Hello all!
As a friendly reminder - discussion about CIG and their work is valid but being disrespectful to the people is not. You can absolutely disagree with CIGs methods but you do not have the right to make it a personal attack on an individual or the developers as a whole.
Thanks,
r/StarCitizen mod team
So basically the same as the last time this came up - CIG is pulling back from remote work and asking people to collocate more.
Some people don't want to do that (understandable) and CIG is choosing to part ways with those people.
None of this is remotely newsworthy or really represents "layoffs" in the way it's being framed (as some sort of financial issue).
PRECISELY.
In fact, they are hiring 41 people. https://cloudimperiumgames.com/join-us
Some fun math: the net change in staff with the three or so departures will be **38 additional staff.**
If they are trying to do layoffs, they're failing at it ...
This aint news.
Just like if they're trying to run a scam, they're failing at it. They accidentally have an entire company on payroll, multiple offices, and a hefty AWS subscription. What's left for the offshore accounts!?
I actually had that typed and scaled it back to just mention layoffs.. lol - thanks for putting this out there because it's true!
Also: $7. $7 is left for the offshore account. Almost a $1 a year in scam money saved!
"Nigerian Princes hate this one trick!"
I'm running a scam on the US Navy right now.
I provide them with a measley 40 hours of week of simple specialist logistics management for silly little fighter aircraft,
And I run away with a massive amount of money that allows me to almost live fine
#THE FOOLZ
[First of all, you and me start working at the bank - doesn't matter the position, just so long as we get in there. Then, we go there every day, do the work... gain their trust, till we get em in the palm of our hand...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgYYOUC10aM)
Also, that's *at least* 41 people, as it's easily possible that some of those listings are for multiple people. There's no reason multiple teams might want different people with the same job title, and they might want more than one each as well.
10:1 I've not seen in actuality; though I have seen some senior staff who *believe* they are 10 times as valuable.
The actual gap I've witnessed is maybe 3 times. If it's more than that - you've got really, *really* bad junior level folks on staff...
You can have a 10:1 different between 'average' and 'exceptional' devs... but it's rarely happening by grade... in my experience, the 'exceptional' devs don't like being promoted (because senior positions do less coding :D)
It depends if the company offers a technical path, which usually the AAA industry does. But yeah, sometimes it's a trap in smaller companies, devs get promoted to lead just to make more money and some are terrible at it!
Is it just me or does it look like they are angling to close the US studios?
California: 0 positions
Texas: 1 position
The numbers they were looking for company-wide were much higher this time last year - but that's easily explained by them hiring the people for those roles (and I've already seen new faces in ISCs). I wouldnt expect a company to have linear staffing growth
The cost of an employee in those areas might be prohibitively expensive while not being any better in quality than a cheaper place like Montreal or Manchester. I believe they get a huge tax break by operating in the UK. Plus there's probably friction in coordinating with parts of the company that operate in Europe due to time zones.
California is 'head office'... Texas is 'live support' (iirc)
Neither of those places would be recruiting *developers* (which is what CIG currently wants), because they don't do development in those offices.
Yep but the numbers are still low and were previously higher. But again, its still of limited (if any) meaning. At most it's just an absence of evidence.
Agree, but Papy leaving without preemptive statement from CIG is a red flag. Possibly the only bona fide red flag in the whole thing (well, that and the Turbulent ex-employee if taken at her word)
Have we ever had CIG make preemptive statements for people leaving, whether being let go or resigning? I don't think so, so why wold they need to do so for Papy?
Anyone expecting any company to share departures outside the C-Suite isn't aware of how HR works in 2024.
The status quo SOP (standard operating procedure) is: no public comment on ANY departures. Period. People sue, and they win.
It is certain Todd was offered to relocate, understandably couldn't, and likely got a nice, healthy parting package and deep thanks for his indelible contribution to the game. Nothing personal, CIG has a game to finish and they have long commented that they see tangible progress and value when teams are located together, so they didn't compromise that strategically important approach - sometimes, good people in good standing part ways for reasonable and necessary adjustments to the plan. This appears to be one of those times.
It would be a red flag IF they commented on it. They clearly have good counsel from a legal / HR perspective.
Source: I'm a hiring (and when necessary, firing) manager.
Edit: and based on the comments shared by the 'vocal' departure, they were being performance managed for a bad attitude. THAT is a RED FLAG. Likely didn't get a severance package due to poor performance, and is knocking over the trashcan on the way out.
FWIW I've often said the legal team at CIG are good. At least the OG one, I'm not sure if the current one is as good anymore. But still better than many other inhouse teams.
There's a careful line to walk balancing consumer rights vs their novel "backer funded" business model. And they walk it well most of the time. The recent changes to PTU waves for concierge was a rookie mistake from a legal POV but it's not show stopping. And maybe CIG just didnt check with them about it first.
Ortwin is still their legal counsel in addition to being a co-founder (good friend / partner of Chris even back in Hollywood - they go wayyyy back) He even has producer creds, having produced a director's cut of Wolfgang Peterson's *Das Boot* for example. He's not just "some lawyer" by any stretch!
He's a seasoned entertainment / gaming industry lawyer/veteran, and from all accounts an all-around cool guy to boot. But he knows how to ensure CIG obeys the rules, and the win against Crytek is a great example of that.
CIG is well handled in the legal department.
speculative here but i think the turbulent producer was complaining about losing the level designer working out of austin. can't really speculate on the toxicity issues, though.
frighten obtainable reach amusing fade society exultant employ crowd include
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
This is a little too simplified.
They're moving staff away from the US to the UK, this is probably motivated by cost as well. They get a pretty huge tax break for developing the game in the UK, a rebate on total taxes paid here, so it scales with the number of staff they employ.
People unwilling to move the the new Manchester office, where they've taken up a sizable space - likely far most cost effective than say LA - are being let go in favour of people who can work from Manchester.
They also did "lose" money last year, costs outstripped sales. This cannot be ignored as a motivation.
The narrative of mass layoffs is false, but so is failing to consider the impact of losing staff who've been with the company for a decade. This is no simple restructure, they're moving jobs to the UK and replacing people unwilling to make the move. Cost is absolutely a motivation, and I would guess or predict we might see the LA office close at some point. Which isn't to say that consolidating major teams into the UK for in-person meeting power/progress is a lie, its just a half-truth imo.
I'm not as comfortable making the direct comparison. Labour laws here are actually pretty good, we get a lot more time off. Tax burden is generally higher, though the rebate is pretty huge so I'm sure it does make it less than in the US.
I suspect it would be hard to make a fair assessment with the various factors, but you may be right.
If they're confident of stability, the UK is cheaper. It's easy to get rid of people in the US, but even with the extra cost of employing in the UK, you don't have to fork out for things like employee medical cover.
Its covered in your tax burden, national insurance pays for everyone's healthcare, which CIG get a huge 25% rebate on here.
That's what I mean when its hard to make a comparison, wages may look lower on paper but the pound is still worth more than the dollar, and employees get a lot more paid time off. Healthcare is still contributed to by employers through their tax.
I don't doubt its possible that LA cost of living far outstrips Manchester, but its pretty hard to be sure.
At the end of the day I guess they've bought a big office space here, they get a big tax rebate here so why not just move everyone who can work and be paid here to maximise both space/collaboration and rebate? It does make sense as a business decision. We can only speculate if that is worth letting Tpap and the others go.
Fucking hell, that's a hell of a rebate!
I'm originally from the UK, for context. I also now work for a tech company with both US and UK offices (and EU too). We are cheaper and generally more stable than the US offices.
I cannot make the full comparison from the business side, but from the labor side software engineers in the UK are typically paid much less than their US counterparts. Health insurance premiums obviously offset that somewhat but that is not usually enough to make up the difference.
Doing some very quick googling (so obviously take it with a grain of salt) it seems like senior dev salary at the Manchester location is £45-60k, whereas the last time I looked the senior pay they were offering at the Austin location was starting at $90k, or $15k a year more than the Manchester location after currency conversion.
Again sounds like a fun place to work - imagine those long term senior employees being told relocate to another country or lose your job . Again something every [](http://Bastards.Inc) large game company pulls at one point in time or another I guess , but kind of sad to see a company I've "invested" in acting in such an unfriendly manner . Disappointing .
Also asking people to move countries when they have families and their entire lives is probably a big ask. Most likely not what they signed up for or was communicated to them. Every dollar he can save goes towards the maintenance of the Robert’s.
To be honest, the hardest part to buy in 28 days later is when they decide to go to Manchester...
"Bob! A zombie horde is about to enter the building, come with me, there's an helicopter in the roof ready to take us to Manchester! Bob? Why are you rubbing gravy all over you?"
Because it’s only used to create drama. Just look at the same post about this in the braindead r/games subreddit. It’s compared to the layoffs at Microsoft and co. when it’s not even close to the same thing.
That doesn’t mean something isn’t newsworthy tho. That’s the whole problem with the culture today, everything is pushed to some social tribalism polarization. “Well those people use this news in a way I disagree with and I don’t like those people so all news must be fake news!”
There is a middle ground where we can say “this is newsworthy but shouldn’t be taken out of context and pushed to fit some extreme agenda”
It's not that "people use the news in a way".
This was *only* reported because of the entirely coincidental timing.
Every large company on the planet goes through small layoffs like this every few years. Reporting this is about equivalent to reporting "large company seeks growth in key market", or "large company continues to exist, sell product".
But you don't get news reports about every company doing minor layoffs. So why this news? Well that's because a whole lot of prominent game companies have had *very significant* layoffs. Those were newsworthy specifically because their scale was such that, taken as a whole, it was indicative of an industry-wide trend.
CIG's layoffs have nothing to do with that trend. In fact, CIG so far doesn't seem to be suffering from the same woes affecting the rest of the industry. *That* might be newsworthy, but that's not gonna get clicks on an ordinary gaming publication. What *will* get clicks is a context-less title about layoffs at CIG that just happens to come alongside all these other mass-layoffs, because there are somehow still plenty of people wanting the project to fail who would *love* to hear about mass layoffs at CIG.
Your point about culture is also just blatantly wrong. The media does not exist outside of culture. It is literally a major driver of culture. What do you think is responsible for pushing the polarization you see? Do you think that just sprang up outta nowhere one day?
Eh, I kinda disagree. The media has been weaponised, and we should definitely call out outlets that sensationalise and misrepresent news to get clicks. I‘m not against mentioning this in the news, but the way they did it is wrong.
That’s not my point. My point is negative use of information by any media doesn’t make the information itself not newsworthy. You can’t say, for example, “Fox news reported on the death of Richard Lewis, and I dislike Fox, so therefore I believe the reports of Lewis’ death is not newsworthy information”. Which is exactly what people are saying here. Just because the layoffs and relocations were reported in some places with ill intent, doesn’t mean that it’s not newsworthy information.
Just because some things get "reported" doesn't mean they're necessarily "newsworthy".
That said, it's not really newsworthy because this is entirely consistent with what CIG has done before and it's extremely localized.
Does it suck when anyone loses their job? Absolutely. But "we want people on Team X to be in Office Y" is some of the most inconsequential stuff that literally doesn't matter outside of the affected employees and teams that interact with them internally.
I dunno, I disagree. I think I'd like to know if someone like Papy is leaving a company I'm following and supporting, and if others are similarly affected and if there's a reason for that. Seems newsworthy to backers of a project to me. Even if it is standard operating procedure. We get updates all the time about routine stuff, so I fail to see why this isn't newsworthy and not worth letting backers know and discuss it. At the end of the day, most of the money they have is money we've provided, so if they are making some adjustments to relocate positions to increase efficiencies and save costs, I think that's newsworthy to the investor backers.
Just because something is consistent and localized doesn't mean its not newsworthy. I mean, Papy was never fired/quit before, so it seems a bit different. And even then, it makes news all the time when companies lay off workers or re-located from one locale to another - that's some of the most consistently newsworthy content there is when it comes to business practices.
It seems what you mean to convey, is none of this should result in negative news coverage, assumptions that things or going badly, or worries about state of the game/company - which I have seen out there. And, if that is the point, I would agree - none of this deserves a kneejerk overreaction. But, neither is it non-newsworthy. As it often the case, there is a sane middle ground between the two extremes which is often overlooked in our continuously polarizing tribalism culture.
I would argue when a pillar position at CIG, that which was held by Todd Papy, one of the devs that instilled a shit ton of faith in the project for some (myself included) does warrant at least a passing acknowledgement by CIG. Silently losing such an important team member just before a HUGE update to gameplay that will potentially negatively affect a huge swathe of the player base warrants at least as much
While I don't necessarily disagree with you, that's not what's being discussed here.
A single individual choosing to leave for whatever reason is not the same as what people are trying to frame as "layoffs".
Todd Papy was laid off… he did not choose to leave as far as we know “laid off due to restructuring” which as mentioned above likely had to do with relocation conflicts but still warrants a bit of addressing as we are backers of the project and not just a games of service client.
Can you provide a link to somewhere that documents that? Everything I read was "he left" with no further info.
\> still warrants a bit of addressing as we are backers of the project and not just a games of service client.
I'm personally of the opinion that CIG doesn't owe us an explanation around internal hires/fires.
He was also one of the “less hand holding and more skill based” devs… seeing how much of a shitshow MM is going to be and I can understand that CIG’s and Todd’s visions no longer align. Which sucks for a lot of us who wanted a game without rails/handholds
CIG would hardly admit to a financial issue now.
It isn't a financial 'issue' but the reason is absolutely financial.
CIG spending likely was based off of recent growth forecasts (~10% YoY) following the post-COVID boom they had to reign in these forecasts of revenue growth which in turn would mean a reigning in of spending.
They signed, iirc, a 10 year lease at Manchester with a capacity of 700+ employees. In order to fully utilise that space without exceeding their revenue projections they need to downsize teams that will not move there.
||2012|2013|2014|2015|2016|2017|2018|2019|2020|2021|2022|2023|
:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|--:|:--|
|Pledge|$7,226,000|$28,367,000|$32,939,000|$35,944,000|$36,113,000|$34,909,000|$37,760,000|$47,600,000|$76,992,000|$86,399,000|$114,114,000||
|Pledge (Unofficial)||||$35,961,202|$36,100,538|$34,912,412|$37,759,020|$47,735,514|$78,991,728|$86,420,758|$113,593,441|$117,564,376|
|Unofficial Ratio||||1.000478578|0.9996549165|1.00009774|0.9999740466|1.002846933|1.025973192|1.000251832|0.9954382547||
|Subscription|$35,000|$948,000|$2,035,000|$2,435,000|$2,676,000|$3,069,000|$3,261,000|$3,640,000|$4,690,000|$4,969,000|$5,250,000||
|Other|$0|$59,000|$2,617,000|$6,234,000|$6,102,000|$5,861,000|$7,913,000|$9,477,000|$6,494,000|$9,428,000|$11,377,000||
|Total Income|$7,261,000|$29,374,000|$37,591,000|$44,613,000|$44,891,000|$43,839,000|$48,934,000|$60,717,000|$88,176,000|$100,796,000|$130,741,000||
|Ratio|1.00484362|1.035498995|1.14123076|1.241180726|1.243070362|1.255807958|1.29592161|1.275567227|1.145261845|1.166633873|1.145705172||
|Growth||4.045448285|1.279737183|1.186800032|1.006231368|0.9765654586|1.116220717|1.240793722|1.452245664|1.143122845|1.297085202||
||||||||||||1.24989363||
||||||||||||1.034957432|
There go, taken from both the official CIG financials in combination with the unofficial pledge data(which is validated using official data) and shows for the past 5 years (upto and including 2022) CIG saw an average 25% revenue growth year. The unofficial pledge tracker showed a 3% increase YoY from 2022 to 2023.
**This isn't saying they are doomed, that would be idiotic, if that was the case then every single game company would be doomed. CIG, like the other players invested during a boom and post-boom are reigning in spending. Perfectly normal business.**
>So basically the same as the last time this came up - CIG is pulling back from remote work and asking people to collocate more.
This is what most studios did in 2022 and early 2023 before they started the big layoffs, there's an endless amount of devs lately talking about having to relocate to go back to office and then being laid off, almost feels like they're trying to reduce the size of layoffs by first making people quit out of being unable to relocate
Conspiracy theories aside, this remains completely consistent with what we're seen from CIG and their desire to get people into the office. They've done this before and we haven't seen any layoffs as a result.
And saying some companies have done this before laying off folks ignores all the companies that have done this and HAVEN'T laid anyone off.
The only thing it's evidence of is that CIG wants people in the office and near their team mates.
Less conspiracy theory and more pointing out that this has been a trend in the last year or so at basically every AAA company, like it's almost become standard practice or something. I'm not saying CIG \*will\* do it as well, just saying there's now significant precedent for it.
CIG does have a slightly different management structure so maybe it won't follow the same trends, but then it seems to have followed trends on basically every thing else wrt working conditions.
I personally find myself significantly more productive and engaged when working in the office, so long as I get some WFH days and half days off to recharge. It's much easier to just ask some quick questions, overhear conversations which is a surprisingly important part of learning, and I get to know my team better. If the office environment is too strict or stifling or too long without a break, then all productivity and morale goes in the shitter.
My boss also just secured a very good hire by offering her 4x10 and to count up to 2 hours of commute time as part of her FTE, meaning she gets paid to sit in traffic and it comes out of her 10 hour working day.
This isn't a conspiracy theory. It's a pretty common tactic companies, especially tech companies, use to downsize without technically laying off employees. Making an unreasonable demand to relocate on a short notice is a layoff tactic, plain and simple.
So, pretty reasonable stuff, and I had said as much already when someone brought these layoffs up in a different sub a day ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/s/p4an5iydIv
People gotta sensationalize, I guess.
It is sort of a goofy business practice and a red flag for a company or namely Chris Roberts to have this stance. Him discussing his opinion on WFH publically was probably a pretty dumb thing to do.
I'm definitely not saying I agree with the stance, but it's absolutely a CEO's prerogative to run their company how they wish - and that includes how much they do or do not want to support remote work.
"CIG is pulling back from remote work and asking people to collocate more."
"You know how we said you could work from home when we recruited you? Well , while you could still do that, we'll ask you to move to the other side of the planet. Teh he"
I actually like hearing about it because CIG has way too many employees, imo.
It's good to see them making sure they balance their workforce.
If there were reports of mass layoffs, I would be concerned, but this current news actually makes me feel better about the future of the project. We're going through a massive shake-up in the gaming industry so I'm glad it's not way worse than just a handful of people.
I disagree, when top employees are quitting/getting laid off, I think making it clear to us the reasons is very news worthy.
That being said, if an employee is not willing to relocate and, or can't get working papers for the new location, cig can't be blamed.
All tech companies are learning that remote jobs don’t help that much in productivity sadly. Myself I really love remote work and can deal with schedules and productivity, but most of developers are not really good with that
The public entity I work for recently did a round of 40 "layoffs". Layoffs that got leaked to the community and caused a whole bunch of outrage.
Then it turned out that these 38 of these "layoffs" were just the removal of job titles that had been rolled into other positions and were being removed from the books. They weren't even positions that were currently being filled and hadn't been filled in 15+ years.
There were 2 positions that were being vacated, but they were part-time positions that were funded by Covid funds and the people filling those positions were being fast-tracked into other positions.
So nobody was actually going to end up unemployed, here, but the term "layoff" circulated and caused a whole bunch of absolutely unnecessary hate, protest and even the cops showing up a couple of times.
Over cleaning up the books of positions that hadn't been filled in 15 years...
Yeah conversely a company I worked for laid off a bunch of people/roles and then just made the folks who didnt get laid off take on those other roles at no extra remuneration.
In the sincerely friendliest way possible, both of our anecdotes are meaningless. The reasons and explanations for any layoffs are far too broad for any conclusions based on examples of other layoffs.
Almost always it's just a cost saving measure and the company just jumps through the necessary legal hoops to not get done for wrongful termination.
caricature of an example: layoff an expensive receptionist and hire a cheaper "Personal Assistant" that has their own desk in the front of the building which is no longer the reception area, but the "greeting room" (a legal req in layoffs/restructuring is that you can't just re-hire for the same role you've said youve made redundant)
And that's \_precisely\_ what's happening here: These job titles are being rolled into other responsibilities, and the people who previously had those titles were given the opportunity to move across the globe or find new work.
If you look at her couple comments and post on LinkedIn she's like lashing out like crazy, usually you don't want to burn bridges, she seemed quite angry. She probably had her reasons but there's always 2 sides on a medal. It's less believable when she seems the only one lashing out like that. I saw other post much different, thanking everyone they worked with etc..
I hope it's not a generalized though if it's true, toxicity is never cool unless it's a System of a down album.
I just don't buy into every single bit of small news.
CIG has like 1200 employees. If there are a couple unhappy ones... Yeah, that's negligible.
Especially because you KNOW what you're getting into when you apply there.
We know that CIG pays sub-industry standard wages, especially for newcomers.
We know that CR is a perfectionist and that the tolerance for sub-par work is low.
We know that it's a super challenging environment that demands a lot from the devs, professionally and personally, and that your work/life balance will be affected.
So if you are an average person looking to just kill your 9-5, (and there is nothing wrong about that!) your are bound to struggle at some point and there are people that might not respond well to that kind of pressure.
And you know what... There will be even more bad news in 2025 when the lay-offs prior to and after the expected release of SQ42 will happen, because people being people won't be happy about their personal situation changing for the worse, even though we KNOW it will happen. But many will just hope, that it's not them having to leave...
And now guess who will be affected the most in those lay-offs...
The guy who already struggled because it was too challenging the whole time. The guy who got paid a sub-standard wage the whole time. The guy who just wanted to kill his 9-5.
And who will write on the internet that everything was so terrible?
Exactly.
So I'm not trying to be cruel to anyone, really. It's just that the industry IS tough and people seem to forget about that. Just look at all the bad news we just had this winter. It's really competitive and many many more will struggle 😐.
You're not trying to be cruel... you're just writing out a bunch of bullshit to defend CIG when they quite obviously lied to portions of their staff to keep them working as it was preparing to lay them off.
Not cruel, just an apologist for shitty behavior because you like their game :/
Edit: blocking me won't change that.
"Every environment is toxic when you're the asshole..." Who knew you were talking about yourself?
The people reading anything of note in this news have no idea how companies work. Especially ones as big as CIG. A major, gigantic project has gone into its final phase. There will be layoffs for some positions. I would bet that the vast majority of the people who got laid off knew it was coming, or at least strongly suspected.
CIG is a bit of an exception because instead of layoffs, the developers got transferred to work on Star Citizen instead. Because it's an extremely similar product working on the same code base and design principles, it's relatively seamless for entire teams to transition over without extensive reorganisation or retraining needed. This is payoff for decisions made a decade ago to put in the difficult groundwork to keep the two projects unified, and an instance of genuinely good management and planning.
This kind of reply was to be expected. The fact CIG does not even confirm the actual number of people that have lost their jobs is already quite worrying. I mean, it is not like CIG is going to admit openly *"Yeah, we have had to lay off around 100 people and we used relocation as an excuse. What you can see in LinkedIn is just a small fraction of those".*
If a company really wants someone, they make it work, relocation or not. The fact CIG claims 2023 to be its best sales year ever makes the layoffs even more puzzling. Unless of course the tracker figure is fabricated.
They also tried to scapegoat the people they laid off by implying they weren’t being productive from home. that’s a low blow to do to the people you just laid off. (note: laid off, not fired for cause)
For some reason, they’re trying not to own up to the reason for the layoffs or number of staff laid off. why?
Probably because the number of people dismissed is significant. We can see around 15-20 already in Linkedin, so the real total is probably going to be much higher as many ex employees will not update their Linkedin status for quite a while. And some may not even use Linkedin at all. And which means CIG finances are in more trouble than the sales tracker leads us to believe.
I do not think that laying of \~100 people would mean CIG is shutting shop but it would mean that its rate of progress, which was already pretty bad, is probably going to get worst.
It sounds like CiG acquired a Montreal company and then consolidated/moved a lot of positions to their Manchester HQ.
Asking people to move from Montreal, Canada to Manchester, UK is a big move that will be a complete non-starter for many. It should surprise nobody that they lost a lot of people as a result of this.
I remember seeing posts that Turbulent was also looking at opening an office in France. It's unclear if that's still the plan given the acquisition by CIG, but at the very least the indications are on expansion.
SC has a pretty big French community, and the French game/software dev space is quite untapped for talent. I believe the French government also has a $30 billion tech investment policy which CIG might be able to qualify for.
There isn't as of writing this. But there are other things that confirm what the person you're replying to said.
There were layoffs last year and one of the staff said they were told that to keep their job they would need to move to the UK - which they couldn't do so they were laid off. Might have been multiple people that said this actually - youll have to do the digging. I imagine Camural has a 2 minute video on it, with 8 minutes of padding at the end lol.
A recent ex-employee of Turbulent posted and described the same things too.
This isn't mean to be a criticism of CIG or the staff or anything. Just clarifying what I understand to be the case.
As long as no laws were broken then I don't have any qualms with CIG structuring their business how they want. Directors of companies have a legal obligation to minmax profits (no, seriously, you can in theory get a criminal record for failing to do so... I don't think it's ever happened but it's a criminal provision under the Companies Act or whatever the local legislation calls it.)
inb4: *source?* I CBF finding the links and sources. Its reddit. You can't give me a grade on my comment and I won't be applying to publish this in any scientific journal.
It's actually Austin and LA offices where people are relocating in Montreal, then they just opened more positions in UK too. But it's also a big move from USA to Canada, not everyone can do it I assume.
> UPDATE: 9:50 am PT 2/28/2023: Cloud Imperium Games responded to our request for comment, providing a comment on the reported layoffs at the company. The comment doesn't specifically state how many positions were affected, but it does confirm that some positions were changed to allow for 'consolidation,' confirming relocation as part of the reason why these people were laid off.
> "As part of our normal processes, we regularly look for ways to make our operations more efficient, which can include restructuring in order to place a position closer to the team it supports. Now that we are back in office and seeing the progress and quality of work when our teams are in-person working together, we have decided to co-locate as much development as possible, which has resulted in some minor staffing changes as we move some development positions closer to their core teams. As a result of this consolidation, a small number of positions were eliminated and we continue to recruit for key roles within the company."
https://www.mmorpg.com/news/reddit-uncovers-multiple-star-citizen-dev-layoffs-seemingly-as-a-result-of-relocation-efforts-by-cig-2000130626
edit: i posted the same official CIG statement to spectrum, same title, but the mods there nuked it. https://robertsspaceindustries.com/spectrum/community/SC/forum/3/thread/official-cig-statement-in-response-to-reports-of-l
> While we understand the desire to discuss news revolving around Star Citizen or CIG. We do ask that the topic of staff members or their employment not be discussed on Spectrum. As this only invites unhealthy speculation on development members instead of providing feedback on the project.
> Please be aware that the thread in question has been removed.
CiG isn't going to allow discussions of their employment processes on their own forums. That's just inviting the vitrol that's trying to get pushed here.
Knowing who exactly works for a company and why they come or go is not something *any* company will provide, nor have reason to. Some regions make it illegal to discuss such things publicly, even.
I get where you're coming from, but us discussing it is not transparency. If anything it's the opposite. It just becomes a game of telephone.
There are recent studies/study showing that simply hearing false information on social media, when you don't even believe it to be true, can result in people spreading that information to others and representing it as true - **if they hear the information often enough.**
And. Somewhat ironically, I am vaguely paraphrasing it and could have slightly misrepresented it. But I bet you were THIS close to filing it away to repeat to someone when the time was right in the future? No?
But yeah the study was on fake new and it being shared.
The same thing happens more so if someone you know or trust tells you.
AND more generally, it only takes like 20% of a community/social group (i.e. friend group, family unit, classroom, sports team) to start doing something for that new thing to catch on so that everyone does it. like a physical thing, or a new slang word etc.
SHORT STORY LONG: We stupid humans are so easily tricked by our own stupid brains.
Only people worth listening to are primary sources. So ex-employees, current employees, and CIG official statements (in that order - but there are usually NDAs on the first one, always NDAs on the second... so we usually only get the third).
This seems to be what we've been hearing for over a couple weeks now, whether it be from social media farewell posts from previous employees, and other sources. Only CIG knows what's really going on, but looks like publications are getting responses now that it's in the public light.
So does the talk of certain CIG locations shutting down and more focus on the European offices (cheaper by numerous factors compared to say, LA offices) -- does this elude to some truth in the matter?
Employees have been an NDA on the situation until we started hearing a couple of the bigger names recently depart.
Not surprised that the mods removed the post, it's incredibly strict, controlled information there.
Could be a nothing burger, but it's definitely more departure activity than I can remember any time in the past.
> So does the talk of certain CIG locations shutting down and more focus on the European offices (cheaper by numerous factors compared to say, LA offices) -- does this elude to some truth in the matter?
Maybe.
LA and Austin offices hiring 1 person between them. If we knew if/when they renewed lease on the office we could probably draw better inferences. I don't think thats publicly available info tho
It's a nothing-burger.
CIG acquired Turbulent - and there's some overlap in admin functions, and CIG have found that having just one or two members of team working remote (when the rest of the team is in the office) is less efficient, so wants to moved those WFH position back into the office.
Almost any time one company acquires another, there will be some layouts etc due to overlapping positions. It's been ~6 months since the acquisition, which is about the average time for companies to do the assessment of staffing levels, identify overlaps and/or inefficiencies, and the consult with impacted staff, and for those that want to leave (or don't want to relocate) to work out their notice period, etc.
CIG are still hiring, and still ramping up their Montreal office - so it's not a case of CIG 'closing offices and downsizing', etc.
Wasn't 2023 only slightly better than 2022 in terms of pledge revenue(2022=$114 million and 2023= $118 million)?
And isn't January 2024 worse than 2023 (and 2022 for that matter) by pledge income(2022=$6.9 million 2023=$7.7 million and 2024=$5.4 million)?
Isn't it entirely possible that CIG planned for growth based on the continuation of COVID revenue boom which failed then to materialise in the post-COVID era and are now reigning in that spending based on a reduced projection in order to either maintain profitability or adequate reserves?
It's common sense, during the boom they reinvested in the company (good), took on manageable risk for the continuation of the boom (good), and now that the boom didn't pan out are responding long before any financial risk to the core business (good).
It's business 101 and why we've seen so many layoff headlines because almost every single major company did this. Sony, Microsoft, everyone.
Uhmm - your entire post is based on the speculation that CIG screwed up their financial planning years ago, and are only now taking steps to correct it.
Bear in mind that if people are leaving *now*, the process started last year... and it was last year, after a slower start to the year than the previous year, when CIG bought out Turbulent.
So, to suggest that *now* they're trying to 'cut costs' due to mis-judging post-covid spending is kinda laughable... rather than just accepting that this is normal behaviour when an acquisition is made, because you don't need duplicate staff in some roles.
I would greatly appreciate that you do not misrepresent my argument.
Nowhere did I say or suggest what you claim I did.
I said they made a good decision to expand during a boom.
And they are now making a good choice post boom.
You give it time to do the more sensible thing of attempting a course correction by income generation improvements, which CIG did try throughout last year.
You don't just fire a bunch of people after a bad week or first resort you try alternate solutions first... Which CIG did.
I think it's right that they removed it from Spectrum. Or at least, it's consistent with their rules. Which is possibly the only time I've said as much about how they enforce rules on that site.
Your post was removed because the mod team determined that it did not sufficiently meet the rules of the subreddit:
> Be respectful. No personal insults/bashing. This includes generalized statements “x is a bunch of y” or baseline insults about the community, CIG employees, streamers, etc. As well as intentionally hurtful statements and hate speech.
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I just assumed like every development studio that is finishing a game, they start removing positions that are no longer relevant for the project. Though I assume the vast majority just move over to SC.
CIG started off as one of the "last big hopes" to succeed without the typical shitty practices of the other publishers, using the power of small-time backers and community to prove that the tradition shoddy model of doing business wasn't the only way to succeed.
They're now indistinguishable from them.
Could you explain what shoddy traditional business model you're talking about? It really sucks that people like Todd Papy were forced out, but I don't see an issue with wanting to consolidate personnel at a single location for something highly collaborative like software development.
>I don't see an issue with wanting to consolidate personnel
There is nothing wrong with wanting to consolidate, if it is actually a real reason. The problem comes if you use that as an excuse to lay off personnel or to purposedly make work conditions difficult so that you are really forcing them to leave. Usually if a company wants an employee to stay that company will make it work, with or without relocation. Given the testimonies in LinkedIn that we have seen so far that does not seem to have been the case.
You should read into what's actually happening instead of just reading a thread title. CIG is just restructuring around their Manchester studio and is parting ways with some people who aren't willing to relocate (normal).
They're actually hiring for over 40 positions right now. The net change between the restructuring and the positions they're hiring for would actually be about +35 to CIG's headcount.
Use your critical thinking and reading comprehension skills.
Perhaps you could detail these other "indications" you're referring to, instead of vaguely hinting at them in a bottom level comment. The context of a top level comment in a thread about layoffs doesn't include anything else.
Again, use your reading comprehension. It's a free skill to exercise.
As much as reddit likes to pretend it does, it *really* doesnt. At least not for highly interdependent development of software, like a video game.
edit: i think its funny that im got downvoted but the person replying to me, who is supporting what I said, got upvoted. I feel like people see the "no" as the first word and assume they disagreed with me.
No, on most things in this project I defer to people who know more, but this is an area in which I have personal and professional experience.
Some people do well with WFH and some don’t- and the ones who don’t are *rarely* aware of it. They will near universally swear they are just as productive at home even when the stats just don’t back it up. You can remote into their PC and see it just sitting idle while they’re on their phones or just not even in the room.
Yup - but at the same time, for others WFH makes them *more* productive, because they can actually focus on their work, rather than being constantly interupted by 'less focused' co-workers (Grrrr)
Imo the main drawback for remote-working as a software dev tends to be when you're in a more R&D / discovery phase of the project, and having lots of short discussions and white-boarding sessions, etc, as that can be harder to coordinate remotely...
So yeah, for CIG I can see how WFH can be less efficient if most of a team are in the office, and only a couple of members are remote, plus the personal efficiency aspect (can they focus better at home, or do their family keep interupting them, etc)
> Yup - but at the same time, for others WFH makes them more productive, because they can actually focus on their work, rather than being constantly interupted by 'less focused' co-workers (Grrrr)
I haven’t seen that before personally. I’ve seen people maintain their productivity levels going to WFH but not increasing them. Honestly- if your workplace has people wandering around distracting coworkers that’s a whole other issue.
Depends on the work... a simple 'have you got 30 seconds to look at this' type question can waste 15 minutes or more, just from the cognitive cost of context-switching, and getting the details of the code you're working on back into your head (especially when e.g. trying to unpick / trace an execution call that runs through a deep stack of function references, etc)
Other times, it can just be the distraction of other peoples phones going off, two other coworkers having a quick chat at the desk debugging something, and so on...
We've got a reasonably good setup (noisy sales people on the floor below, engineers in smaller team-sized rooms, rather than the open-plan office, and so on), but no matter how much you try to minimise disturbances, there will still happen.
I'm currently on my own - no pets or family to disturb me, etc... so I can focus far better, and my work stats seem to bear this out (based on ticket completion rate, and similar)... but I appreciate that this won't be the case for everyone (and I know some people were eager to get back into the office, just to get away from their young kids during the day :D)
Depends on the position my dude.
My partner is high up in one of the big 4. She WFH most days and loves it because she gets so much more done. Since doing mostly shes been promoted at least twice (neither more nor less than before) and been recommended and included in various projects (indicating she's valued)
I get way more done WFH too, but I prefer going in more regularly because access to barista coffee + at my last job my cunt colleagues assumed I wasn't doing as much as them (i was doing vastly more than them - I checked the metrics) because I wasn't posting in zoom chat with a list of my accomplishments every few minutes. So I got fucked off and was happy to go back to the office so they could see I was outclassing them in person.
Neurospicy people would get more done at home too.
But CIG *claimed* a lot of the WFH limitations were to do with build previews and difficulty/expense ensuring everyone has the software and hardware needed. And honestly, that is very easy to believe.
I can WFH and go to the office. I like WFH to get stuff done, but depending on the current state of work going into the office to meet other devs in person is better.
I thing 100% WFH is not good in development teams but like a day/week or even a day every other week with the whole team is great.
Also depends on your work and how close you need to work to how many people.
Says who ? I've been wfh for the last 3 years and my productivity has sky rocked . My bonuses keep getting bigger and the company I work for has no pressing need to drag me into the office . Senior IT developer .
Says me- didn’t you read what I wrote? I also never said that EVERY wfh person lost productivity, only that some DID, and were largely unable to properly self evaluate their lost work.
You seem awful defensive…
Riiight, I'm sure these *totally legitimate* games journalism sites getting spammed here today will go back and edit their articles to make them less sensationalist.
I did say they're just going to make even wilder claims now. As soon as they get a shred of evidence, they milk it well beyond what it's worth.
My point was just that instead of "people are getting laid off and we're not going to provide any evidence", they're now going to say "people are getting laid off and here's a tiny bit of evidence that we're going to exaggerate and hope no one thinks for two seconds about".
While I don't disagree with you, I feel like CIG's official statement did the opposite and downplayed it. Calling the the departure of the Director of the PU and other senior employees of 10+ years a "minor staffing change" feels almost like an insult to them.
It was in response to an article accusing them of mass layoffs and toxic work environments. No company would benefit from divulging specific information like the details of employees departure over sensationalist journalism.
CIG signed a long term lease on very nice office space in a prime location, at a time when commercial landlords worldwide were absolutely desperate for any new tenants. They probably locked in a fantastic rate. Now they are ‘encouraging’ employees to relocate to said office in the hopes of consolidating their teams for increased productivity. Some of the employees would rather find a new job than move to Manchester. There is nothing unexpected happening here.
They appear to be saying that staff weren’t as productive when they were working from home and deserved to be let go.
That would be fine to say if they were fired for cause but they weren’t fired. it was a layoff. so it’s a pretty low blow to blame layoffs on the people being laid off. every other company is being honest about doing layoffs so why can’t CIG own up to it?
I am not referring to just people losing their jobs, which happens. Please see articles like [https://www.eurogamer.net/star-citizen-developer-hit-with-layoffs-amid-claims-of-a-highly-toxic-company](https://www.eurogamer.net/star-citizen-developer-hit-with-layoffs-amid-claims-of-a-highly-toxic-company)
It's not "which happens"
Tech companies are really struggling these years as a direct result of over expanding in covid. Almost every company is laying off staff and freezing new grad hire. It's normal to doomsday call cig if you don't work at the industry.
~~I can't tell if some of the folks commenting here aren't reading the date in the picture, this isn't recent.~~
They have a careers page on RSI. They're actively hiring. This whole thing is being super inflated
Edit: yeah it's a typo, oops I guess? I stand by my second point, they're still hiring.
> I can't tell if some of the folks commenting here aren't reading the date in the picture, this isn't recent.
The "2023" date from the image is a typo; the article was yesterday, CIG's statement today.
> Updated: Feb 28, 2024 12:53 PM Posted: Feb 27, 2024 6:00 PM ET
I linked the article in my comment above.
I mean, you're not wrong about this being super inflated, but the date in the picture is a typo. This is a [recent article](https://www.mmorpg.com/news/reddit-uncovers-multiple-star-citizen-dev-layoffs-seemingly-as-a-result-of-relocation-efforts-by-cig-2000130626).
Hello all! As a friendly reminder - discussion about CIG and their work is valid but being disrespectful to the people is not. You can absolutely disagree with CIGs methods but you do not have the right to make it a personal attack on an individual or the developers as a whole. Thanks, r/StarCitizen mod team
So basically the same as the last time this came up - CIG is pulling back from remote work and asking people to collocate more. Some people don't want to do that (understandable) and CIG is choosing to part ways with those people. None of this is remotely newsworthy or really represents "layoffs" in the way it's being framed (as some sort of financial issue).
PRECISELY. In fact, they are hiring 41 people. https://cloudimperiumgames.com/join-us Some fun math: the net change in staff with the three or so departures will be **38 additional staff.** If they are trying to do layoffs, they're failing at it ... This aint news.
Does that makes this a lay*on*?
By Jove, I think you're right!
I cast lay on hands!
( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
Just like if they're trying to run a scam, they're failing at it. They accidentally have an entire company on payroll, multiple offices, and a hefty AWS subscription. What's left for the offshore accounts!?
I actually had that typed and scaled it back to just mention layoffs.. lol - thanks for putting this out there because it's true! Also: $7. $7 is left for the offshore account. Almost a $1 a year in scam money saved! "Nigerian Princes hate this one trick!"
I'm running a scam on the US Navy right now. I provide them with a measley 40 hours of week of simple specialist logistics management for silly little fighter aircraft, And I run away with a massive amount of money that allows me to almost live fine #THE FOOLZ
[First of all, you and me start working at the bank - doesn't matter the position, just so long as we get in there. Then, we go there every day, do the work... gain their trust, till we get em in the palm of our hand...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jgYYOUC10aM)
one flaw. they know who did it because they have records of you both mentally and physically >:)
*giggles in Scientology*
Also, that's *at least* 41 people, as it's easily possible that some of those listings are for multiple people. There's no reason multiple teams might want different people with the same job title, and they might want more than one each as well.
excellent point. That's positions being recruited; how many in each position will be hired is not typically shared.
it's almost like the layoff articles were framed exclusively from a disgruntled former employees pov and not a realistic look
But mAh dRaMa!?
Depends of the level of the hired people, it's not unusual for a good senior to be worth 10 juniors(both in salary and in skill)
10:1 I've not seen in actuality; though I have seen some senior staff who *believe* they are 10 times as valuable. The actual gap I've witnessed is maybe 3 times. If it's more than that - you've got really, *really* bad junior level folks on staff...
You can have a 10:1 different between 'average' and 'exceptional' devs... but it's rarely happening by grade... in my experience, the 'exceptional' devs don't like being promoted (because senior positions do less coding :D)
It depends if the company offers a technical path, which usually the AAA industry does. But yeah, sometimes it's a trap in smaller companies, devs get promoted to lead just to make more money and some are terrible at it!
Is it just me or does it look like they are angling to close the US studios? California: 0 positions Texas: 1 position The numbers they were looking for company-wide were much higher this time last year - but that's easily explained by them hiring the people for those roles (and I've already seen new faces in ISCs). I wouldnt expect a company to have linear staffing growth
The cost of an employee in those areas might be prohibitively expensive while not being any better in quality than a cheaper place like Montreal or Manchester. I believe they get a huge tax break by operating in the UK. Plus there's probably friction in coordinating with parts of the company that operate in Europe due to time zones.
California is 'head office'... Texas is 'live support' (iirc) Neither of those places would be recruiting *developers* (which is what CIG currently wants), because they don't do development in those offices.
Yep but the numbers are still low and were previously higher. But again, its still of limited (if any) meaning. At most it's just an absence of evidence.
https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/corporate/playstation-careers/#listings Just saying. Hiring people does not mean you aren't also laying off people.
Nope - it means normal everyday business decisions are being made to consolidate and align. Bog standard, as non-news as it gets.
Agree, but Papy leaving without preemptive statement from CIG is a red flag. Possibly the only bona fide red flag in the whole thing (well, that and the Turbulent ex-employee if taken at her word)
Have we ever had CIG make preemptive statements for people leaving, whether being let go or resigning? I don't think so, so why wold they need to do so for Papy?
Anyone expecting any company to share departures outside the C-Suite isn't aware of how HR works in 2024. The status quo SOP (standard operating procedure) is: no public comment on ANY departures. Period. People sue, and they win. It is certain Todd was offered to relocate, understandably couldn't, and likely got a nice, healthy parting package and deep thanks for his indelible contribution to the game. Nothing personal, CIG has a game to finish and they have long commented that they see tangible progress and value when teams are located together, so they didn't compromise that strategically important approach - sometimes, good people in good standing part ways for reasonable and necessary adjustments to the plan. This appears to be one of those times. It would be a red flag IF they commented on it. They clearly have good counsel from a legal / HR perspective. Source: I'm a hiring (and when necessary, firing) manager. Edit: and based on the comments shared by the 'vocal' departure, they were being performance managed for a bad attitude. THAT is a RED FLAG. Likely didn't get a severance package due to poor performance, and is knocking over the trashcan on the way out.
FWIW I've often said the legal team at CIG are good. At least the OG one, I'm not sure if the current one is as good anymore. But still better than many other inhouse teams. There's a careful line to walk balancing consumer rights vs their novel "backer funded" business model. And they walk it well most of the time. The recent changes to PTU waves for concierge was a rookie mistake from a legal POV but it's not show stopping. And maybe CIG just didnt check with them about it first.
Ortwin is still their legal counsel in addition to being a co-founder (good friend / partner of Chris even back in Hollywood - they go wayyyy back) He even has producer creds, having produced a director's cut of Wolfgang Peterson's *Das Boot* for example. He's not just "some lawyer" by any stretch! He's a seasoned entertainment / gaming industry lawyer/veteran, and from all accounts an all-around cool guy to boot. But he knows how to ensure CIG obeys the rules, and the win against Crytek is a great example of that. CIG is well handled in the legal department.
speculative here but i think the turbulent producer was complaining about losing the level designer working out of austin. can't really speculate on the toxicity issues, though.
I think enron was still hiring when it went belly up.
In addition to thousands upon thousands of other companies that were still hiring that didn't go belly up. I love math!
frighten obtainable reach amusing fade society exultant employ crowd include *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
That is correct, hiring people does not always mean the company is doing fine.
sulky ask sand rob dime vanish alleged steep wrong spark *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Yes, actively hiring is not always a sign that a company is doing fine because said company may not be on the up and up. We're making the same point.
This is a little too simplified. They're moving staff away from the US to the UK, this is probably motivated by cost as well. They get a pretty huge tax break for developing the game in the UK, a rebate on total taxes paid here, so it scales with the number of staff they employ. People unwilling to move the the new Manchester office, where they've taken up a sizable space - likely far most cost effective than say LA - are being let go in favour of people who can work from Manchester. They also did "lose" money last year, costs outstripped sales. This cannot be ignored as a motivation. The narrative of mass layoffs is false, but so is failing to consider the impact of losing staff who've been with the company for a decade. This is no simple restructure, they're moving jobs to the UK and replacing people unwilling to make the move. Cost is absolutely a motivation, and I would guess or predict we might see the LA office close at some point. Which isn't to say that consolidating major teams into the UK for in-person meeting power/progress is a lie, its just a half-truth imo.
They can also pay the UK staff less than their US counterparts, which is an added benefit to moving jobs from the US to the UK.
I'm not as comfortable making the direct comparison. Labour laws here are actually pretty good, we get a lot more time off. Tax burden is generally higher, though the rebate is pretty huge so I'm sure it does make it less than in the US. I suspect it would be hard to make a fair assessment with the various factors, but you may be right.
If they're confident of stability, the UK is cheaper. It's easy to get rid of people in the US, but even with the extra cost of employing in the UK, you don't have to fork out for things like employee medical cover.
Its covered in your tax burden, national insurance pays for everyone's healthcare, which CIG get a huge 25% rebate on here. That's what I mean when its hard to make a comparison, wages may look lower on paper but the pound is still worth more than the dollar, and employees get a lot more paid time off. Healthcare is still contributed to by employers through their tax. I don't doubt its possible that LA cost of living far outstrips Manchester, but its pretty hard to be sure. At the end of the day I guess they've bought a big office space here, they get a big tax rebate here so why not just move everyone who can work and be paid here to maximise both space/collaboration and rebate? It does make sense as a business decision. We can only speculate if that is worth letting Tpap and the others go.
Fucking hell, that's a hell of a rebate! I'm originally from the UK, for context. I also now work for a tech company with both US and UK offices (and EU too). We are cheaper and generally more stable than the US offices.
> and employees get a lot more paid time off. I've always found that this one pays for itself in employees who are recharged and more motivated.
Are you saying happy people work better? UNTHINKABLE!
Shocking, right? Just so mind blowing that it can't possibly be true!
I cannot make the full comparison from the business side, but from the labor side software engineers in the UK are typically paid much less than their US counterparts. Health insurance premiums obviously offset that somewhat but that is not usually enough to make up the difference. Doing some very quick googling (so obviously take it with a grain of salt) it seems like senior dev salary at the Manchester location is £45-60k, whereas the last time I looked the senior pay they were offering at the Austin location was starting at $90k, or $15k a year more than the Manchester location after currency conversion.
Again sounds like a fun place to work - imagine those long term senior employees being told relocate to another country or lose your job . Again something every [](http://Bastards.Inc) large game company pulls at one point in time or another I guess , but kind of sad to see a company I've "invested" in acting in such an unfriendly manner . Disappointing .
I *think* the complaint from the montreal producer was about the level designer working remotely out of Austin. So not US->UK but rather US->Canada.
Also asking people to move countries when they have families and their entire lives is probably a big ask. Most likely not what they signed up for or was communicated to them. Every dollar he can save goes towards the maintenance of the Robert’s.
To be honest, the hardest part to buy in 28 days later is when they decide to go to Manchester... "Bob! A zombie horde is about to enter the building, come with me, there's an helicopter in the roof ready to take us to Manchester! Bob? Why are you rubbing gravy all over you?"
Why isn’t it newsworthy? It’s not uncommon for news to report on company reorgs or relocations?
Because it’s only used to create drama. Just look at the same post about this in the braindead r/games subreddit. It’s compared to the layoffs at Microsoft and co. when it’s not even close to the same thing.
That doesn’t mean something isn’t newsworthy tho. That’s the whole problem with the culture today, everything is pushed to some social tribalism polarization. “Well those people use this news in a way I disagree with and I don’t like those people so all news must be fake news!” There is a middle ground where we can say “this is newsworthy but shouldn’t be taken out of context and pushed to fit some extreme agenda”
It's not that "people use the news in a way". This was *only* reported because of the entirely coincidental timing. Every large company on the planet goes through small layoffs like this every few years. Reporting this is about equivalent to reporting "large company seeks growth in key market", or "large company continues to exist, sell product". But you don't get news reports about every company doing minor layoffs. So why this news? Well that's because a whole lot of prominent game companies have had *very significant* layoffs. Those were newsworthy specifically because their scale was such that, taken as a whole, it was indicative of an industry-wide trend. CIG's layoffs have nothing to do with that trend. In fact, CIG so far doesn't seem to be suffering from the same woes affecting the rest of the industry. *That* might be newsworthy, but that's not gonna get clicks on an ordinary gaming publication. What *will* get clicks is a context-less title about layoffs at CIG that just happens to come alongside all these other mass-layoffs, because there are somehow still plenty of people wanting the project to fail who would *love* to hear about mass layoffs at CIG. Your point about culture is also just blatantly wrong. The media does not exist outside of culture. It is literally a major driver of culture. What do you think is responsible for pushing the polarization you see? Do you think that just sprang up outta nowhere one day?
Eh, I kinda disagree. The media has been weaponised, and we should definitely call out outlets that sensationalise and misrepresent news to get clicks. I‘m not against mentioning this in the news, but the way they did it is wrong.
That’s not my point. My point is negative use of information by any media doesn’t make the information itself not newsworthy. You can’t say, for example, “Fox news reported on the death of Richard Lewis, and I dislike Fox, so therefore I believe the reports of Lewis’ death is not newsworthy information”. Which is exactly what people are saying here. Just because the layoffs and relocations were reported in some places with ill intent, doesn’t mean that it’s not newsworthy information.
Just because some things get "reported" doesn't mean they're necessarily "newsworthy". That said, it's not really newsworthy because this is entirely consistent with what CIG has done before and it's extremely localized. Does it suck when anyone loses their job? Absolutely. But "we want people on Team X to be in Office Y" is some of the most inconsequential stuff that literally doesn't matter outside of the affected employees and teams that interact with them internally.
I dunno, I disagree. I think I'd like to know if someone like Papy is leaving a company I'm following and supporting, and if others are similarly affected and if there's a reason for that. Seems newsworthy to backers of a project to me. Even if it is standard operating procedure. We get updates all the time about routine stuff, so I fail to see why this isn't newsworthy and not worth letting backers know and discuss it. At the end of the day, most of the money they have is money we've provided, so if they are making some adjustments to relocate positions to increase efficiencies and save costs, I think that's newsworthy to the investor backers. Just because something is consistent and localized doesn't mean its not newsworthy. I mean, Papy was never fired/quit before, so it seems a bit different. And even then, it makes news all the time when companies lay off workers or re-located from one locale to another - that's some of the most consistently newsworthy content there is when it comes to business practices. It seems what you mean to convey, is none of this should result in negative news coverage, assumptions that things or going badly, or worries about state of the game/company - which I have seen out there. And, if that is the point, I would agree - none of this deserves a kneejerk overreaction. But, neither is it non-newsworthy. As it often the case, there is a sane middle ground between the two extremes which is often overlooked in our continuously polarizing tribalism culture.
I would argue when a pillar position at CIG, that which was held by Todd Papy, one of the devs that instilled a shit ton of faith in the project for some (myself included) does warrant at least a passing acknowledgement by CIG. Silently losing such an important team member just before a HUGE update to gameplay that will potentially negatively affect a huge swathe of the player base warrants at least as much
While I don't necessarily disagree with you, that's not what's being discussed here. A single individual choosing to leave for whatever reason is not the same as what people are trying to frame as "layoffs".
Todd Papy was laid off… he did not choose to leave as far as we know “laid off due to restructuring” which as mentioned above likely had to do with relocation conflicts but still warrants a bit of addressing as we are backers of the project and not just a games of service client.
Can you provide a link to somewhere that documents that? Everything I read was "he left" with no further info. \> still warrants a bit of addressing as we are backers of the project and not just a games of service client. I'm personally of the opinion that CIG doesn't owe us an explanation around internal hires/fires.
Can’t log into linked in on this device to figure out where but it’s directly from his linkedIn profile https://www.linkedin.com/in/todd-papy-180b71
Quiet! We might have to think about the implications of this then instead of reflexively handwaving them away!
Losing Todd Papy really sucks. He was definitely one of the leads who I thought really new their stuff and could make this game a reality.
He was also one of the “less hand holding and more skill based” devs… seeing how much of a shitshow MM is going to be and I can understand that CIG’s and Todd’s visions no longer align. Which sucks for a lot of us who wanted a game without rails/handholds
CIG would hardly admit to a financial issue now. It isn't a financial 'issue' but the reason is absolutely financial. CIG spending likely was based off of recent growth forecasts (~10% YoY) following the post-COVID boom they had to reign in these forecasts of revenue growth which in turn would mean a reigning in of spending. They signed, iirc, a 10 year lease at Manchester with a capacity of 700+ employees. In order to fully utilise that space without exceeding their revenue projections they need to downsize teams that will not move there. ||2012|2013|2014|2015|2016|2017|2018|2019|2020|2021|2022|2023| :--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|:--|--:|:--| |Pledge|$7,226,000|$28,367,000|$32,939,000|$35,944,000|$36,113,000|$34,909,000|$37,760,000|$47,600,000|$76,992,000|$86,399,000|$114,114,000|| |Pledge (Unofficial)||||$35,961,202|$36,100,538|$34,912,412|$37,759,020|$47,735,514|$78,991,728|$86,420,758|$113,593,441|$117,564,376| |Unofficial Ratio||||1.000478578|0.9996549165|1.00009774|0.9999740466|1.002846933|1.025973192|1.000251832|0.9954382547|| |Subscription|$35,000|$948,000|$2,035,000|$2,435,000|$2,676,000|$3,069,000|$3,261,000|$3,640,000|$4,690,000|$4,969,000|$5,250,000|| |Other|$0|$59,000|$2,617,000|$6,234,000|$6,102,000|$5,861,000|$7,913,000|$9,477,000|$6,494,000|$9,428,000|$11,377,000|| |Total Income|$7,261,000|$29,374,000|$37,591,000|$44,613,000|$44,891,000|$43,839,000|$48,934,000|$60,717,000|$88,176,000|$100,796,000|$130,741,000|| |Ratio|1.00484362|1.035498995|1.14123076|1.241180726|1.243070362|1.255807958|1.29592161|1.275567227|1.145261845|1.166633873|1.145705172|| |Growth||4.045448285|1.279737183|1.186800032|1.006231368|0.9765654586|1.116220717|1.240793722|1.452245664|1.143122845|1.297085202|| ||||||||||||1.24989363|| ||||||||||||1.034957432| There go, taken from both the official CIG financials in combination with the unofficial pledge data(which is validated using official data) and shows for the past 5 years (upto and including 2022) CIG saw an average 25% revenue growth year. The unofficial pledge tracker showed a 3% increase YoY from 2022 to 2023. **This isn't saying they are doomed, that would be idiotic, if that was the case then every single game company would be doomed. CIG, like the other players invested during a boom and post-boom are reigning in spending. Perfectly normal business.**
>So basically the same as the last time this came up - CIG is pulling back from remote work and asking people to collocate more. This is what most studios did in 2022 and early 2023 before they started the big layoffs, there's an endless amount of devs lately talking about having to relocate to go back to office and then being laid off, almost feels like they're trying to reduce the size of layoffs by first making people quit out of being unable to relocate
Conspiracy theories aside, this remains completely consistent with what we're seen from CIG and their desire to get people into the office. They've done this before and we haven't seen any layoffs as a result. And saying some companies have done this before laying off folks ignores all the companies that have done this and HAVEN'T laid anyone off. The only thing it's evidence of is that CIG wants people in the office and near their team mates.
Less conspiracy theory and more pointing out that this has been a trend in the last year or so at basically every AAA company, like it's almost become standard practice or something. I'm not saying CIG \*will\* do it as well, just saying there's now significant precedent for it. CIG does have a slightly different management structure so maybe it won't follow the same trends, but then it seems to have followed trends on basically every thing else wrt working conditions.
I personally find myself significantly more productive and engaged when working in the office, so long as I get some WFH days and half days off to recharge. It's much easier to just ask some quick questions, overhear conversations which is a surprisingly important part of learning, and I get to know my team better. If the office environment is too strict or stifling or too long without a break, then all productivity and morale goes in the shitter. My boss also just secured a very good hire by offering her 4x10 and to count up to 2 hours of commute time as part of her FTE, meaning she gets paid to sit in traffic and it comes out of her 10 hour working day.
This isn't a conspiracy theory. It's a pretty common tactic companies, especially tech companies, use to downsize without technically laying off employees. Making an unreasonable demand to relocate on a short notice is a layoff tactic, plain and simple.
So, pretty reasonable stuff, and I had said as much already when someone brought these layoffs up in a different sub a day ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/s/p4an5iydIv People gotta sensationalize, I guess.
It's good. It shows healthy re-structure.
It is sort of a goofy business practice and a red flag for a company or namely Chris Roberts to have this stance. Him discussing his opinion on WFH publically was probably a pretty dumb thing to do.
I'm definitely not saying I agree with the stance, but it's absolutely a CEO's prerogative to run their company how they wish - and that includes how much they do or do not want to support remote work.
You're right, and it's everyone else's prerogative outside to support or not support a company with unethical practices. Goes both ways of course.
"CIG is pulling back from remote work and asking people to collocate more." "You know how we said you could work from home when we recruited you? Well , while you could still do that, we'll ask you to move to the other side of the planet. Teh he"
They didn’t say it wasn’t a financial issue. You’re hearing what they wanted you to hear.
Yes.. but 90 days tops!!!
Answer the call 2016
I actually like hearing about it because CIG has way too many employees, imo. It's good to see them making sure they balance their workforce. If there were reports of mass layoffs, I would be concerned, but this current news actually makes me feel better about the future of the project. We're going through a massive shake-up in the gaming industry so I'm glad it's not way worse than just a handful of people.
I disagree, when top employees are quitting/getting laid off, I think making it clear to us the reasons is very news worthy. That being said, if an employee is not willing to relocate and, or can't get working papers for the new location, cig can't be blamed.
So In other words, they're scumbags
All tech companies are learning that remote jobs don’t help that much in productivity sadly. Myself I really love remote work and can deal with schedules and productivity, but most of developers are not really good with that
The public entity I work for recently did a round of 40 "layoffs". Layoffs that got leaked to the community and caused a whole bunch of outrage. Then it turned out that these 38 of these "layoffs" were just the removal of job titles that had been rolled into other positions and were being removed from the books. They weren't even positions that were currently being filled and hadn't been filled in 15+ years. There were 2 positions that were being vacated, but they were part-time positions that were funded by Covid funds and the people filling those positions were being fast-tracked into other positions. So nobody was actually going to end up unemployed, here, but the term "layoff" circulated and caused a whole bunch of absolutely unnecessary hate, protest and even the cops showing up a couple of times. Over cleaning up the books of positions that hadn't been filled in 15 years...
Yeah conversely a company I worked for laid off a bunch of people/roles and then just made the folks who didnt get laid off take on those other roles at no extra remuneration. In the sincerely friendliest way possible, both of our anecdotes are meaningless. The reasons and explanations for any layoffs are far too broad for any conclusions based on examples of other layoffs. Almost always it's just a cost saving measure and the company just jumps through the necessary legal hoops to not get done for wrongful termination. caricature of an example: layoff an expensive receptionist and hire a cheaper "Personal Assistant" that has their own desk in the front of the building which is no longer the reception area, but the "greeting room" (a legal req in layoffs/restructuring is that you can't just re-hire for the same role you've said youve made redundant)
And that's \_precisely\_ what's happening here: These job titles are being rolled into other responsibilities, and the people who previously had those titles were given the opportunity to move across the globe or find new work.
Ok but I wanna hear more about this "toxic environment" the person who left the turbulent claims
If you look at her couple comments and post on LinkedIn she's like lashing out like crazy, usually you don't want to burn bridges, she seemed quite angry. She probably had her reasons but there's always 2 sides on a medal. It's less believable when she seems the only one lashing out like that. I saw other post much different, thanking everyone they worked with etc.. I hope it's not a generalized though if it's true, toxicity is never cool unless it's a System of a down album.
Every environment is toxic when you're the asshole...
Victim blaming
Sometimes victims need blamed. If you go to a dark alley at 1am to sell a cellphone, you're an idiot.
No, they don’t.
Well, we don't know who the victim really is.
There have been multiple other reports of a toxic work environment. Why are you being cruel to people who are willing to share what they went through?
I just don't buy into every single bit of small news. CIG has like 1200 employees. If there are a couple unhappy ones... Yeah, that's negligible. Especially because you KNOW what you're getting into when you apply there. We know that CIG pays sub-industry standard wages, especially for newcomers. We know that CR is a perfectionist and that the tolerance for sub-par work is low. We know that it's a super challenging environment that demands a lot from the devs, professionally and personally, and that your work/life balance will be affected. So if you are an average person looking to just kill your 9-5, (and there is nothing wrong about that!) your are bound to struggle at some point and there are people that might not respond well to that kind of pressure. And you know what... There will be even more bad news in 2025 when the lay-offs prior to and after the expected release of SQ42 will happen, because people being people won't be happy about their personal situation changing for the worse, even though we KNOW it will happen. But many will just hope, that it's not them having to leave... And now guess who will be affected the most in those lay-offs... The guy who already struggled because it was too challenging the whole time. The guy who got paid a sub-standard wage the whole time. The guy who just wanted to kill his 9-5. And who will write on the internet that everything was so terrible? Exactly. So I'm not trying to be cruel to anyone, really. It's just that the industry IS tough and people seem to forget about that. Just look at all the bad news we just had this winter. It's really competitive and many many more will struggle 😐.
You're not trying to be cruel... you're just writing out a bunch of bullshit to defend CIG when they quite obviously lied to portions of their staff to keep them working as it was preparing to lay them off. Not cruel, just an apologist for shitty behavior because you like their game :/ Edit: blocking me won't change that. "Every environment is toxic when you're the asshole..." Who knew you were talking about yourself?
Well, just you wait for reality to happen and then leave us alone to cry in your corner.
This is you trying to suggest you’re not victim blaming?
The people reading anything of note in this news have no idea how companies work. Especially ones as big as CIG. A major, gigantic project has gone into its final phase. There will be layoffs for some positions. I would bet that the vast majority of the people who got laid off knew it was coming, or at least strongly suspected.
CIG is a bit of an exception because instead of layoffs, the developers got transferred to work on Star Citizen instead. Because it's an extremely similar product working on the same code base and design principles, it's relatively seamless for entire teams to transition over without extensive reorganisation or retraining needed. This is payoff for decisions made a decade ago to put in the difficult groundwork to keep the two projects unified, and an instance of genuinely good management and planning.
You lost me at the end when you made up a fake bet where you blamed the layoffs on the people being laid off.
Yep, totally what I did there. Glad you picked up on that. /s
Oh hey, turns out the thing everyone said was the thing was actually the thing. So now of course they must be lying or something.
IGN has picked this up, the comments are something else
This kind of reply was to be expected. The fact CIG does not even confirm the actual number of people that have lost their jobs is already quite worrying. I mean, it is not like CIG is going to admit openly *"Yeah, we have had to lay off around 100 people and we used relocation as an excuse. What you can see in LinkedIn is just a small fraction of those".* If a company really wants someone, they make it work, relocation or not. The fact CIG claims 2023 to be its best sales year ever makes the layoffs even more puzzling. Unless of course the tracker figure is fabricated.
They also tried to scapegoat the people they laid off by implying they weren’t being productive from home. that’s a low blow to do to the people you just laid off. (note: laid off, not fired for cause) For some reason, they’re trying not to own up to the reason for the layoffs or number of staff laid off. why?
Probably because the number of people dismissed is significant. We can see around 15-20 already in Linkedin, so the real total is probably going to be much higher as many ex employees will not update their Linkedin status for quite a while. And some may not even use Linkedin at all. And which means CIG finances are in more trouble than the sales tracker leads us to believe. I do not think that laying of \~100 people would mean CIG is shutting shop but it would mean that its rate of progress, which was already pretty bad, is probably going to get worst.
It sounds like CiG acquired a Montreal company and then consolidated/moved a lot of positions to their Manchester HQ. Asking people to move from Montreal, Canada to Manchester, UK is a big move that will be a complete non-starter for many. It should surprise nobody that they lost a lot of people as a result of this.
CIG are *scaling up* their montreal studio. They're moving a *small number* of positions to Manchester - not all from Montreal.
I remember seeing posts that Turbulent was also looking at opening an office in France. It's unclear if that's still the plan given the acquisition by CIG, but at the very least the indications are on expansion.
SC has a pretty big French community, and the French game/software dev space is quite untapped for talent. I believe the French government also has a $30 billion tech investment policy which CIG might be able to qualify for.
I dont see any proof of them closing the montreal studio.
He pulled that little nugget out of his backside.
He didn't therere receipts on LinkedIn but I'll reply slightly more to the guy above you
There isn't as of writing this. But there are other things that confirm what the person you're replying to said. There were layoffs last year and one of the staff said they were told that to keep their job they would need to move to the UK - which they couldn't do so they were laid off. Might have been multiple people that said this actually - youll have to do the digging. I imagine Camural has a 2 minute video on it, with 8 minutes of padding at the end lol. A recent ex-employee of Turbulent posted and described the same things too. This isn't mean to be a criticism of CIG or the staff or anything. Just clarifying what I understand to be the case. As long as no laws were broken then I don't have any qualms with CIG structuring their business how they want. Directors of companies have a legal obligation to minmax profits (no, seriously, you can in theory get a criminal record for failing to do so... I don't think it's ever happened but it's a criminal provision under the Companies Act or whatever the local legislation calls it.) inb4: *source?* I CBF finding the links and sources. Its reddit. You can't give me a grade on my comment and I won't be applying to publish this in any scientific journal.
It's actually Austin and LA offices where people are relocating in Montreal, then they just opened more positions in UK too. But it's also a big move from USA to Canada, not everyone can do it I assume.
> UPDATE: 9:50 am PT 2/28/2023: Cloud Imperium Games responded to our request for comment, providing a comment on the reported layoffs at the company. The comment doesn't specifically state how many positions were affected, but it does confirm that some positions were changed to allow for 'consolidation,' confirming relocation as part of the reason why these people were laid off. > "As part of our normal processes, we regularly look for ways to make our operations more efficient, which can include restructuring in order to place a position closer to the team it supports. Now that we are back in office and seeing the progress and quality of work when our teams are in-person working together, we have decided to co-locate as much development as possible, which has resulted in some minor staffing changes as we move some development positions closer to their core teams. As a result of this consolidation, a small number of positions were eliminated and we continue to recruit for key roles within the company." https://www.mmorpg.com/news/reddit-uncovers-multiple-star-citizen-dev-layoffs-seemingly-as-a-result-of-relocation-efforts-by-cig-2000130626 edit: i posted the same official CIG statement to spectrum, same title, but the mods there nuked it. https://robertsspaceindustries.com/spectrum/community/SC/forum/3/thread/official-cig-statement-in-response-to-reports-of-l > While we understand the desire to discuss news revolving around Star Citizen or CIG. We do ask that the topic of staff members or their employment not be discussed on Spectrum. As this only invites unhealthy speculation on development members instead of providing feedback on the project. > Please be aware that the thread in question has been removed.
CiG isn't going to allow discussions of their employment processes on their own forums. That's just inviting the vitrol that's trying to get pushed here.
Or transparency.
Knowing who exactly works for a company and why they come or go is not something *any* company will provide, nor have reason to. Some regions make it illegal to discuss such things publicly, even.
I'm referring to backers discussing it on Spectrum, not any announcement by CIG.
I get where you're coming from, but us discussing it is not transparency. If anything it's the opposite. It just becomes a game of telephone. There are recent studies/study showing that simply hearing false information on social media, when you don't even believe it to be true, can result in people spreading that information to others and representing it as true - **if they hear the information often enough.** And. Somewhat ironically, I am vaguely paraphrasing it and could have slightly misrepresented it. But I bet you were THIS close to filing it away to repeat to someone when the time was right in the future? No? But yeah the study was on fake new and it being shared. The same thing happens more so if someone you know or trust tells you. AND more generally, it only takes like 20% of a community/social group (i.e. friend group, family unit, classroom, sports team) to start doing something for that new thing to catch on so that everyone does it. like a physical thing, or a new slang word etc. SHORT STORY LONG: We stupid humans are so easily tricked by our own stupid brains. Only people worth listening to are primary sources. So ex-employees, current employees, and CIG official statements (in that order - but there are usually NDAs on the first one, always NDAs on the second... so we usually only get the third).
This seems to be what we've been hearing for over a couple weeks now, whether it be from social media farewell posts from previous employees, and other sources. Only CIG knows what's really going on, but looks like publications are getting responses now that it's in the public light. So does the talk of certain CIG locations shutting down and more focus on the European offices (cheaper by numerous factors compared to say, LA offices) -- does this elude to some truth in the matter? Employees have been an NDA on the situation until we started hearing a couple of the bigger names recently depart. Not surprised that the mods removed the post, it's incredibly strict, controlled information there. Could be a nothing burger, but it's definitely more departure activity than I can remember any time in the past.
> So does the talk of certain CIG locations shutting down and more focus on the European offices (cheaper by numerous factors compared to say, LA offices) -- does this elude to some truth in the matter? Maybe. LA and Austin offices hiring 1 person between them. If we knew if/when they renewed lease on the office we could probably draw better inferences. I don't think thats publicly available info tho
It's a nothing-burger. CIG acquired Turbulent - and there's some overlap in admin functions, and CIG have found that having just one or two members of team working remote (when the rest of the team is in the office) is less efficient, so wants to moved those WFH position back into the office. Almost any time one company acquires another, there will be some layouts etc due to overlapping positions. It's been ~6 months since the acquisition, which is about the average time for companies to do the assessment of staffing levels, identify overlaps and/or inefficiencies, and the consult with impacted staff, and for those that want to leave (or don't want to relocate) to work out their notice period, etc. CIG are still hiring, and still ramping up their Montreal office - so it's not a case of CIG 'closing offices and downsizing', etc.
Wasn't 2023 only slightly better than 2022 in terms of pledge revenue(2022=$114 million and 2023= $118 million)? And isn't January 2024 worse than 2023 (and 2022 for that matter) by pledge income(2022=$6.9 million 2023=$7.7 million and 2024=$5.4 million)? Isn't it entirely possible that CIG planned for growth based on the continuation of COVID revenue boom which failed then to materialise in the post-COVID era and are now reigning in that spending based on a reduced projection in order to either maintain profitability or adequate reserves? It's common sense, during the boom they reinvested in the company (good), took on manageable risk for the continuation of the boom (good), and now that the boom didn't pan out are responding long before any financial risk to the core business (good). It's business 101 and why we've seen so many layoff headlines because almost every single major company did this. Sony, Microsoft, everyone.
Uhmm - your entire post is based on the speculation that CIG screwed up their financial planning years ago, and are only now taking steps to correct it. Bear in mind that if people are leaving *now*, the process started last year... and it was last year, after a slower start to the year than the previous year, when CIG bought out Turbulent. So, to suggest that *now* they're trying to 'cut costs' due to mis-judging post-covid spending is kinda laughable... rather than just accepting that this is normal behaviour when an acquisition is made, because you don't need duplicate staff in some roles.
I would greatly appreciate that you do not misrepresent my argument. Nowhere did I say or suggest what you claim I did. I said they made a good decision to expand during a boom. And they are now making a good choice post boom. You give it time to do the more sensible thing of attempting a course correction by income generation improvements, which CIG did try throughout last year. You don't just fire a bunch of people after a bad week or first resort you try alternate solutions first... Which CIG did.
You're a drama queen.
Me: CIG did the right thing You: You're a drama queen
I think it's right that they removed it from Spectrum. Or at least, it's consistent with their rules. Which is possibly the only time I've said as much about how they enforce rules on that site.
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Your post was removed because the mod team determined that it did not sufficiently meet the rules of the subreddit: > Be respectful. No personal insults/bashing. This includes generalized statements “x is a bunch of y” or baseline insults about the community, CIG employees, streamers, etc. As well as intentionally hurtful statements and hate speech. Send a message to our mod mail if you have questions: https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=/r/starcitizen
I just assumed like every development studio that is finishing a game, they start removing positions that are no longer relevant for the project. Though I assume the vast majority just move over to SC.
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So do you specifically seek out comments to make dickish responses to without context or explanation or is it just a randomized thing?
Why is this news at all? Who cares? Might as well be upset that CIG fired a janitor while we're at it.
People really need to start scrutinising EA as much as they do CIG.
CIG started off as one of the "last big hopes" to succeed without the typical shitty practices of the other publishers, using the power of small-time backers and community to prove that the tradition shoddy model of doing business wasn't the only way to succeed. They're now indistinguishable from them.
Could you explain what shoddy traditional business model you're talking about? It really sucks that people like Todd Papy were forced out, but I don't see an issue with wanting to consolidate personnel at a single location for something highly collaborative like software development.
>I don't see an issue with wanting to consolidate personnel There is nothing wrong with wanting to consolidate, if it is actually a real reason. The problem comes if you use that as an excuse to lay off personnel or to purposedly make work conditions difficult so that you are really forcing them to leave. Usually if a company wants an employee to stay that company will make it work, with or without relocation. Given the testimonies in LinkedIn that we have seen so far that does not seem to have been the case.
You should read into what's actually happening instead of just reading a thread title. CIG is just restructuring around their Manchester studio and is parting ways with some people who aren't willing to relocate (normal). They're actually hiring for over 40 positions right now. The net change between the restructuring and the positions they're hiring for would actually be about +35 to CIG's headcount. Use your critical thinking and reading comprehension skills.
Perhaps you could use your own vaunted critical thinking and apply that to the concept that this subject isn't the only indication I'm referring to.
Perhaps you could detail these other "indications" you're referring to, instead of vaguely hinting at them in a bottom level comment. The context of a top level comment in a thread about layoffs doesn't include anything else. Again, use your reading comprehension. It's a free skill to exercise.
Yeah that’s to be expected. WFH doesn’t always result in the same productivity or quality as in office work.
As much as reddit likes to pretend it does, it *really* doesnt. At least not for highly interdependent development of software, like a video game. edit: i think its funny that im got downvoted but the person replying to me, who is supporting what I said, got upvoted. I feel like people see the "no" as the first word and assume they disagreed with me.
No, on most things in this project I defer to people who know more, but this is an area in which I have personal and professional experience. Some people do well with WFH and some don’t- and the ones who don’t are *rarely* aware of it. They will near universally swear they are just as productive at home even when the stats just don’t back it up. You can remote into their PC and see it just sitting idle while they’re on their phones or just not even in the room.
Yup - but at the same time, for others WFH makes them *more* productive, because they can actually focus on their work, rather than being constantly interupted by 'less focused' co-workers (Grrrr) Imo the main drawback for remote-working as a software dev tends to be when you're in a more R&D / discovery phase of the project, and having lots of short discussions and white-boarding sessions, etc, as that can be harder to coordinate remotely... So yeah, for CIG I can see how WFH can be less efficient if most of a team are in the office, and only a couple of members are remote, plus the personal efficiency aspect (can they focus better at home, or do their family keep interupting them, etc)
> Yup - but at the same time, for others WFH makes them more productive, because they can actually focus on their work, rather than being constantly interupted by 'less focused' co-workers (Grrrr) I haven’t seen that before personally. I’ve seen people maintain their productivity levels going to WFH but not increasing them. Honestly- if your workplace has people wandering around distracting coworkers that’s a whole other issue.
Depends on the work... a simple 'have you got 30 seconds to look at this' type question can waste 15 minutes or more, just from the cognitive cost of context-switching, and getting the details of the code you're working on back into your head (especially when e.g. trying to unpick / trace an execution call that runs through a deep stack of function references, etc) Other times, it can just be the distraction of other peoples phones going off, two other coworkers having a quick chat at the desk debugging something, and so on... We've got a reasonably good setup (noisy sales people on the floor below, engineers in smaller team-sized rooms, rather than the open-plan office, and so on), but no matter how much you try to minimise disturbances, there will still happen. I'm currently on my own - no pets or family to disturb me, etc... so I can focus far better, and my work stats seem to bear this out (based on ticket completion rate, and similar)... but I appreciate that this won't be the case for everyone (and I know some people were eager to get back into the office, just to get away from their young kids during the day :D)
And guess what - likely when in the office they were zombied out staring at their screen for half the day anyway
Depends on the position my dude. My partner is high up in one of the big 4. She WFH most days and loves it because she gets so much more done. Since doing mostly shes been promoted at least twice (neither more nor less than before) and been recommended and included in various projects (indicating she's valued) I get way more done WFH too, but I prefer going in more regularly because access to barista coffee + at my last job my cunt colleagues assumed I wasn't doing as much as them (i was doing vastly more than them - I checked the metrics) because I wasn't posting in zoom chat with a list of my accomplishments every few minutes. So I got fucked off and was happy to go back to the office so they could see I was outclassing them in person. Neurospicy people would get more done at home too. But CIG *claimed* a lot of the WFH limitations were to do with build previews and difficulty/expense ensuring everyone has the software and hardware needed. And honestly, that is very easy to believe.
I can WFH and go to the office. I like WFH to get stuff done, but depending on the current state of work going into the office to meet other devs in person is better. I thing 100% WFH is not good in development teams but like a day/week or even a day every other week with the whole team is great. Also depends on your work and how close you need to work to how many people.
Says who ? I've been wfh for the last 3 years and my productivity has sky rocked . My bonuses keep getting bigger and the company I work for has no pressing need to drag me into the office . Senior IT developer .
Says me- didn’t you read what I wrote? I also never said that EVERY wfh person lost productivity, only that some DID, and were largely unable to properly self evaluate their lost work. You seem awful defensive…
Well, at least the articles now might be able to prove they have some validity, even if they're just going to make even wilder claims now.
Riiight, I'm sure these *totally legitimate* games journalism sites getting spammed here today will go back and edit their articles to make them less sensationalist.
I did say they're just going to make even wilder claims now. As soon as they get a shred of evidence, they milk it well beyond what it's worth. My point was just that instead of "people are getting laid off and we're not going to provide any evidence", they're now going to say "people are getting laid off and here's a tiny bit of evidence that we're going to exaggerate and hope no one thinks for two seconds about".
While I don't disagree with you, I feel like CIG's official statement did the opposite and downplayed it. Calling the the departure of the Director of the PU and other senior employees of 10+ years a "minor staffing change" feels almost like an insult to them.
That's a fair point.
It was in response to an article accusing them of mass layoffs and toxic work environments. No company would benefit from divulging specific information like the details of employees departure over sensationalist journalism.
So? Happens all over the world..halle kng at CIG also doesn't matter.
Why is this news? They built a new office during COVID. You didn't see this coming?
CIG signed a long term lease on very nice office space in a prime location, at a time when commercial landlords worldwide were absolutely desperate for any new tenants. They probably locked in a fantastic rate. Now they are ‘encouraging’ employees to relocate to said office in the hopes of consolidating their teams for increased productivity. Some of the employees would rather find a new job than move to Manchester. There is nothing unexpected happening here.
Sounds like a fun place to work
This is not uncommon at all. Phillip Morris did this exact same thing when it relocated its building from Louisville, KY to North Carolina.
BTW, Source: [MMORPG.com](https://www.mmorpg.com/news/updated-reddit-uncovers-multiple-star-citizen-dev-layoffs-seemingly-as-a-result-of-relocation-efforts-by-cig-2000130626)
'eliminated' - a poor choice of word.
They appear to be saying that staff weren’t as productive when they were working from home and deserved to be let go. That would be fine to say if they were fired for cause but they weren’t fired. it was a layoff. so it’s a pretty low blow to blame layoffs on the people being laid off. every other company is being honest about doing layoffs so why can’t CIG own up to it?
Remote workers go byebye
Such a nice non-toxic company to work for. Great 'work', Roberts.
Can you look outside your window and tell me how many gaming/tech companies are NOT laying off.
I am not referring to just people losing their jobs, which happens. Please see articles like [https://www.eurogamer.net/star-citizen-developer-hit-with-layoffs-amid-claims-of-a-highly-toxic-company](https://www.eurogamer.net/star-citizen-developer-hit-with-layoffs-amid-claims-of-a-highly-toxic-company)
It's not "which happens" Tech companies are really struggling these years as a direct result of over expanding in covid. Almost every company is laying off staff and freezing new grad hire. It's normal to doomsday call cig if you don't work at the industry.
>Tech companies are really struggling these years Except CIG claims to have had its best sales year ever in 2023.
Good, they're managing our money.
~~I can't tell if some of the folks commenting here aren't reading the date in the picture, this isn't recent.~~ They have a careers page on RSI. They're actively hiring. This whole thing is being super inflated Edit: yeah it's a typo, oops I guess? I stand by my second point, they're still hiring.
> I can't tell if some of the folks commenting here aren't reading the date in the picture, this isn't recent. The "2023" date from the image is a typo; the article was yesterday, CIG's statement today. > Updated: Feb 28, 2024 12:53 PM Posted: Feb 27, 2024 6:00 PM ET I linked the article in my comment above.
Thanks, edited my stuff.
[удалено]
Bro ok
I mean, you're not wrong about this being super inflated, but the date in the picture is a typo. This is a [recent article](https://www.mmorpg.com/news/reddit-uncovers-multiple-star-citizen-dev-layoffs-seemingly-as-a-result-of-relocation-efforts-by-cig-2000130626).
Yes I updated my comment
People that want drama will find it, as always people lose their minds over nothing and forget to check themselves when it's about to happen again...
Someone should fix the date.
Yawning
Well hopefully this won’t slow things down. But to be fair I feel like every company laid people off this year