General Gaming Update: Epic laid off ~50% of Bandcamp's staff amidst its sale to Songtradr

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

The moment everyone started vying for everyone’s time, to monopolize that as much as possible for the sake of pushing post release monetization as their main source of revenue and growth was when a countdown began. There is almost no end to the number of people that can buy 8-20 hour games. But time is a zero sum game and far more finite.  

[SuperSpreader]

30 minutes ago, Spawn_of_Apathy said:

The moment everyone started vying for everyone’s time, to monopolize that as much as possible for the sake of pushing post release monetization as their main source of revenue and growth was when a countdown began. There is almost no end to the number of people that can buy 8-20 hour games. But time is a zero sum game and far more finite.  

 

Right! There's only so many hours of the day and you're competing against time for time with other companies rather than for dollars. 

 

You're a genius.

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

4 hours ago, SuperSpreader said:

 

Right! There's only so many hours of the day and you're competing against time for time with other companies rather than for dollars. 

 

You're a genius.

Only so-so on the last part. It’s an observation many of us have been seeing with live service games for a while now. This idea that only other live service games compete with live service games is a fallacy. Destiny is a prime example. They’ve openly talked about number of players playing, number of hours played, and number of players returning are key performance indicators for them. 
 

and so if that’s the case literally anything you could spend time on other than Destiny is competing with Destiny, because it’s keeping you away from Destiny. Single player games, binging a tv show, dating, picking up an extra shift at work, etc. All of it competes with Destiny, because Bungie wants you to spend as much time as possible playing Destiny. 
 

There’s only so much room for a forever game. A game designed with no end. Even if every live service game was loved, they would cannibalize each other’s player base. People would only be able to spend a couple hours a week in each game this is where Bungie has built Destiny to be frighteningly appealing and affective, but ultimately impossible for most companies. They’re an assembly line of content. Every 3 months there is a new season. Each new season has 7-8 weeks of story. There’s gear to grind. I’m addition to that each season will always have a holiday event that lasts 2-3 weeks (Guardian Games, Solstice of Hero’s, Festival of the Lost, the Dawning). Every 3 weeks Iron Banner comes in with exclusive gear, every weekend there’s Trials with its exclusive gear, there’s either a Raid brought into the game or a Dungeon, and every so often an exotic mission. And there’s the season pass. There is so much to do that if you’re not playing 3-5 days a week you will fall behind or miss stuff. And then annually they have an expansion. 
 

Destiny is both loved and reviled for this. Many people often think they’re bored at some point. Most of the time it’s not boredom, it’s burnout. Between the release schedule of content and the RNG Bungie has developed a system where it’s never ok to take a break. 
 

this is what EVERYONE making a live service game wants. They want every player to want to play every free moment of every day, forever. But most want to do it in the cheapest way possible. Relying 100% on battle passes and making their game so grindy that it takes 10x longer to achieve something you could even 10 years ago.
 

Vanilla Destiny 1 from 2013 would die today in this gaming landscape. It would likely never see a year 2. Because of where Destiny is today gamers don’t have the patience for a game like that to get better. Not one that wants to keep charging you every few months to every year just to feel rewarded. A game like Destiny needs an endgame and needs a steady stream of content or it’s dead on arrival. 
 

So yeah, these games are made to milk a player’s time in hopes they can then milk a player’s wallet. Games are designed around it, earnings projections are scoped around it. And literally everything is the antithesis to that that model. We’re seeing the tipping point. It’s just not sustainable. They’re basically taking the salaries of people to make up for the revenue they’re not making with micro transactions, because they promised investors a certain amount of growth and return. 

[Remarkableriots]

I can't think of any game where previous chunks of the game are removed if you don't constantly keep playing the game like Destiny 2 does.

[crispy4000]

4 hours ago, Spawn_of_Apathy said:

So yeah, these games are made to milk a player’s time in hopes they can then milk a player’s wallet. Games are designed around it, earnings projections are scoped around it. And literally everything is the antithesis to that that model. We’re seeing the tipping point. It’s just not sustainable. They’re basically taking the salaries of people to make up for the revenue they’re not making with micro transactions, because they promised investors a certain amount of growth and return. 

Its definitely its not sustainable for any game that can't carve out its own niche and keep it.  There's also huge pressure to maintain the schedule.  But when I think about AAA publishers these days, almost everyone's got at least one strong GaaS franchise that keeps churning on.

 

The tipping point could apply most aptly to games like Fall Guys, that are more shallow by nature.  Beyond that, I kinda feel that the GaaS games failing now would have also failed 5 years ago.

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

23 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

I kinda feel that the GaaS games failing now would have also failed 5 years ago.

Well that’s the thing, even 5 years ago many of them were too late. You look at Anthem at launch and Destiny 1 at launch and there isnt that much separating them. But the difference was D1 was released in 2013 and Anthem in 2019. By this point in time Destiny had got its shit together tucked up with D2’s launch in 2017 and then had one of the best expansions in the franchises history. 
 

many of these live service games are releasing years behind. They’d have to release in in the early 2010s to have a chance. Blizzard I think has learned twice with OW2 and Diablo 4, that a live service game that has the PvE content to keep players invested is not something people will wait on and it’s expensive. They’ll keep a loyal following with what they have, but most have moved on, and baring a huge turn around and massive content drop aren’t coming back any time soon. 
 

Games like fallguys will always trail off, because at their core they’re a gimmick. 

[crispy4000]

9 hours ago, Spawn_of_Apathy said:

Well that’s the thing, even 5 years ago many of them were too late. You look at Anthem at launch and Destiny 1 at launch and there isnt that much separating them. But the difference was D1 was released in 2013 and Anthem in 2019. By this point in time Destiny had got its shit together tucked up with D2’s launch in 2017 and then had one of the best expansions in the franchises history. 
 

many of these live service games are releasing years behind. They’d have to release in in the early 2010s to have a chance. Blizzard I think has learned twice with OW2 and Diablo 4, that a live service game that has the PvE content to keep players invested is not something people will wait on and it’s expensive. They’ll keep a loyal following with what they have, but most have moved on, and baring a huge turn around and massive content drop aren’t coming back any time soon. 
 

Games like fallguys will always trail off, because at their core they’re a gimmick. 

 

While that's all very true, EA released Apex Legends the same month an Anthem, and eventually figured out how to satiate player demands for content there.

 

There's huge risk/reward to live service games, and they all know it.  They're even more acutely aware of it now.  I don't think there's any magic formula, other than making a game that's continually fresh and exciting to play in spite of everything else out there.  If the game can't be that, don't bother.

[SuperSpreader]

10 hours ago, Spawn_of_Apathy said:

Destiny had got its shit together tucked up with D2’s launch in 2017

 

Escaping Activision probably helped 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Epic's divestment of Bandcamp appears to be going swimmingly.

 

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Bandcamp employees say they've been locked out of critical systems and unable to do their jobs since Epic announced it was selling. 

 

This will hurt Bandcamp Fridays where 100% of the profits go to artists. 

 

They're bargaining over layoffs and severance. 

 

It's an epic mess.

 

 

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

9 minutes ago, SuperSpreader said:

 

Escaping Activision probably helped 

eh, not really. Bungie didn’t leave Activision until 2018 after the expansion released to much acclaim. Vicarious Visions had been doing some amazing work with Destiny content because of the Activision deal. Many people didn’t realize it at the time, but their absence was greatly missed. 
 

the main thing was that by the time Anthem came out feeling lacking in content, Destiny was feeling fully realized. The quarterly content release model had already been going for a year and there was a bunch of content to play. If you’re telling people you’ve made a PvE game they can play forever there better be enough content to hold people over with a steady stream of content to come along, all while being able to pivot and put out updates to the game with balance patches, but fixes, and other tweaks. And it better be fun day 1. 
 

For PvP only, like Apex Legends, especially with it being both new and free to play, it buys you some time if the initial game is fun. Halo Infinite’s stumble was as a successor to Halo it had the right gameplay feel and was fine for an early access version, it was woefully inadequate in number of maps, number of modes, and rewards and progression systems compared to past Halo games. The style of MP game needs content and it had a legacy of having content. But the cash shop seemed ready to go. Which is where many classic customization options and rewards were now. All the good will from the early access quickly evaporated when there wasn’t anything more at release…or 6 months after release. 
 

to bring this back around to Epic, they seemed to banking on the Fortnite gravy train never ending. They have no new franchises. There’s no successor to Gears to show off UE5. I don’t even think they want to make a SP game. More risk for not nearly enough revenue. More work too, which means more cost. At their point their executives and investors only want stuff that cheap to make and support that will just generate infinite income. 
 

which, something I’m wondering. Is there a scenario where Epic refuses to abandon live service models as they’re bread and butter and they simply collapse? What happens to Unreal Engine? What happens to all the developers that use and rely on UE? 
 

I assume they’d sell out before then and get bought either wholesale by Tencent or somebody else. I really don’t want to see Sony or MS having the sole ownership of UE. 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Epic Games to update Unreal Engine pricing for devs not making games

WWW.GAMEDEVELOPER.COM

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Developers not working in video games will soon pay a per-seat licensing fee to use Unreal Engine.

 

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He also shed some light on the business decisions that led to the company making unexpectedly significant business shifts in the last week. Apparently Epic Games began running into "financial problems" about 10 weeks ago, meaning that the company was facing some sort of financial downturn from late July through September.

 

Evidently, all of Epic Games' business had been "heavily funded by Fortnite" in the last six years, and different parts of the company became "disconnected" from their revenue streams. It adds some context to previous comments made by Sweeney about the impact of declined Fortnite revenue—if the company's signature game had started to not turn a profit, other parts of Epic Games may not have easily been able to make up for declining revenue.

 

 

[Brian]

Epic Games lays off 800+ staff: CEO Tim Sweeney expects "degradation in quality"

WWW.POCKETGAMER.BIZ

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Last week, Fortnite creator Epic Games laid off over 800 members of staff after finally feeling the impact of a post-pandemic games industry struggle. Overal...

 

 

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Sweeney started by noting that Epic has now "stabilised" its finances after realising there was a problem around 10 weeks ago. Following the layoffs, which streamlined the company down to what is "absolutely needed", Epic has ensured that it "won’t run out of money".

 

Lololololol how do you realize only 10 weeks ago that you are running out of money. Wow. So disappointed I can’t see their financials 

 

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Turning things around after admitting this likely drop in quality, Sweeney stood in solidarity with the games industry against Unity’s Runtime Fee. "We can’t make our problems your problems," he said

After laying off 19% because of his poor decisions. 
 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Quote

Sweeney started by noting that Epic has now "stabilised" its finances after realising there was a problem around 10 weeks ago. Following the layoffs, which streamlined the company down to what is "absolutely needed", Epic has ensured that it "won’t run out of money".

 

Man, I don't know about you guys, but I'd be TOTALLY REASSURED by that statement if I was an Epic employee/vendor/investor!

 

Now I REALLY want to see Epic's Statement of Cash Flows!

[ThreePi]

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Developers worried about the state of the Epic Games Store should take some relief from Sweeney's speech as well. He stated that the company will continue to develop and support the storefront, saying it is the "cure to the disease" supposedly infecting the video game industry.

 

What a fucking piece of shit.

[SuperSpreader]

That whole generation of developers needs to go 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Tim, exactly just how bad is the cash situation at Epic?!?

 

Removing Player-to-Player Trading in December

WWW.ROCKETLEAGUE.COM

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Player-to-Player Trading will be removed later this year. Find out what that means for Rocket League players.

 

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Player-to-Player Trading will be removed from Rocket League on December 5 at 4 p.m. PST.

 

We’re making this change to align with Epic’s overall approach to game cosmetics and item shop policies, where items aren’t tradable, transferrable, or sellable. This opens up future plans for some Rocket League vehicles to come to other Epic games over time, supporting cross-game ownership.

 

 

[Keyser_Soze]

5 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

Tim, exactly just how bad is the cash situation at Epic?!?

 

Removing Player-to-Player Trading in December

WWW.ROCKETLEAGUE.COM

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Player-to-Player Trading will be removed later this year. Find out what that means for Rocket League players.

 

 

 

So killing metaverse nft trades?

 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

From Kotaku's Ethan Gach:

 

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Epic Games lays off roughly 50% of Bandcamp amidst its sale to Songtradr.

 

The Fortnite maker purchased the music platform just last year but is now spinning it off amid massive cost cutting.

 

 

[Keyser_Soze]

That's just BS.

[CitizenVectron]

25 minutes ago, Commissar SFLUFAN said:

From Kotaku's Ethan Gach:

 

 

 

I wonder if all those laid off were part of the new union, and if those remaining weren't.

[GeneticBlueprint]

God dammit. Why can't a good thing just stay good?

 

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Bandcamp: extremely profitable company, uniquely beloved of musicians and music fans alike, riding a wave of public goodwill, decides to sell themselves to a billionaire who then dumps them off to another billionaire who now fires half the company

 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

On 10/16/2023 at 2:21 PM, CitizenVectron said:

I wonder if all those laid off were part of the new union, and if those remaining weren't.

 

Take a wild guess:

 

Bandcamp’s Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

WWW.404MEDIA.CO

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Songtradr, which has acquired Bandcamp from Epic Games, said it did not have union membership information, but Songtradr’s CEO invited the bargaining team to a meeting last week.

 

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Bandcamp’s entire union bargaining team, the eight union members democratically elected by their peers to negotiate their first union contract, were laid off when Epic Games sold Bandcamp to music licensing company Songtradr on Monday. 

 

Songtradr told 404 Media that it did not have any union membership information when it made its decision on which employees it would keep as part of the sale, but the union told me Songtradr invited them to a meeting with Songtradr’s CEO last week. 404 Media has viewed the invitation, which shows Bandcamp’s bargaining team were invited and that Songtradr’s CEO Paul Wiltshire planned to attend.

 

“Songtradr had no access to union membership information and we executed our employment offer process with full-consideration of all legal requirements,” Jalila Singerff, director of communications at Songtradr, told 404 Media in an email. “We carried out a comprehensive, full company evaluation that involved a detailed examination of each role. This evaluation considered several factors such as product groups, job functions, employee tenure, performance evaluations, the importance of roles for smooth business operations, and whether a similar function already existed at Songtradr including our experience of running it and associated requirements.”

 

In addition to those eight, these were additional union-related layoffs:

- 3/6 on editorial team
- 12/13 union-eligible support staff
- Two-thirds of union-eligible engineers

[stepee]

man how did nobody notice the typo in Songtradr 

[Guest]

fucking dogshit company.