Kongregate, Digital Bros. cut jobs in a growing wave of video game industry layoffs
The series of layoffs in the video game industry continues: Digital Bros. Entertainment and Kongregate have both announced job cuts.
Digital Bros., owner of Check publisher 505 Games and other studios are laying off 30% of its workforce – about 130 people – as part of an “organizational review.” it announced on Tuesday. The job losses will have a major impact on Digital Bros.’ studios, according to a press release. In addition to 505 Games, Digital Bros. Entertainment owner of DR Studios (Terraria for mobile and console), Kunos Simulazioni (Assetto Corsa), Infinity plus two (Puzzle quest 3), Supernova games, nesting games, Avantgarden (Last day of June) and Ingame Studios (Crime Boss: Rocky City).
Kongregate, the online gaming portal and publisher, has cut more than a dozen jobs across various departments. Kongregate did not respond to Polygon’s request for comment. The layoffs span multiple departments, including art, VFX, marketing, community management and production. It’s been a challenging few years for Kongregate, which made its name in the early 2000s as the online portal for Flash games. When Adobe has discontinued Flash support in 2020, Kongregate had to switch to keeping its Flash games for good.
In July 2020, Kongregate announced that it was no longer accepting user-created games as it moved towards its own in-house development. At that time, it fired several people to “reform” the company. One person fired by Kongregate told Polygon it came as a total surprise.
Three video game studios have laid off employees in as many days: Amazon’s gaming division announced layoffs on Monday. More than 180 people have been laid off from Amazon’s Crown Channel and Game Growth programs as the company “refocuses” on Prime Gaming, according to a memo from Amazon Games vice president Christoph Hartmann. Humble Games, which publishes video games such as Coral Island And Mineko’s night marketalso laid off an unknown number of employees this week, it confirmed to GLHF. More than 6,000 people were laid off in the video game industry last year. according to a layoff tracking website.