Developers’ feelings on the game industry: layoffs crisis, return-to-work mandates, and the recent Unity debacle
The industry-wide layoffs crisis, return-to-work mandates, and the recent Unity debacle are some of the feelings that developers have regarding the situation.
Job insecurity can lead to bigger problems for developers than just finding new work. Developers on work visas face the threat of deportation and losing the lives they’ve built abroad. For others, it keeps them from seeking out jobs with healthier environments: “I feel forced to stay in a toxic environment.”
The industry’s push toward consolidation may offer some solace to smaller studios. According to a developer, making yourself desirable for acquisition is part of an effort to make ends meet at a small company. Financial burdens have some pressures caused by it. 43 percent of developers think consolidation will be a bad thing for the game industry.
Some developers feel that the return-to-office mandates are having a negative impact on the industry as employers are concerned about the Pandemic easing.
Dom Tait, research director at Omdia, GDC’s research partner for the survey, wrote that the current wave of layoffs is coming from employers adjusting spending levels to return to their pre-pandemic levels.
According to Tait, with the forecast return to steady growth to 27th of October, this should present a more stable picture for employment levels in future.
Game Developers are Concerned about the Ethics of Using Artificial Intelligence in their Developments, according to a new State of the Game Industry
Over one-fourth of developers have some kind of mandatory return-to-office policy. 40 percent reported working at aaa studio compared to 16 percent at theindie studios. The survey found that having any kind of mandatory RTO resulted in developer discontent, even though the policies ranged from a full five-day work week to a hybrid schedule.
One anonymous response said that they thought about making their own game engine to not have to worry about shady business practices.
Choice of video game engine software was one of the major topics covered by the survey. Almost 30% of those surveyed use either Unity or Unreal Engine in their development. The survey was conducted at the same time thatUnity announced its disastrous runtime fee policy, angering a number of developers, before walking it back. In light of these events, one-third of surveyed developers said they either have considered switching or have already switched game engine software, with Unity’s pricing model news as one of the primary motivating reasons.
The anonymous person stated that they thought it was a genuine concern to replace someone’s job. It should be used to increase capabilities, not reduce the workforce.
The developer sentiment was broken down according to job type. The majority of respondents thought that AI would benefit their jobs, while those with creative jobs felt that it would hurt their jobs.
Game developers are overwhelmingly concerned about the ethics of using AI. The organizers of the Game Developers Conference (GDC) have released their annual State of the Game Industry survey, in which 84 percent of the 3,000-plus respondents said they were somewhat or very concerned about the ethics of using generative AI.