Survey Finds 21% of European Games Industry Professionals Were Laid Off in Last Year
Brain drain
by Khayl Adam · Push SquareAccording to the annual Big Games Industry Employment Survey, run in conjunction with the Values Value recruitment agency and career platform InGame Job, a sobering almost 21% of European games industry professionals have been laid off in the last year; some found new jobs, others found work outside of the industry, and still more are looking.
GamesIndustry.biz reviewed the associated graphs and numbers, revealing some patterns and data, both positive and negative. Around 74,000 people were employed across the European games sector in 2023, split between more than 5,000 development and publishing studios; the jobs most prone to redundancy in the region include HR, recruitment, quality assurance (QA), and artists. Around 15% of all European industry workers were laid off and subsequently found work again in 2023/2024, while a full 6.2% are still searching. 10% took jobs outside of the video games industry.
Some other interesting tidbits include that 57% of employees at companies in the EU still work remotely, compared to 75% in European countries outside the EU. The number of developers who said they use AI in their daily work and find it helpful rose from 37% last year to 54% in 2024.
Europe, as a collective video game market, is expected to make about $35 billion in revenue in 2024, of which the UK is the largest contributor at $13 billion. For comparison, North America is expected to account for upwards of $50 billion, and Asia-Pacific, a monstrous combined $85 billion. Another $9 and $8 billion are expected from Latin America and the Middle East & Africa, respectively.
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Are you surprised by the scale of the industry's issues? Will we ever see the boom days again? Let us know in the comments section below.
[source gamesindustry.biz]
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About Khayl Adam
Khayl Adam is Push Square's roving Australian correspondent, a reporter tasked with scouring the internet for the richest, most succulent PlayStation stories. With five years of experience as a freelance journalist and mercenary wordsmith, RPGs are his first great love, but strategy and tactics games are a close second, genres in which he is only too happy to specialize.
Comments 10
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- LikelySatan
- 3:52am
I remember back in the day, my mom encouraging me to get into coding because she knew how much I loved games. Even then, mid-90s, I was like "Nah, mom they treat those people like trash unless you made Doom or something."
So America isn't the only one suffering. Just the one getting the most coverage.
Either way it was inevitable with the overhiring during the covid based on data and not common sense.
@LikelySatan yeah and if you're coding in the AAA space, it'll literally be something like your role would be to program the wheel-to-road grip for all the cars in Forza or Need for Speed, and nothing else in the game
Something I learned back during my uni course: every time a major game studio closes and people splinter off into smaller indies, there's always a high percentage of talented people that exit the games industry from either being disillusioned by the experience or being unable to find their next role within a year
- 5
- RagnarLothbrok
- 4:57am
I mean the number is gonna continue to escalate. So much focus on live service still resulting in total money sinks. Then Single player wise EU and NA studios are really pushing away alot of players in dropping quality and offputting naratives/characters etc. we have yet to see the Ubiosft cuts yet in full which are gonna be alot
- 6
- nessisonett
- 6:25am
@kevinm360 My teacher’s mate was responsible for the shadow work in FIFA games for years. Not sure if he made the transition into Frostbite but i can’t imagine that was the most engrossing work back in the day. Besides, computing jobs are f*cked in the UK in general, Brexit means most companies pissed off. My degree’s largely useless.
Nice to find a comrade with a useless degree (mine's Law), hope things work out for you in the future.
I'm guessing you're relatively young (under 30) so time is on your side.
In my current studies, I was doing coding as my Elective Track, but I grew to hate it as my studies progressed. I dropped it quick last year and switched to something else (Accounting).
It cost me another year in the joint, but it's a sacrifice that will probably pay off.
- 8
- themightyant
- 8:27am
Interesting report, but it’s hard to know how abnormal this is without comparing it to previous years. On paper the numbers initially look shocking, but the video game industry has always been turbulent. In fact it used to be an even more turbulent when most jobs were tied to the current game and many devs would get released when the game launched. Need more data.
- 9
- TrannosaurusBex
- 10:47am
@LikelySatan being a game developer was also something I wanted to get into back then. So glad I realised how much I hated coding in my 2nd year at uni and it never materialised, as I wasn't smart enough to realise the poor treatment of their workers. The pay isn't great, but now I love my work in hospitality.
Survey also finds that a lot of bad games were released last year.
Fwr to many gender studies grads going into gaming insteas of people with writing abilities or even a basic interest in gaming.
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