time soon.
Related: 2023 Has Been A Horrible Year For Gaming
As reported by Bloomberg, the latest gaming industry giant to cut a bunch of its workers is Epic Games, the massive studio behind Fortnite and Unreal Engine. According to Jason Schreier's report, the layoffs will affect 870 employees, which is around 16 percent of Epic Games' workforce. Those hit by the layoffs will receive six months of severance pay and health insurance, as well as accelerated stock vesting.
These huge cuts were announced to the team in a staff memo from Tim Sweeney, Epic Games' CEO, which was obtained and shared by Insider Gaming following the news of the layoffs. In the memo, Sweeney says that the company will be divesting Bandcamp, which it bought at the start of 2022, and "spinning off" most of SuperAwesome, a parental consent management toolkit that Epic aimed to use to "build a wide range of kid-safe services".
"For a while now, we’ve been spending way more money than we earn, investing in the next evolution of Epic and growing Fortnite as a metaverse-inspired ecosystem for creators," Sweeney says in the memo. "I had long been optimistic that we could power through this
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