Over 630 games industry professionals lost their jobs in June, bringing the total so far this year to around 11k

The number of layoffs in the games industry continues to grow. Hundreds of people from studios around the world lost their jobs last month.

Sackboy: A Big Adventure (Sumo Digital)

A total of 632 people were laid off across the games industry in June, according to estimates by the Game Industry Layoffs project. For comparison, around 1,300 jobs were cut in the same period last year.

The estimates for June are on par with March, when more than 600 people lost their jobs, but less than the 6,000+ layoffs in January, 2,000+ in February, 1,000+ in April, and 770+ in May.

Below are the largest layoffs that occurred in June 2024:

• Sumo Group — 250 employees, including around 100 people at the now-closed studio Timbre Games (worked at two unannounced titles for PC and consoles);
• Behaviour Interactive — 95 employees as part of its “strategic changes” to focus on supporting Dead by Daylight, making new horror games, and working with third-party studios;
• Gameloft — 90 employees, including 49 people at its Toronto studio and 41 people at the Kharkiv office;
• Avalanche Studios — 50 employees after closing its offices in New York and Montreal (to “ensure a stable and sustainable future for the company”);
• VRChat — around 50 employees, or 30% of its workforce (“the hard decision today is that our team is too large in its current form to support the health and growth of the business”).

Other studios that were hit with layoffs last month include Striking Distance, Techland, Paradox Tectonic (closed), Pieces Interactive (closed), and Ubisoft Toronto.

It is worth noting that Game Industry Layoffs doesn’t include all the job cuts. For example, Chinese media company Perfect World reportedly laid off hundreds of employees across its divisions, not to mention cuts that occurred in smaller studios (like indie team Cut to Bits, which laid off the majority of staff last month).

Also keep in mind that not all companies disclose such information, and some estimates may be inaccurate due to a lack of official data.

Game companies have laid off almost 11,000 people since the beginning of the year. Given the lack of data for some studios, the total number is likely higher. However, this is already more than the 10.5k estimated layoffs for the entire 2023.