The cuts at Xbox last week were brutal; Let’s not mince words here.
Four studios have been sold, a fifth may be in the works, over a thousand jobs have already been cut and another 2,000 are planned. The mood at Xbox is currently gloomy – a total of 180 after the wave of optimism since the appointment of new CEO Asha Sharma in the spring.
As a result, countless stories are emerging about what the fate of the remaining Xbox studios might be. Much of the discussion currently revolves around id Software, the popular maker of DOOM. The studio is an integral part of the industry and arguably one of the most important and influential brands in the modern gaming canon.
The cuts at id Software were severe and painful. Some have claimed that the studio’s vaunted id Tech engine is effectively on hold and that id is no longer big enough to produce its own games.
What is the truth here? I’ve been researching Microsoft’s plans for id. Despite the callousness of Microsoft’s bean counters, I’m confident the studio will survive.
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Microsoft has no plans to put id Tech on hold
The OG engineers at id popularized the first-person genre, which now grosses billions of dollars.
DOOM and other id Software games have long been powered by the id Tech engine. The engine was originally developed for Quake in the 90s and has since powered a variety of titles including open-world games like RAGE, horror games like The Evil Within, Wolfenstein shooters and of course the modern DOOM games. More recently, Machine Games’ Indiana Jones and DOOM: The Dark Ages were based on the latest versions of id Tech.
It feels very different than Unreal Engine, especially in first-person games. It has been praised for its optimization on lower-end hardware stacks as well as its overall versatility.
The cuts at id Software have hit the teams that build id Tech hard, wiping out decades of expertise overnight. But rumors that practically no one is working on the engine now are false. Sources tell me that id Tech still has a solid stack of expertise within id Software itself and at Machine Games. I’m told that Microsoft also has no plans to force either studio to switch to the Unreal Engine, which seems to have become standard across Microsoft and many other major game makers.
Microsoft provided us with this statement on the matter: “Dozens of people work at id Tech in multiple locations. Reports that there is only one person left in Texas are inaccurate.”
In my opinion, Microsoft would have to be woefully short-sighted to reject id Tech. Handing over even more power to Unreal Engine opens them up to monopolistic price increases across the board that would be fiscally irresponsible. Xbox CEO Asha Sharma herself said in her memo to employees that she wants Microsoft to rely less on vendors for things like this. Therefore, I would argue that Microsoft should invest more in id Tech, not less.
But hey, quarterly thinking is Microsoft’s motto these days. And it Is It is true that the talent and knowledge of a generation has been carelessly cast aside.
id Software’s headcount is now similar to DOOM (2016).
DOOM (2016) is, in my opinion, id Software’s best game of all time.
Another rumor circulating is that id Software has shrunk to a headcount that is unsustainable for future in-house productions, relegating them to “support studio” status. That is also wrong.
Although the cuts have been shockingly persistent, I believe the remaining core team at id Software is about the same as it was when DOOM (2016) was released. DOOM (2016) is, in my opinion, arguably the studio’s best game of all time, despite the comparatively smaller number of employees that produced it. This in no way means we should expect the same quality without evidence… Microsoft has removed mountains of incredible talent from the pool.
Still, I’m not sure what exactly id Software might do next. There were reports that id Software had several pitches in the pipeline, including a Perfect Dark reboot and a western shooter called Ironwood. It’s unclear whether any of them will get the green light.
id Software has just released DOOM: The Dark Ages Revelations, a massive story expansion for last year’s DOOM prequel. What the studio develops next remains to be seen, but Xbox CEO Asha Sharma specifically mentioned DOOM and Quake as franchises worth investing in.
Microsoft wants to expand its most important and best-known intellectual property, which likely precludes “new” franchise ideas, at least in the short term. I’d still like to see what a modern Hexen would look like…maybe we’ll find out more at Quakecon, which is still ongoing.
It was still an unnecessarily brutal exercise
DOOM will outlast Microsoft’s bean counters. (Image credit: Bethesda Softworks)
Although rumors of id Software’s demise were greatly exaggerated, the layoffs were still persistent and brutal. Despite the success of the modern DOOM trilogy, employees with decades of experience and professional experience were laid off.
Microsoft’s gaming ambitions were scaled back sharply last week in what CEO Asha Sharma calls a “reboot.” This has resulted in a significant reduction in teams working on a variety of projects, from The Elder Scrolls to Xbox’s social media delivery and platform functions. Other studios like Blizzard seem to have escaped largely unscathed so far. And Xbox’s hardware team building, Helix, has also remained intact.
Xbox has worked hard to save studios like Undead Labs from complete closure. But it hasn’t stopped Microsoft from cutting hundreds of jobs in other areas, within Xbox and beyond. Microsoft’s huge investments in artificial intelligence haven’t really yielded any significant returns, and its huge capital expenditures on data center expansion are spooking investors.
At Xbox, the layoffs reflect a challenging time in traditional gaming. Core gaming saw a decline due to increased costs and a lack of investment in younger cohorts, leading to abandonment of consoles in favor of Roblox on mobile, alongside non-gaming activities. Microsoft’s lack of investment in the Xbox platform and social features has left the company unable to attract new users from the Gen-X and Gen-Y cohorts, many of whom are beginning to age.
How Xbox develops from here remains entirely to be seen, but one thing is certain: DOOM is eternal and will outlast Microsoft’s bad decisions.
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