Report: Unity continues mass layoffs with 'abrupt' communications and 5am emails
'Unity must do better in how they treat their workers in hard times.'
Here's a summary of my take on this situation: 🤬
There's no need for Unity anymore. Godot is excellent for at least 2D games the same way Unity used to be. Unreal is easy to pick up for 3D. GameMaker Studio is going strong.
Godot is great for a lot of 3D as well, just don’t expect Triple A level graphics.
The exact reason I have to deal with unity for a specific project.
And now its already built, so stuck with it for a while.
GameMaker Studio is going strong.
Now that is a name I haven't heard in a very long time
Unreal is easy to pick up for 3D.
Unreal Engine 1.5 - yeah, maybe. Definitely not UE5. It's one of the most complicated, convoluted and heavyweight systems in existence. Just engine itself is 100gb+ download, opening it the first time takes 30m to compile shaders. Just reading briefly through gtlf import dialog took me like 10minutes.
UE is a beast to run (and has incredibly shitty linux support if you want to use the marketplace or any plugins...). But basically everything you listed is a one time cost or just an indicator that you probably shouldn't be developing medium fidelity 3d games on a potato.
Honestly? For "hobbyist" 3d games, Unity is still the king. Godot is awesome but a lot of the core loops and flows are very much geared with 2D first and the performance of 3D games is a hotly contested issue. I would still say that Godot's 3D "performance" is better than Unreal's 2D but... that is an incredibly low bar.
And in terms of workflows? UE is more than a bit convoluted but with stuff like blueprints it is probably the most consistent tool out there (so long as you never try to do a 2D game). Unity is a distant second. And Godot is great but it also reeks of an open source project that is being designed and redesigned in real time (just look at how file IDs are handled...). Not the end of the world if you understand the core concepts but also not something people are generally going to learn without a lot of trips to the forums (or watching youtubes of people who did said trips for them).
I am a big supporter of godot but... it is incredibly tacky to run into a thread about layoffs and basically say "Good, they shouldn't have jobs. Use this instead"
Time and place
I can criticize a broken product. The jobs deserve thing is creative reading on your part.
I work for Unity, I've been sick for a couple days, this is how I find out lol. It's a mess here fam any devs reading this just use godot instead
I'm very sorry man, I've been through that, and I have friends that have been cut at unity before. They treat their workers terribly.
Focus on getting better first, just process it for a bit. When you're ready to start looking, the market is warm right now. I'm more than happy to help review resumes.
Ah I think my comment made in haste was ambiguous. Fortunately I was not cut this time around, I've somehow skated by all the firings. I'm actually just clinging on for a few more months then I'm off to Sweden to go back to school. Hoping to actually finish my game dev degree this time around! I do have some school application stuff I would love to have people see though I'll keep you in mind for that if you are up for it (for a work sample primarily, to get into higher rates schools)
Shout out to Bevy engine. It’s like if you took Unity DOTS and actually made it work.
Needs a lot of work yet but I like it. I’m using it for non game shenanigans personally.
Bevy is damn impressive. I can understand why it's not suitable for large projects yet but for anyone tinkering or projects willing to adapt to a rapidly iterate ecosystem is well worth a look.
What a crazy self destruction they imposed on themselves. Shame for the honest workers over there
Is this related to the pricing changes or something else?
It saddens me when hard-working employees are punished for bad leadership.
(cries in federal employment)
It’s very sad. We’re going lose a lot of great employees with tons of experience. This is going to cost to taxpayers in the form of poor services and contractors down the road filling in for more money and with less experience.
These buffoons understand very little, and neither do they understand the value of hard work and what it’s like needing to earn a living. This grandstanding is reckless.
"That being said, I want to call out the way Unity chose to communicate these layoffs. Receiving a 5am email from 'noreply@unity' informing me that my role was being 'eliminated' and that I'd lose system access by the end of the day felt completely abrupt and impersonal. Unity must do better in how they treat their workers in hard times like this."
Ouch
Oh the irony, they are almost there. Trying to appeal to empathy and humanity of a corporation in the same breath that they acknowledge the lack of it.
There is no humane nature intrinsic in corporations. People need to stop humanizing it. Treat it like It is, know that you are being taken advantage of, you are being squeased, extracted of every value you can give and then discarted.
I was part of the first big wave and they hard warned us maybe potentially there might perhaps be restructing and "resizing". We agonized for months waiting to know if it was our teams or no, if we had to look (this was before Unity nosedived and buddy quit).
I would have preferred it be abrupt I think
I've somehow survived all the firings and restructurings so far. It's a shit show over here. I'm trying to get through a few more months then I'm off to another country to go back to school
The agonizing hasn't stopped for me I've just gotten used to it as a part of my day to day. It's wild what they've been putting us through we need to unionize
I'm in Canada so left on silver parachute due to mass layoff laws. The issue in most places isn't the abrupt notice, it's the shitty labor laws.
I agree a no-reply email isn't the way to go, but we shouldn't be surprised.
They should have stuck to the engine business and not gotten involved in spam/adware schemes.
The ad company that fucked developers over a few months ago?
So long losers!
There's a lot of people losing their jobs today that didn't do anything wrong.
Epic and the Godot Foundation eating good rn
Hope everyone laid off gets back on their feet soon.
Deserved