Xbox is laying off a fifth of its staff and dumping its game studios
Remember when tech companies spent the pandemic buying up everything in sight like they were playing Monopoly with real money? Well, the bill has officially arrived.
Remember the grand plan? Microsoft bought up every game studio they could find, trying to choke out the Sony PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch. They spent billions. But now, the party is over.
The new boss, Asha Sharma, basically sent a letter saying the platform teams grew way too fast while actual playtime declined. So they are cutting almost three thousand jobs and letting go of several major studios.
Double Fine Productions and Compulsion Games are being kicked out to survive as independents. Ninja Theory and Undead Labs are being sold off to new ownership. Meanwhile, Arkane Studios, which cost a chunk of an $8.1 billion acquisition of ZeniMax Media, is sitting in limbo while executives "figure things out."
It turns out buying the entire industry doesn't automatically make people want to play those games.
Source: The New York Times
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