After increasing the price of V-Bucks earlier this month, Epic Games announced a massive cut in workers across Fortnite. Announced alongside the death of three major game modes for the live-service game, around 1,000 developers have been let go from the studio.
Amongst affected 1,000 developers, many of Fortnite’s most iconic workers have been cut, including those who worked on some of the biggest success stories of the last year, such as The Simpsons mini-season for the battle royale game.
Following the layoffs, Fortnite gameplay producer Robby Williams described the last 24 hours as “a brutal day at Epic”, adding that “what comes next is very hard and painful”. The rough patch not only applies to the 1,000 developers that are now job searching, but also the remaining staff who have to deliver a rapidly updated live-service game with a much, much smaller team.
Williams told fans that the “teams will have to pick up the pieces and try to keep moving forward” despite the cuts in both workforce and morale. However, “we cannot even fully understand what kind of impacts this will have on the game for the rest of the year and likely beyond”.
While all live-service games operate at a faster pace than most titles, Fortnite is a constant push of new content all of the time. With output expectations seemingly not changed, the workers still creating new Fortnite content will have to make up the work handled by their former colleagues.
“I’ll continue to do my best to keep making the best game for you,” Williams continued, “and I’m confident that my peers feel the same, but please be patient with us as we navigate this tough time and do our best in spite of these truly gut-wrenching losses.”
Fortnite’s controversial V-Bucks price hike prior to the layoff announcements already set off the ire of the game’s community with some planning to boycott the game in response. In numerous posts on the game’s subreddit, fans have pushed against Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney with some claiming the CEO “is single-handedly driving Fortnite into the ground”.
Additionally, the loss in workers, including some of the game’s most talented artists, have led many to assume that Fortnite will now increase its use of AI-generated art as the game continued. Fortnite Chapter 7, the game’s Hollywood-themed season, was already criticised for its apparent use of poor-quality AI art which Epic did not apologise for.
Additionally, as Fortnite shuts down official game modes, the online service is seemingly looking more to its user-created suites of content to keep players engaged. As Roblox-like experiences such as Steal the Brainrot continue to become more popular on the platform, highlighting user-made games appears to be a major focus of the battle royale game’s future.
