What impact have layoffs had on the games industry over the past two years?

gamesindustry.biz:

Mass layoffs have been the defining theme of the past two years — and they're not over yet. The industry is still feeling the effects of this crisis, even though many players are starting to see signs of stabilization.

Let's take a closer look at the layoffs of 2023-2024 in Europe to understand who was hit the hardest, how long it took professionals to find new jobs, and how their incomes and working conditions were impacted.

Our main source of data is the Big Games Industry Employment Survey 2024, conducted in Spring 2024 and presented at the Devcom conference in August 2024. GamesIndustry.biz previously covered a talk by Tanja Loktionova, one of the survey's organizers, where she shared its initial findings. Now, the full report is available for free on the InGame Job portal.

In this article, we'll dig deeper into the wave of mass layoffs in the industry, which was a key focus of the Big Games Industry Employment Survey 2024.

Let's recap: the anonymous survey gathered over 1,800 responses from game industry professionals. The majority were mid-level or higher specialists (9% Junior, 29% Middle, 30% Senior, 28% Lead/Top).

Additionally, 19% of respondents had over ten years of experience in games. In short, these were mostly seasoned professionals who might have been expected to be safe from layoffs.

However, even among them, some were affected: 15% reported being laid off in 2023-2024 but had already found new jobs by the time of the survey. Another 6.2% said they were laid off and remained unemployed at the time of the survey.

Altogether, 21.6% of respondents reported experiencing layoffs. So, who are these professionals who found themselves out of work?

When it comes to seniority levels, the survey shows that layoffs impacted professionals across the board, regardless of expertise. Between 23% and 26% of juniors, mid-levels, and seniors reported being laid off. At the Lead/Top level, the percentage was slightly lower, at 15-16%.

However, the recovery process varied by