Even Madden Can’t Shake the Recession
January 26th, 2009 | Written by Anthony Perez | Topic: Industry News
You know the economy is bad when bankers receiving government bailouts are buying new $50 million jumbo jets, presumably to high tail it out of the f–king country before we start feeding on each other. But another sign of our troubled times came today when the Orlando Sentilel confirmed that EA has layed-off an undisclosed number of employees from Madden and Tiger Woods developer EA Tiburon.
When the developer of Madden – the perennial champions of limited annual improvements leading to top 10 sales figures – drops workers, that’s not good. Not quite as bad as Sony’s reluctance to advertise Killzone 2, but still bad. All of this is coming in the wake of news that the gaming industry grew 19 percent in a year when most industries shrank.
This isn’t a good sign for gamers hoping for innovative new gaming experiences as publishers will likely play it safe by only releasing sure hits. And the games that do show promise this year, will probably have their budgets slashed thus making such promises ring empty.
Oh and for those who said the gaming industry was “recession-proof,” don’t say we didn’t tell you otherwise: Why Gaming is Not Recession Proof.
UPDATE: Yeah, so this recession thing hit Skate developer EA Black Box as well…
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