The latest mass layoff at Xbox will see roughly 3,200 people lose their jobs—1,600 today, and 1,600 more over the next fiscal year—and four game studios turned loose into the forest: Compulsion and Double Fine as independents, Ninja Theory and Undead Labs under new ownership. It’s bad no matter how you look at it, a reflection of flailing leadership at Microsoft and a dreadful state of affairs for the game industry as a whole.
The bloodletting has inspired a range of reactions across the internet—and yes, there is a small subset of the gaming population celebrating what it sees as a victory of ‘real gamers’ over some imaginary ideology that holds too many game studios in its grasp.
For the most part, though, the responses are shocked, sorrowful, angry, and even among those who insist these cuts were necessary, filled with regret.
Griffin DeClaire, who was laid off from Bethesda Game Studios today, said the cut came as a complete surprise because he was just told he’d be getting a raise. “I really don’t know what my next steps are,” DeClaire wrote on LinkedIn.