this post was submitted on 23 May 2026
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143
Fallout lead Tim Cain argues games industry crisis hasn't reached the level of the 1983 crash: 'I don't think there's ever been a worse time in the games industry' (www.pcgamer.com)
submitted 2 weeks ago by Agent_Karyo@piefed.world to c/games@lemmy.world
23 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

He doesn't want to diminish the current crisis, though.

all 24 comments
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[–] HetareKing@piefed.social 48 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

On one hand, from what I understand, in the 1983 crash there was a real mood of video games being over, that the fad had passed. In North America, anyway. I don't think there's any risk of that happening today. On the other, the video game industry is a lot larger now, so there's a lot more shrinking that can happen without it completely destroying itself. So in that sense it may actually be bigger.

That said, I'm inclined to believe that by laying off all these people, big companies are just creating their own future competition, because there's no shortage of demand for video games. If anything there's a greater demand for games that aren't constrained by the arrogance of big company executives.

[–] Truscape@lemmy.blahaj.zone 25 points 2 weeks ago

One of the reasons the 1983 crash was so harsh was because brick and mortar distribution and producing expensive cartridges made self-publishing and indie development much more difficult. Hell, the Commodore 64 never had any problems throughout the crash because games were distributed on tape and floppy disk, and hobbyists could easily create new games much cheaper than console counterparts.

I would argue we have the same echoes here. The winners will be the indie PC and mobile devs alongside digital distribution platforms like Steam (Valve) and GOG where anyone with talent and ambition can enter.

[–] jellyfishhunter@lemmy.world 39 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

I feel so out of the loop. What crisis is hitting the industry? From my point of view things are going as usual. Is this about big publishers creating mediocre bullshit I don't pay attention to anyways?

[–] Arcane2077@sh.itjust.works 70 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

So here’s a very simple boiled down summary of what’s been happening in the last ~15 years, and has gotten exponentially more extreme with every subsequent year:

Game doesn’t sell well = All the devs are laid off, CEO gets a new yacht Game sells really well = Most devs are laid off, CEO gets three yachts

There’s too many knock-on effects to list, but specifically in the videogames business: Quality of games goes down. Prices go up. Burnout in the industry goes up. Exploitation of foreign contractors goes up.

There’s a metric fuckton of environmental, economic, and societal damage being done as well but I’m not qualified enough to explain/express them. The effects of all this will be felt by out-of-the-loop-ers in the years and decades to come

[–] jellyfishhunter@lemmy.world 15 points 2 weeks ago (3 children)

That feels like the ugly norm for way more than 15 years. I'm surprised it's called a crisis just now.

[–] Trainguyrom@reddthat.com 14 points 2 weeks ago

The crisis is that the triple-A industry is starting to feel consumers loss of interest in them as indie devs continue to outshine them with every release

[–] Dunstabzugshaubitze@feddit.org 13 points 2 weeks ago

lots of growth during covid that could not be sustained => many, many layoffs to prop up earning statistics in the following years.

[–] ripcord@lemmy.world 3 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Also even if it was only 15 years I'm struggling to understand the "crisis now" part.

[–] EldritchFeminity@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 week ago

The "crisis now" part is the economic downturn. People aren't spending as much on games as they were, especially after all these companies bet big on the idea that people would continue to spend money on games like they did during COVID forever. So now it affects the C Suite, and things only matter when they affect them personally.

[–] setsneedtofeed@lemmy.world 2 points 2 weeks ago

There's just so much insane bloat in the industry. It feels like every game made by a AAA studio has a hundreds of millions of dollar budget, and hundreds of people working on it. A lot of people are just completely unfazed by the novelty of high production value anymore. Not a majority, but the number of people checking of AAA seems to grow constantly a little bit over time.

There's obviously an audience for these massively produced games, but I just don't understand how every AAA game is expected to be successful like this.

Meanwhile digital publishing, with Steam Early Access being the default example, has lowered the bar to entry in the market to basically nothing. Indie and "AA" games are on the front page of the storefront next to multimillion dollar AAA games.

Sure the vast majority of Early Access games never get finished enough to grab attention, but given the sheer volume, even a tiny fraction of those games releasing and getting traction dilutes the hold of AAA games.

People spending time playing Zomboid or Kenshi aren't spending that time playing AAA next big thing.

I'm not deluded enough to think anything like a majority of gamers are playing mostly indie games, but a noticeable enough amount might be to reduce the needed profit margin of a bloated production.

[–] BackgrndNoize@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

This seems to be the case of software engineering industry in general, I'm hoping to get out of this field entirely in the next few years it's become a shit hole

[–] IronBird@lemmy.world 1 points 2 weeks ago

same kinda bubble that happens to film industry every once and awhile, big name producers dropping way too much $ into "blockbusters" that stress the company of they arent massive hits.

eventually the suits will get the great idea of funsing smaller projects and they'll pat themselves on the back for solving a problem they created. then after a couple years of that we begin the cycle anew

[–] nicpicname@lemmy.zip 12 points 2 weeks ago

No way in hell this is comparable to 1983. This is a terrible period of time though

[–] capt_wolf@lemmy.world 10 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Meanwhile, indie devs:

[–] PapstJL4U@lemmy.world 1 points 1 week ago

And enjoyers of Indy games...my steam list gets longer and longer and is nearly all Indy,A or AA games.

[–] ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de 4 points 2 weeks ago

All ET's fault.

[–] REDACTED@infosec.pub 1 points 2 weeks ago

Maybe for microsoft

[–] BeUnique@lemmy.zip 1 points 2 weeks ago

Dude has a great YT channel!

[–] ElectricMachman@geostationary.orbiting.observer -3 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

A worse time? Home computers thrived, the arcades were packed, bedroom programming was on the rise, the Famicom was released... Other than Atari betting too big on E.T., the industry was in a healthy position.

[–] Dunstabzugshaubitze@feddit.org 10 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago) (1 children)

the 1983 crash was mostly a home console crash, which was a bigger market in the US than in europe, but i guess it really sucked for console devs there, and the famicom took two years to be released outside of japan as the NES.

e: [youtube] tim cain has a video on his channel where he talks about his perspective as a developer during the time

[–] Pat_Riot@lemmy.today 2 points 2 weeks ago

As a kid in the 80s I had a Colecovision console, probably 20 titles and even the steering wheel peripheral. I miss it. For pure game enjoyment it was the height of the art. NES brought about the start of games that were work, though there were some great titles on that system. At least for someone like me, the only improvement that has come with the newer systems is better racing games.

[–] Truscape@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 2 weeks ago

The funny thing is I think we are in the same situation except now the free distribution of games on the internet means the supply side issues are even less relevant to the game industry. The losers might end up being consoles again.