Fortnite workers who survived yesterday’s mass cull of employees say they’re unable to understand the impression on the sport’s future this yr “and past.”
Yesterday, Epic Video games introduced it was making 1,000 staff members redundant. In a press release, Epic boss Tim Sweeney blamed the job losses on the corporate “spending considerably greater than we’re making” amid a downturn in curiosity in Fortnite — regardless of it remaining one of the crucial fashionable video games on this planet.
Within the hours that adopted, quite a few veteran Epic Video games staff took to social media to verify they had been amongst these impacted. This consists of senior and long-standing members equivalent to design director Christopher Pope, precept engineer Evan Kinney, and lead author Nik Blahunka — all of whom had labored on Fortnite’s gameplay, reside occasions and story for years.
Vitaliy Naymushin, a personality artwork director who designed a few of Fortnite’s earliest characters together with its default mascot Jonesy, was additionally laid off. As was Devin Connors, the long-standing neighborhood supervisor at Rocket League studio Psyonix.
Reflecting on the losses through a publish on social media, Fortnite gameplay producer Robby Williams described yesterday as “a brutal day at Epic” and that “what comes subsequent could be very exhausting and painful” — for these now jobless, but additionally the corporate’s remaining workers who will now push on with out 1,000 of their colleagues.
“Our groups must choose up the items and attempt to preserve shifting ahead,” Williams wrote, “however we can’t even totally perceive what sort of impacts this can have on the sport for the remainder of the yr and sure past.
“I am going to proceed to do my finest to maintain making one of the best recreation for you,” he continued, “and I am assured that my friends really feel the identical, however please be affected person with us as we navigate this powerful time and do our greatest despite these really gut-wrenching losses.”
Yesterday’s layoffs come only a week after the triumphant launch of Fortnite’s long-awaited Chapter 7 Season 2, with the sport’s story and gameplay at a contemporary excessive level following a prolonged wait for brand spanking new content material. But it surely was additionally clear that Epic Video games was not pleased with the monetary efficiency of the sport in latest months — one thing which prompted the corporate to controversially elevate the value of its profitable V-Bucks in-game forex, prompting an enormous backlash from gamers.
“What we now have to do is obvious,” Sweeney stated yesterday in his message to workers, telling them they wanted to “construct superior Fortnite experiences with contemporary seasonal content material, gameplay, story, and reside occasions; speed up developer instruments with better stability and functionality as we evolve from Unreal Engine 5 and UEFN to Unreal Engine 6.”
“We have had challenges delivering constant Fortnite magic with each season,” Sweeney famous, however teased “the following era of Epic with enormous launch plans in direction of the tip of the yr.” Sweeney is ready to carry a city corridor assembly with workers tomorrow, Thursday March 26, to debate subsequent steps.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s Information Editor. You’ll be able to attain Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or discover him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
