Those of you who pay close attention to the games industry – or even tech sector at large – will know that many companies are being struck with layoffs right now, even the ones that are performing well. It’s perhaps not too surprising to hear that, following a bunch of job cuts at Naughty Dog earlier in the year, Sony’s Visual Arts Service Group is the latest developer to be pruned.
For those not familiar with VASG, it’s an internal division which collaborates with all first-party developers and some third-parties on tasks such as motion capture, music, mixing, and more. It’s one of the Japanese giant’s secret sauces: a highly talented business unit capable of assisting more well-known developers to add that extra bit of sparkle to a project.
While the scale of the layoffs is largely unknown, several former employees have posted about their situation on LinkedIn over the past week or so. In the meantime, God of War creator David Jaffe has teased on Twitter that more bad news is coming for PlayStation in the coming days, but he didn’t elaborate or share any further details.
As alluded, this all comes at a time where job security in the games industry is pretty fragile. Many, many developers have been laid off this year alone, with Embracer Group most notably scaling back its operations after it failed to raise enough capital to stabilise its reckless acquisitions. Hopefully everyone who’s been made redundant can find another position smoothly and swiftly.
[source videogameschronicle.com]
Comments 16
Jaffe's news is that Connie Booth (legendary first party producer at SIE - has worked at Sony since Crash) is leaving Sony.
He just doesn't know if it's for her own reasons (retirement) or if there was some bad blood. Apparently Angie Smets (ex-Guerrilla) will take her position. He made an drama because he doesn't like Guerrilla nor their games (he also thinks Hermen Hulst is the one who will be appointed as SIE CEO).
Seems like Jaffe's "BIG SCOOP" is that Connie Booth is leaving PlayStation, or being let go.
She has a long legacy in the company, but it's kind of wrong of him to use one person's departure to earn money, and hype it up as if it's big news. He's been doing stuff like this for years, he's a terrible person. It's time people in the industry stop talking to him, and journalists stop reporting about him.
@ED_209 So the big news isn't a world shaking doom and gloom thing he built up then? Typical.
I don't know why people keep giving David Jaffe any sort of attention. He consistently comes across as a massive idiot with opinions that are best ignored. That's probably true of many of us, but hey at least we don't get quoted in articles!
Isn't Jaffe a walking tabloid at this point?
Headlines sell and all that.
Shame about VASG though. That team has serious talent.
Shepherd_Tallon wrote:
That's a great way of putting it. I largely agree with a lot of everyone else's criticisms of him. But I still watch Jaffe time to time because in between all that fluff an nonsense there is occasionally something really insightful or worthwhile you won't get anywhere else, unlike many he has no fear of speaking his mind or disappointing Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo. He's also still well connected, he has interviews and content no one else does like the ex-head of Sony VASG Michael Mumbauer. Genuinely interesting stuff.
But never has a channel needed a rough gameplan more each episode to counter his ADD/ADHD and directionless waffle, being baked most of the time doesn't help either. Plus a proper decent editor, not just one of his followers doing an occasional job on the cheap. Truth is it seems he doesn't care as long as the duckets keep rolling in. (A Jaffe-ism to show i'm a frustrated fan, not just a hater)
In the meantime, God of War creator David Jaffe has teased on Twitter that more bad news is coming for PlayStation in the coming days, but he didn’t elaborate or share any further details.
He's revealed what he meant by this and it's that Connie Booth is stepping down form her role.
So nothing major like he was trying to imply, but I suppose he has to drum up traffic somehow.
@themightyant Some good insight there.
Being honest I watched a few of his episodes when he first started the channel, but it just wasn't my cup of tea. It felt like sensationalism to me and I figured that the internet has enough of that.
I haven't watched him in what feels like a long time.
@UltimateOtaku91 To Jaffe that IS major news. Connie Booth may not be a known face to many, but behind the scenes good producers and managers like her are some of the the secret sauce that make Sony's games so great. They keep projects on time and on budget which cycles back into happier devs making better games, more often. It's not sexy work but it's a vital part of the process. Jaffe has long suggested that one of the problems at Microsoft is they don't seem to have the same great oversight and they should hire Connie, or someone like her. I wouldn't downplay how big this news could be.
But the trouble with Jaffe's video, as he admits, is he doesn't know if she retired, if she was justifiably fired or forced out. It's irresponsible to report with so few facts imho, it only leads to rampant speculation and people projecting, filling the gaps with their own biases.
The incentives most companies had to keep people employed during the pandemic aren't here anymore, expect heavy layoff across the industry.
I think Sony would be very happy with this framing. The company wasn’t struck by anything; it actively decided to lay off employees.
Service games don’t need emotional cutscenes.
Lots of studios/people could be on the chopping block. Barlow, unfortunately, seems mentally unstable with his personal life issues, Druckmann can't seem to make a MP game and Naughty Dog has nothing in sight except a ps5 port for TLoU2, Media Molecule is doing what after the failure/money pit that was Dreams (shame it was awesome), potentially some of these GaaS titles are being scrapped after realizing that there is no way in hell they can make that many successful service type games....it could really be a ton of people/studios on the chopping block. Even when these mega companies post absurd Financials that still doesn't mean somewhere, somebody isn't causing them to hemorrhage money in some way. It sucks but it's a reality
@GoodOlDubs It was struck by a 5% interest rate in the 10-year US bonds. This threshold is sure to make a sizeable damage in any enterprise around the globe, large or small, and Sony is not imune to that. They're simply taking necessary precautions.
Expect some big whale to appear floating around somewhere soon.
Sure, those are the economic circumstances in which Sony found itself. But whenever a company decides to lay off employees, it is exactly that: a decision. In this case, it is a decision to protect (sizeable!) profitability in order to appease investors.
Layoffs aren’t an act of nature; they’re a decision. As it is, it’s like saying a tax hike happened to a government, or a fart happened to me.
You’re right about the context, and I think it should be framed that way. I’m a business journalist so for once I know what I’m talking about. This is not a flex; it’s just nice to finally know something relevant here
Sony is laying off X employees as the industry grapples with soaring interest rates and etc etc etc
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