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[Cyberpunkd]

Microsofts not a charity. Got to trim the fat. Economics 101. Lay offs are normal after an M&A

Corporations are not your friends.

You know what else is Economics 101? Making sure there is a right talent in place for the duration of the project so your largest and most recognisable IP doesn’t flop.

 

[Cyberpunkd]

Truly rich folk/companies don't get there by wasting money...

Don’t you worry sweetie, there will be something else that they will pour millions into for no results, they can have Google mentoring them, these guys are great at wasting money while still being incredibly cash rich.

 

[Chechack]

At this point of time im sure this is like an elaborate plans by those group of suits just launder money and get themselves some golden parachutte

 

[Heisenberg007]

Thats why i dont get the layoffs. They get these out by the skin of their teeth some years. if they are dropping to just MW and BO with expansions in-between then these moves would make more sense but it doesn't seem to be the case.

I know you play COD like me, im worried about the future all of a sudden.

COD is almost always the #1 seller. They wouldn't drop the yearly cadence or one of the COD series. There's just too much money at stake that keeps the lights on and supports ~17,000 employees.

Dropping to just MW and BO would also mean either (1) having a skip year or (2) increasing the pace of MW/BO delivery.

They are unlikely to do the 1st one because of money and the 2nd one because they would need more people in those teams, not less.

 

[havoc00]

 

[ShaiKhulud1989]

Well, heavy use of contractors is typical XGS' MO to avoid taxes and long-term benefits. There were a lot of earlier musings in the industry that XGS is basically unwilling to properly hire people and like to sign them as contractors because it works for big IT, so it must work for games. Except it don't.

Part of the reason why Xbox Pipeline is a mess is a fact that they can't plan long-term and can't hold people for the proper amount of time for the future game to gestate with a stable core team (I still find the whole story around Pefect Dark and The Intiative fiasco thoroughly amusing). CoD formula (and Blizzard, albeit way slower) is based around monumental piplenies, rock-solid studios with know-how and huge key staff retention, because those people know the work of the conevyor belt and how to tweak it.

Good luck messing up this machine that Kotick built for 20 years to shave some miniscule (for the MS) tax money.

After this set of layoffs I'm convinced that this company will never brute-force into gaming and always be a laughing stock because MS doesn't understand the very basics of the creative industries. Xbox doesn't care about people making actual games. It cares about brands husks and names. Hence why we've got entire studios created to support just one husk of a franchise after the original creators left to do something more interesting. The whole Idea about something like 343 (that is heavily relying on outside contractors for literally anything) was kinda inane to begin with, it was just an entity that never understood Halo because the idea behing the collective was never creative to begin with.

CoD still looks too big to fail, but so was GoW and Halo a few years back. MS will find a way to f everything up, don't worry!

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

Well, heavy use of contractors is typical XGS' MO to avoid taxes and long-term benefits. There were a lot of earlier musings in the industry that XGS is basically unwilling to properly hire people and like to sign them as contractors because it works for big IT, so it must work for games. Except it don't.

Part of the reason why Xbox Pipeline is a mess is a fact that they can't plan long-term and can't hold people for the proper amount of time for the future game to gestate with a stable core team (I still find the whole story around Pefect Dark and The Intiative fiasco throrughly amusing). CoD formula (and Blizzard, albeit way slower) is based around monumental piplenies, rock-solid studios with know-how and huge key staff retention, because those people know the work of the conevyor belt and how to tweak it.

Good luck messing up this machine that Kotick built for 20 years to shave some miniscule (for the MS) tax money.

After this set of layoffs I'm convinced that this company will never brute-force into gaming and always be a laughing stock because MS doesn't understand the very basics of the creative industries. Xbox doesn't care about people making actual games. It cares about brands husks and names. Hence why we've got entire studios created to support just one husk of a franchise after the original creators left to do something more interesting. The whole Idea about something like 343 (that is heavily relying on outside contractors for literally anything) was kinda inane to begin with, it was just an entity that never understood Halo because the idea behing the collective was never creative to begin with.

CoD still looks too big to fail, but so was GoW and Halo a few years back. MS will find a way to f everything up, don't worry!

I don't think CoD is too big to fail.

It absolutely will fail now that we see the moves Microsoft is making here. Talent will flee. There's no appreciate for just how hard it is to make a game like this on a yearly cadence.

Not investing in your employees by making them longer tenure is not investing in your own product. It's doomed to disaster.

Microsoft doesn't respect its workforce or its people; they only respect the success an IP has established in the market (on the backs of those people historically), and they paid $69B to acquire the IP and have no consideration for the workforce they acquired at all. It will become a nickel and dimed race to Zero and then we'll look back 20 years from now, scratch our heads, and wonder why MS even bothered buying them to begin with as the deal looks to be a terrible one historically

 

[ShaiKhulud1989]

I don't think CoD is too big to fail.

I don't too. It won't be the frist or the last colossus that fall on it's ass because of the gross mishandling. Especially under Phil.

I'm speaking more about the general impression.

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

Corporations are not your friends.

You know what else is Economics 101? Making sure there is a right talent in place for the duration of the project so your largest and most recognisable IP doesn’t flop.

Whateves Sony pony

 

[LavitzSlambert]

I don't think CoD is too big to fail.

It absolutely will fail now that we see the moves Microsoft is making here. Talent will flee. There's no appreciate for just how hard it is to make a game like this on a yearly cadence.

Not investing in your employees by making them longer tenure is not investing in your own product. It's doomed to disaster.

Microsoft doesn't respect its workforce or its people; they only respect the success an IP has established in the market (on the backs of those people historically), and they paid $69B to acquire the IP and have no consideration for the workforce they acquired at all. It will become a nickel and dimed race to Zero and then we'll look back 20 years from now, scratch our heads, and wonder why MS even bothered buying them to begin with as the deal looks to be a terrible one historically

With Microsoft, their disfunction in the gaming industry is a result of their fundamental misunderstanding of the entire industry. They are an enterprise software company through and through, and they run all of their businesses as such. It's why their Windows hardware division is so unsuccessful, it's why they refocused on software and SaaS, and it's why the continuously make these blunders at Xbox. This is coming straight from the top - this isn't necessarily just Phil Spencer's plan, this is 100% Nadella and the board.

It's the same story with this company over and over again. The only know how to do one thing - make assloads of money by extorting their customers.

 

[Lupin25]

Xbox isn’t very profitable as a division, so the worst changes affect them as a whole.

The revenue is there, but the investment in gamepass has hurt them… still without enough subs to surpass PS Plus.

 

[ShaiKhulud1989]

They are an enterprise software company through and through, and they run all of their businesses as such

Pretty much sums it up. This is Xbox Curse that no amount of billions will fix.

 

[nemiroff]

Nah. Clickety bait.

Talent will flee. There's no appreciate for just how hard it is to make a game like this on a yearly cadence.

Not investing in your employees by making them longer tenure is not investing in your own product. It's doomed to disaster.

Microsoft doesn't respect its workforce or its people; they only respect the success an IP has established in the market (on the backs of those people historically), and they paid $69B to acquire the IP and have no consideration for the workforce they acquired at all. It will become a nickel and dimed race to Zero and then we'll look back 20 years from now, scratch our heads, and wonder why MS even bothered buying them to begin with as the deal looks to be a terrible one historically

Nah, it's not that clear cut. I work in a tech company heavily downsized over the last few years. But it pays well, and benefits are great. The talent wasn't fired, 90% remains or rehired. We are thriving, spirits are high, we make products the market wants, we get bonuses and stock price is higher than ever.

Point is, this will most likely not affect COD's status in the market, customers generally don't care what happens behind the walls. As long as it keep selling in the millions none of this matters much outside the forums.

 

[Unknown Soldier]

Nah. Clickety bait.


Nah, it's not that clear cut. I work in 10 000 employee tech company downsized to a 7 000 employee company over the last few years. But it pays well, and benefits are solid, medical, pension home office, and overall flexibility is enticing. The talent wasn't fired, 90% of the talent remains or rehired. We are thriving, spirits are high, we make solid products highly retarded by the market, we get bonuses and stock price is higher than ever.

I would also like to make solid products highly retarded by the market

Sorry, your auto correct got me there

 

[nemiroff]

I would also like to make solid products highly retarded by the market

Sorry, your auto correct got me there

Funny thanks for the heads up bro

 

[Killjoy-NL]

Xbox isn’t very profitable as a division, so the worst changes affect them as a whole.

The revenue is there, but the investment in gamepass has hurt them… still without enough subs to surpass PS Plus.

Just imagine Sony and Nintendo saying 'No' to Xbox 1st party or GP on their platform.

 

[shaddam]

For how long will the name sell it?

 

[Heisenberg007]

Nah. Clickety bait.


Nah, it's not that clear cut. I work in a tech company heavily downsized over the last few years. But it pays well, and benefits are great. The talent wasn't fired, 90% remains or rehired. We are thriving, spirits are high, we make products the market wants, we get bonuses and stock price is higher than ever.

Point is, this will most likely not affect COD's status in the market, customers generally don't care what happens behind the walls. As long as it keep selling in the millions none of this matters much outside the forums.

Customers will care when the quality goes down inevitably, because the budget has been reduced and fewer overworked people are working on the games.

Look at Halo Infinite. It was extremely popular once, and now the IP has little appeal and customers don't generally care about it.

 

[mindfreak191]

Finally, Raven Software gets to make original games again, right? Right?

 

[phil_t98]

Customers will care when the quality goes down inevitably, because the budget has been reduced and fewer overworked people are working on the games.

Look at Halo Infinite. It was extremely popular once, and now the IP has little appeal and customers don't generally care about it.

Has the budget been reduced on halo? Wasn’t the last halo one of the biggest budgeted games?

 

[ShaiKhulud1989]

Has the budget been reduced on halo? Wasn’t the last halo one of the biggest budgeted games?

They’ve overspent because they’ve tried to cheapen out. It’s a funny cycle of shitty management.

 

[ByWatterson]

Halo infinite is a better product than any of the last few CODs so not sure what the concern is

It is....after they changed leadership and stopped using nonstop contractors.

 

[Gaelyon]

It's the Microsoft's Touch tm

 

[King Dazzar]

I guess the aim then is to have CoD release in as good a state as Redfail. And hey remember Redfail was released before they got rid of the QA teams. What a shit show.

 

[Majormaxxx]

So this is how COD dies.

It's ded already

 

[Tokio Blues]

Im ok with this, MWIII was a disaster.

 

[BlackTron]

I know it seems too insane to be true but this is the exact same pattern you've seen from MS since before they even entered gaming. I only said a dozen times before the acquisition that MS's issue is not owning IPs it's managing them. Interestingly, when talking about what went wrong with Halo Infinite they mentioned the contract workers. Why learn anything?

Anybody who tried to prove a point by counting games before they even come out was either a fool or getting paid

 

[digoutyoursoul]

And it happened, under your leadership

 

[FlyyGOD]

Give me a damn break

Halo games are practically dead. 343i has been a disaster for the ip. Xbox killed Halo just like they will do with COD

I see alot of people commenting on the status of Halo without even have played it in it's current state. I would say it is the best multiplayer shooter on consoles by far right now.

 

[Team Andromeda]

Corps outsource all the time. Going forward I bet Infinity Ward will just be the studio making COD games every few years.

 

[Daneel Elijah]

I see alot of people commenting on the status of Halo without even have played it in it's current state. I would say it is the best multiplayer shooter on consoles by far right now.

Splatoon was probably the same at some point. If the console have a small userbase not enough people can profit from it. The game being good now don't matter as much as the fact that the brand is weaker than it was let's say 10 years ago. No need to play it or know the IP, the numbers are clear. The game is on PC, and Steamdb say 2000 people are playing it now, against 200 000 for a game like Apex Legend. I understand that people who don't know a thing about one of probably your favorite IP can be irritating but please explain what is wrong instead of just dismissing people posts because they are not saying what you would want them to say about it.

 

[clarky]

COD is almost always the #1 seller. They wouldn't drop the yearly cadence or one of the COD series. There's just too much money at stake that keeps the lights on and supports ~17,000 employees.

Dropping to just MW and BO would also mean either (1) having a skip year or (2) increasing the pace of MW/BO delivery.

They are unlikely to do the 1st one because of money and the 2nd one because they would need more people in those teams, not less.

If they dropped to just MW and BO with a big expansion inbetween ( like this years MWIII was supposed to be) that would give each game 2 years to breathe, and give them around 4 years of dev time and all the benefits that would come with that. For the average COD player that would be win-win. In the long run i'd argue that would earn them more money, not less. Most players are not ready to move on every 12 months.

If the base game is indeed going to be on Gamepass in the future then above makes even more sense.

 

[FlyyGOD]

Splatoon was probably the same at some point. If the console have a small userbase not enough people can profit from it. The game being good now don't matter as much as the fact that the brand is weaker than it was let's say 10 years ago. No need to play it or know the IP, the numbers are clear. The game is on PC, and Steamdb say 2000 people are playing it now, against 200 000 for a game like Apex Legend. I understand that people who don't know a thing about one of probably your favorite IP can be irritating but please explain what is wrong instead of just dismissing people posts because they are not saying what you would want them to say about it.

How can anyone judge a game they haven't played ?

 

[DaGwaphics]

Apparently, the at minimum 10k ABK employees they now have on the payroll are all-in on the next-next-gen version of pong. I hear it is going to have colors.

 

[Team Andromeda]

How can anyone judge a game they haven't played ?

Don't you know ? People watch YouTube LOL

 

[Daneel Elijah]

How can anyone judge a game they haven't played ?

The same way people shit about fastfood? We all know that taste is a personal thing, but there is objective reasons that fastfood should not be eaten in most case if you can do better?
Not a dig against Halo by the way. If you like it, good for you. I loved Death Stranding and TLOU2, but I understand that some people don't. I have never played Halo, but I know that Microsoft failed to have it ready for the Series S/X launch. And we have seen numbers go from 200 000 players at their peak to 2000 now, according to SteamDB. Once again I get it that people dismissing Halo when the reality is more complex than a"look at Halo lol" is irritating. But please explain instead of being dismissive of people opinion. Even if they don't get your response, the other readers may understand and learn something. This is why I am on this forum. Not to say stuff, but learn more about gaming and talk when I feel I need to.

 

[Dr_Salt]

So you’re telling me this 2024 CoD is basically the last one that will be probably decent. Then everything will really go to shit.

Cod has gone to shit a long time ago.

 

[TheThreadsThatBindUs]

Microsoft has the inverse Midas Touch... everything they touch turns to shit.

 

[FullMetalx117]

Bobby really sold Activision at the perfect time - got the modern warfare reboot done, warzone covid peak, and then only left the surefire cod in black ops until MSFT needs to reboot modern warfare again.

I would not bet on Microsoft handling a reboot well. Halo/Gears, once iconic franchises in their own right, are examples of that.

COD should be put on the death watch. Just like the MCU, it will fall. Quality is more important than ever, cookie cutter won’t cut it.

 

[ShaiKhulud1989]

Microsoft has the inverse Midas Touch... everything they touch turns to shit.

You can’t spell Midas without MS, I guess

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

I see alot of people commenting on the status of Halo without even have played it in it's current state. I would say it is the best multiplayer shooter on consoles by far right now.

I was going to play it but dumb MS ask me for a MS account. fuck that shit.

 

[BlackTron]

Well, heavy use of contractors is typical XGS' MO to avoid taxes and long-term benefits. There were a lot of earlier musings in the industry that XGS is basically unwilling to properly hire people and like to sign them as contractors because it works for big IT, so it must work for games. Except it don't.

Part of the reason why Xbox Pipeline is a mess is a fact that they can't plan long-term and can't hold people for the proper amount of time for the future game to gestate with a stable core team (I still find the whole story around Pefect Dark and The Intiative fiasco thoroughly amusing). CoD formula (and Blizzard, albeit way slower) is based around monumental piplenies, rock-solid studios with know-how and huge key staff retention, because those people know the work of the conevyor belt and how to tweak it.

Good luck messing up this machine that Kotick built for 20 years to shave some miniscule (for the MS) tax money.

After this set of layoffs I'm convinced that this company will never brute-force into gaming and always be a laughing stock because MS doesn't understand the very basics of the creative industries. Xbox doesn't care about people making actual games. It cares about brands husks and names. Hence why we've got entire studios created to support just one husk of a franchise after the original creators left to do something more interesting. The whole Idea about something like 343 (that is heavily relying on outside contractors for literally anything) was kinda inane to begin with, it was just an entity that never understood Halo because the idea behing the collective was never creative to begin with.

CoD still looks too big to fail, but so was GoW and Halo a few years back. MS will find a way to f everything up, don't worry!

I couldn't have said it better myself. I did think we would get at least a game or two worth of output across the board, fudging the direct-causal relationship, before the MS effect had completely ruined everyone. They just went directly there overnight, frankly exceeding my worst nightmares as someone who already had no faith left. Like all these studios have practically become Rare already, that's terrifying

 

[Tal Shiar Agent]

It's ded already

Which is crazy because MWIII's MP and MWZ started out so good, but the QA fell off a cliff.

 

[Pop]

I see alot of people commenting on the status of Halo without even have played it in it's current state. I would say it is the best multiplayer shooter on consoles by far right now.

That happens to all media.

And you're assuming because someone who "hasn't" played has no clue about the current state. I've played all Halos. I would say Halo was my fav franchise until 343i took over which has been a disaster. The community like yourself, has given 343i so much slack for their failures.

 

[FlyyGOD]

That happens to all media.

And you're assuming because someone who "hasn't" played has no clue about the current state. I've played all Halos. I would say Halo was my fav franchise until 343i took over which has been a disaster. The community like yourself, has given 343i so much slack for their failures.

I'm saying Halo is in an excellent state right now. It's multiplayer is better than any other shooter on console. People who haven't played it wouldn't know .

 

[thatJohann]

Yikes how the mighty have fallen

 

[Ass of Can Whooping]

I'm saying Halo is in an excellent state right now. It's multiplayer is better than any other shooter on console. People who haven't played it wouldn't know .

I'll probs get back into it with the PS5 port

 

[Stooky]

If they dropped to just MW and BO with a big expansion inbetween ( like this years MWIII was supposed to be) that would give each game 2 years to breathe, and give them around 4 years of dev time and all the benefits that would come with that. For the average COD player that would be win-win. In the long run i'd argue that would earn them more money, not less. Most players are not ready to move on every 12 months.

If the base game is indeed going to be on Gamepass in the future then above makes even more sense.

the sales of MW disagree with you. the average COD player is buying the game every year. Expansion packs don't sell like full releases. For your plan Microsoft could accomplish that with 1 studio and outsourcing.

 

[Nvzman]

This.

They can get away with this shit because idiots will keep buying whatever they shovel out.

This is absolutely not true in the slightest. Ghosts, Infinite Warfare, and Vanguard were all disliked upon release and they had notably lower sales (except maybe Ghosts) and sustained player counts than other games in the series.
If this rumor is true, then Microsoft will effectively kill cod within a few years. As someone who buys cod on a yearly basis seeing so many veterans getting laid off or leaving is already making me extremely skeptical that I'll be playing newer cods in the future.

 

[James Sawyer Ford]

Nah, it's not that clear cut. I work in a tech company heavily downsized over the last few years. But it pays well, and benefits are great. The talent wasn't fired, 90% remains or rehired. We are thriving, spirits are high, we make products the market wants, we get bonuses and stock price is higher than ever.

You haven't seen a Tech Crash yet like the Dot Com bust. Last year was a blip, but there will be reckoning in the future. And when that happens it only gets worse for divisions bleeding money like Xbox.