2019-04-01 PC Gamer

NO VISION

In a year of “record results”,ACTIVISIONlays off 800 employees

support staff to support. But they are

not the ones who are suffering.

Anecdotally I’ve seen a number of

armchair experts stress that the

layoffs affect “non-development”

roles, as if that’s OK. While it’s good

to remind yourself that people are

responsible for the games you love,

it’s also people who provide customer

service and community management

and support for those games. And all

of them – whether they’re directly

involved in the actual creation of the

game you’re playing – play a vital role

in bringing those games to market

and keeping them exciting and

vibrant and entertaining.

Phil Savage

O

n February 12, Activision hosted an
earnings call in which CEO Bobby Kotick
announced “record results”. On the same
call, president Coddy Johnson announced
that approximately 8% of the company’s
staff, around 800 people, were being laid off.

That’s because despite the record, Activision had failed to
meet Wall Street’s expectations. “While we had record
performance in 2018, it didn’t quite live up to our
expectations,” said Kotick – a sentence that might make
you wonder if capitalism is broken.
“Our current outlook for 2019 falls below what is
possible in an industry filled with growth opportunities,”
Kotick continued.
All companies restructure, but the scale of the layoffs,
and the callousness of their announcement, felt
particularly brutal. And the conditions that led to 800

people being laid off were created by

Activision’s management. They are

ultimately responsible for the fact

that, in 2018, Activision released just

oneCall of Dutyand two remasters of

late-’90s 3D platformers, and who

seemingly aren’t interested in

greenlighting new games for their

IN 2018, ACTIVISION

RELEASED JUST ONE

CALL OF DUTY AND

TWO REMASTERS

Activision continues

to rely on Call of

Duty’s success.

MONITOR

NEWS | OPINION | DEVELOPMENT