Over the past several months, some of the biggest names in video-game development have announced layoffs. How many workers have actually been cut, and what does this mean for game developers?

According to videogamelayoffs.com, video-game companies have cut roughly 7,800 workers in 2023. While many of these layoffs have been small, others have been quite deep. We’ve pulled a few of the biggest from the website’s charts:

(A note on methodology: while videogamelayoffs.com cautions it shouldn’t be regarded as a single source of truth, much of its data seems to align with other crowdsourced layoff trackers and news reports. Always keep in mind that many layoffs are unannounced and won’t necessarily appear in the data for these kinds of websites.)

“This has been one of the most volatile periods in the games industry in the last 15 years,” International Game Developers Association executive director Dr. Jakin Vela recently told Polygon, the popular video-game news site.

Like much of the tech industry, many video-game developers saw a spike in sales during the pandemic, as homebound gamers purchased multiple titles and signed up for cloud-based services. That revenue spike was unsustainable; once it declined, tech executives looked at their respective bottom lines (and headlines about a looming economic recession) and decided to cut. Seen through that lens, the cuts among video-game developers echo the wholesale job losses throughout much of the tech industry at the end of 2022 and beginning of 2023, as even the largest and most-monetized companies laid off workers by the thousands. 

For those tech pros interested in a video game career, mastering your key skills (such as Unity and Unreal) and keeping them up-to-date is critical. Showing off those skills by building your own games and making solid connections in the industry are also critical.