Do Game Developers Need To Unionise?

On the 13th February 2019, game publisher Activision notified almost 800 of their own employees that they were going to be laid off, and there are no unions to support them or prevent this from happening, but why?

According to Intel co-founder Robert Noyce in this article by Polygon, the tech industry doesn’t want unions because “remaining non-union is essential for survival for most of our companies. If we had the work rules that unionised companies have, we’d all go out of business.”

But support for a game’s developer union has been growing steadily over the last decade.

In the same Polygon article, it states that in a 2009 IGDA survey, 32% of game developers would support a union.

However, in a separate study published in 2017 by French-Canadian researchers Johanna Westar and Marie-Josée, it showed that that figure increased by 56%.

This study also said that 66% of developers said they would endorse a union at their studio, and 82% said they’d endorse and industrywide game development union.

But why was there a sudden increase?

One reason likely stems from horror stories of companies steadily declining and suddenly shutting down, leaving hundreds of employees without jobs, the most recent being Telltale Games.

Around 5 months ago Telltale games suddenly pulled the plug on many of its operations leaving nearly 250 employees without jobs due to the company’s steady decline over the last few years.

It is rumored this is because the publishers didn’t allow the developers to do anything new with their previously successful ‘interactive story’ formula, which in turn resulted in less interest in their games and dwindling profits.

The employees were left with no severance pay and only a week of healthcare, and due to the studio being based in Los Angeles, many couldn’t afford to pay for rent anymore.

Tales like this are all too familiar over the last few years, leaving many developers wanting some form of union to support those who need it.

However, the most frightening reason developers want, and need, a union, is companies like Activision’s questionable business decisions.

As I stated at the start of this article, Activision just recently laid off nearly 800 employees, but the weird thing about this is that it doesn’t seem like they needed to.

According to this article by Polygon, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick said that Activision made “£7.5 billion in sales and $1.8 billion in profit last year” and he boasted that they “achieved record results in 2018.”

Many people believe this is the work of Activision’s CEO and other higher ups keeping themselves, and their shareholders pockets full.

For example, in this video by YouTube Games Journalist Jim Sterling, he explains that in the last few months Activision hired Dennis Durkin as the new CFO.

When he was hired, the job came with a $15 million bonus for taking the job.

However, this was during a period in which Activision was cutting funds and support for games like Heroes of the Storm and its pro league, leaving many employees and eSports teams with no income.

All this was also under the leadership of Bobby Kotick as well, leading many to believe that he is simply doing what he can to keep himself and his friends rich.

In the same video, Sterling points out how Activision was disappointed that Call of Duty Black Ops 4 made $50 million less than Black Ops 3 in its opening weekend, despite the fact that it still made $500 million.

It's statements like this that make people believe that large games publishers only care about profits and making “all the money in the world” as Jim Sterling says, and that this is why they will happily lay off massive amounts of workers at short notice.

This doesn’t just happen at Activision, EA and Capcom are both guilty of unreasonable expectations for new games, which makes developers scared for their jobs.

A game studio could make a game that sells incredibly well, and a publisher could still layoff everyone in that studio because it didn’t meet their unreasonable expectations.

And this is all just another reason that developers are wanting a union.

As publishers create bigger and bigger unreasonable profit margins, it becomes more and more likely that layoffs are just around the corner for each studio that fails to meet those expectations.

Fortunately, the game developer community is trying its best to be supportive and help those laid off get back on their feet by offering help on Twitter.

Game developers offering support for those laid off.

Some also voiced their concerns and openly supported the need for a union for games developers as well.

Marijam Didžgalvytès tweet about developers need a Union.

One of the few positives to come out of Activision’s recent actions is that now more than just developers are aware of these mass layoffs and the need for a union.

Many YouTubers like, Jim Sterling and Gaming Journalism websites like Polygon, have been reporting on this issue, meaning that regular people now understand how serious this is.

The publicity may finally force some companies to act, and provide their employees with at least some form of job security or at the very least severance pay.

However, it may still be a while before any unions are properly set up, so I talked to games journalist Marijam Didžgalvytè, to ask how she feels about this situation, and what developers can do to protect themselves from these situations.

When I asked Didžgalvytè about how she felt about the recent Activision Layoffs she said:

“The company's cushy financial position is an appalling proof that the CEOs of the companies seldom care about anything else then their's and the board's pay. In the case of Bobby Kotick and Activision / Blizzard, 800 talented individuals who are creating products that make those salaries and those profits possible, were unceremoniously fired”

She also added that this exposes a broken system that refuses to invest in the workers or the health of the company.

I also asked if there’s anything developers can do to protect themselves against situations like the mass layoffs at Activision?

She responded by saying that a union would not be able to protect the workers against mass layoffs, but would be able to negotiate severance packages and sustainable timelines for such events, making the lives of developers easier during these times.

Didžgalvytè also said that building a union would provide solidarity between workers, enhance networks and battle against the isolation that often comes with layoffs, and added that:

“A strong trade union would also be able to identify any mismanagements from above early on and fight it before the situation becomes critical.”

After the events of the past few months, it’s becoming clear that for any games developers working under large publishers in the industry, a union is becoming necessary to make sure that nothing like this ever happens again.

But there’s still work that needs to be done to make this happen.

More people need to be aware of this issue, and the developer’s voices need to be heard.

If this doesn’t happen, then the games industry will become an area nobody wants to work in.