The Mobile Mavens reflect on Epic Games’ latest layoffs
- “Talent density is the direction the industry is moving: fewer people, higher output per head.” - Tanja Loktionova.
- “Which company is safe? We are still paying for the overstaffing we did during COVID. It was a misstep that falls on all of us as leaders." - Ali Farha.
- “Strategically, these lawsuits were important in terms of striving to change app store rules for an arguably 'fairer' future, but at the same time they have been extremely financially draining.” - Louise Wooldridge.
Epic Games recently announced layoffs of over 1000 employees following a slowdown in Fortnite engagement. In recent years, the company has also been involved in high-profile legal battles with Apple and Google, ultimately leading to Fortnite's return to both the App Store and Google Play.
These developments have raised questions about Epic's long-term strategy, so we asked our Mobile Mavens to share their thoughts on the layoffs and what comes next for the company.
Adam Smart
Epic's recent redundancies are understandably being linked by many to Fortnite, but that framing is likely too simplistic. While Tim Sweeney has acknowledged a softening in Fortnite engagement since 2025, reflecting broader industry trends, that's only one part of a much bigger picture.
Epic has spent the last several years investing heavily across multiple fronts, most notably in its prolonged legal battles with Apple and Google. Those cases, which began in 2020, were hugely consequential for the industry – particularly in opening up the conversation around direct-to-consumer payments –but they also came at an enormous financial cost.
Beyond that, Epic has been building out a much broader ecosystem. The Epic Games Store has required sustained investment across PC, console, and mobile, with mobile in particular still not fully realised despite years of effort tied to those same legal challenges.
“Epic has spent the last several years investing heavily across multiple fronts, most notably in its prolonged legal battles with Apple and Google.”Adam Smart
At the same time, the company has explored additional initiatives, including potential B2B direct-to-consumer payment solutions. Even where those haven't fully materialised, they represent significant upfront costs in terms of product, partnerships, and go-to-market efforts.
When you layer all of that together, the redundancies start to look less like a reaction to a single product and more like the result of cumulative strategic investment meeting a tougher macroeconomic environment.
There's also a broader structural point here. Parts of the games industry - particularly on the PC and console side - have historically operated in a more cyclical, project-based way, not unlike film production.
Teams scale up during development and often contract post-launch, which can make financial performance appear stronger once those costs come off the books. While live-service models like Fortnite have shifted that dynamic, the industry is still in transition between those two approaches.
Ultimately, what we're seeing with Epic is a convergence of factors: long-term strategic bets, the high cost of challenging platform incumbents, evolving business models, and a more difficult global economic backdrop.
In that context, the redundancies feel less like a signal of a single failure and more like the result of a company that spent years betting it could reshape the economics of the entire games industry – a period of consolidation was probably inevitable. It just looks bigger when it's Epic.
Tanja Loktionova
Epic won in court, then let go of the person who made Fortnite look like Fortnite. Vitaliy Naymushin spent 11 years at Epic, from pre-launch through to today, as director of character art. He created Jonesy, Ramirez, Penny, and directed the game's visual identity for season after season. His colleague and fellow art director, who survived the cut, wrote publicly: "Fortnite looked like Fortnite because of you."
Also gone: the QA lead who'd been catching Fortnite bugs since Season 1. The release manager who ran the iOS and Google Play relaunches. The Rocket League community manager, 9.5 years in.
“Epic won in court, then let go of the person who made Fortnite look like Fortnite.”Tanja Loktionova
This isn't a trim around the edges. Talent density is the direction the industry is moving: fewer people, higher output per head. It's possible Epic had exactly that in mind, cutting wide to preserve a denser, stronger core. Whether that's what actually happened is the open question. When the person who defined Fortnite's visual identity for 11 years is among those let go, it's hard not to wonder.
For mobile, that's the real question. Not whether the app stores let Epic back in. Whether they still have the talent to make it matter when they get there.
Stuart De Ville
From an indie perspective, layoffs at a high-profile studio like Epic are always a reminder of how quickly the games landscape can shift, even for companies that seem untouchable.
Epic’s strategy over the past several years, investing heavily in Fortnite, platform initiatives like the Epic Games Store, and taking on Apple and Google, has been ambitious and high-risk. These layoffs feel like a recalibration rather than a sign of failure, reflecting both changing player engagement and the need to align team size with current business realities.
For those laid off, the outlook is actually quite positive in many ways. Epic alumni are highly skilled and visible in the industry, particularly around live-service games, engine work, and platform strategy. Many will likely move into leadership roles at other studios, join ambitious indies, or even launch their own ventures.
In that sense, while layoffs are challenging, they often redistribute talent in ways that strengthen the wider games ecosystem, seeding experience and expertise across the industry.
“While layoffs are challenging, they often redistribute talent in ways that strengthen the wider games ecosystem, seeding experience and expertise across the industry.”Stuart De Ville
For Fortnite, slowing engagement is not unexpected after a decade of massive cultural presence. It doesn’t necessarily signal the end of the game, but it does suggest Epic will need to adapt its approach, perhaps leaning more heavily on live-service strategies, seasonal content, or ecosystem integration to maintain relevance.
More broadly, Epic’s overall trajectory shows the tension between creative ambitions and commercial scale. For indies, it’s a reminder that even highly visible successes require constant adjustment, and that legal battles or headline-grabbing platform moves are only one piece of a much larger operational puzzle.
What matters in the long run is the sustainable delivery of experiences and value for the community.
Pascal Clarysse
It's tempting to point at the lost revenue that could have been generated on Apple App Store and Google Play, as well as the legal bills. It feels like that would be a narrow mechanical accountant's view, though, in the sense that I don't believe for a second that Epic Games as a company is low on cash flow or anything urgently alarming of the sort.
Bluntly put, they could easily keep paying the full workforce despite the gradual downturn in Fortnite's popularity after 9 years on the market.
They took in 6B$ in revenue in 2025, on the heels of taking huge billion-dollar investments from LEGO/Kirkby, Disney, Sony and more. This is a strategic decision to keep the warchest for other future battles and goals, for which 25% of the current 4000-strong team is deemed not to be really necessary.
Let's look at the bigger picture over the past decade: Fortnite took off into a stratosphere much higher than any other hit from Epic Games had before.
“There's the tremendous goodwill the company has gained from developers around the world by offering the Epic Games Services stack across platforms for free, no strings attached.”Pascal Clarysse
Tim Sweeney recognised the situation and, as the audacious visionary leader he is accustomed to being, decided to seize the window of opportunity to place several big bets that had never been imaginable for the company Epic Games was before and that probably would not be attainable again after Fortnite's time eventually fades. He chose to leverage the mania to build the company's post-mania longevity.
One of his bets was the fight against Apple and Google Play indeed, subsidised in many ways, direct and indirect, through Fortnite's popularity. But there was also the Epic Games Store, which alone has generated 1.1B$ in revenue in 2025 and keeps growing, positioning the company as a full-fledged platform across PC and mobile.
There's the tremendous goodwill the company has gained from developers around the world by offering the Epic Games Services stack across platforms for free, no strings attached. There's the UEFN attempt to challenge Roblox on the UGC front (formerly known as Metaverse).
Then there are so many amazing studio acquisitions that add long-lasting hits with solid long-term brand IP potential, such as Rocket League, Fall Guys or the best experts in the rhythm genre, Harmonix, to name but a few. Talking of IP, they brought in timeless icons LEGO (as the best side-kick to go after the Minecraft audience), Marvel and Star Wars (through Disney investment) as partners both corporate and in-lair at their terms (emphasis on these last three words as it's almost unfathomable if you ponder it for a moment).
Then there's the Epic MegaGrants program that brings in tons of ambitious developers solving specific problems inside the Unreal Engine ecosystem. At the end of the Fortnite wave, that Unreal Engine business will remain the core pillar of Epic, like it was before Fortnite. Let's not forget that. It's stronger now than it ever was, and in part due to the side bets that Sweeney took.
In the grand scheme of things, I'd say he still won the macro-bet of landing the company in a much higher league after the mania decreases than the one in which where they were before the mania started. Easier said than done. Rocket ships at hyperspeed are not easy to pilot, crash & burn is always among possibilities. Bravo for the foresight, Captain Sweeney.
Obviously, at the micro-level, some of the bets turned out better than others, now that the music is slightly slowing down and it's time to measure the winners and losers. Ciao, Rocket Racing mode. Goodbye, music-based Festival. Slow down, MegaGrants program.
Considering Epic went on a hiring spree in parallel to its high-profile acquisitions during the gung-ho phase, it's inevitable that the era of refocusing is accompanied by a tightening of the troops, not just for pure financial effects, but also to make sure that individual purposes and collective goals remain in alignment.
To make a football analogy, nobody enjoys to be 4th right-back on the bench in case the first 3 right-backs get injured. When times of abundance diminish, such situations inside a fast-lane company tend to multiply.
To be clear, it is not my intent to paint the picture that the 1000 people laid off are less performing, less worthy or less valuable than the other 3000 who stay, or than any one of us in the industry for that matter. Sometimes it's about timing and one can be the 5th wheel of a car that only needs 4. Then go on to become the critical focal point that shines at his or her next endeavor.
“I really appreciate Tim Sweeney's (always) honest statement that the layoffs were NOT caused by AI.”Pascal Clarysse
We've seen this over and over again in our craft as much as we see it with athletes for those among us who follow sports. And of course, I have total empathy for the pain of anyone losing their jobs. If that's you, the best tip I can give you right now is Amir Satvat.
I also want to stress that the Epic Games situation couldn't be more unique, and in the broader context of things, I really appreciate Tim Sweeney's (always) honest statement that the layoffs were NOT caused by AI.
The industry-wide layoffs that have been taking place are brutal, massive and a signal of dire times. Times during which the deciders atop seem to overestimate the actual productivity gains from AI tools... Or cynically use that narrative as an excuse to simply maximise profit margins during an era of consolidation and monetisation for the winners at the top of the ossified charts, on the back of 15 years of a bullish mobile market.
Here's hoping the pendulum swings again sooner rather than later, for the times are definitely dark these days.
Rebecca Liao
Very few gaming companies are immune from contraction in this market, whether that takes the shape of layoffs, consolidation or shutting down.
“Very few gaming companies are immune from contraction in this market, whether that takes the shape of layoffs, consolidation or shutting down. ”Rebecca Liao
The real indicator is what a company does after these measures to survive and continue growing, and Epic seems to be focused on the right things at the outset. More seasonal content for Fortnite and different engagement models will help, but what I'm personally most excited about is updates to their game engine.
They must be adding AI-native capabilities to Unreal, and that should excite game developers everywhere. Since the market for content has become so saturated, platform plays are more promising at the moment, and Epic seems to be orienting in that direction for this next cycle.
Ali Farha
Every time I hear about a gaming company laying off people, I feel upset and sorry for my colleagues in the industry. But this one got me a little bit worried.
We are talking about the company behind one of the most successful IPs in modern history. Massive companies spend hundreds of millions, if not more, trying to replicate Fortnite's success. When you see a company like Epic laying off people after all that success, it makes me ask: Which company is safe?
“I believe this will be a signal for companies trying to replicate the success of Fortnite and the live service genre to redo their calculations.”Ali Farha
We are still paying for the overstaffing we did during COVID. It was a misstep that falls on all of us as leaders in the gaming industry, and we should learn from it forever. It also proves that the economy behind making games, putting hundreds of millions of dollars into a single project with massive teams, is not working anymore. It just happens over and over, we have seen companies laying off people only weeks after a launch.
I believe this will be a signal for companies trying to replicate the success of Fortnite and the live service genre to redo their calculations.
With the current economy and technological advancements that enable smaller teams to deliver high-quality, fast games, the process of making games will be different, and the shift is already underway.
That is my take. I am really sorry for the colleagues affected, and I hope you get back into the game very soon.
Louise Wooldridge
In our data, we have certainly seen the downturn in Fortnite engagement, and a lot of it is driven by Roblox - particularly the viral games Grow a Garden and Steal a Brainrot.
Gamers who actively play both games on console initially were putting more time into Fortnite, but in early-mid 2025 the momentum shifted towards Roblox. Now most of their time is spent there.
The games provide quite different experiences, but they attract the same audiences.
“This proves that retention - not acquisition - is the key to ongoing success for these types of games, and the audience flow can easily be disrupted. ”Louise Wooldridge
Month-to-month retention for Fortnite is similar to that of many other live-service games: around 30% of players stop playing in one month and are not playing one month later, but turnover is so high and consistent that churned players are replaced instantly, giving the illusion of steady monthly active users.
This proves that retention - not acquisition - is the key to ongoing success for these types of games, and the audience flow can easily be disrupted.
I'm not too worried about Fortnite. User numbers and engagement ebb and flow over months and years - one significant update or collaboration event could drive activity to a new peak. Content updates come thick and fast, so there are extremely frequent opportunities to re-engage the player base.
I think they are paying the price for scaling up too heavily during prior periods of very high revenue generation - as with many companies in recent months and years.
Plus, Epic's legal campaigns against Apple and Google have been very expensive, compounded by the removal of Fortnite from iOS some years ago, which would have been a significant blow.
Strategically, these lawsuits were important in terms of striving to change app store rules for an arguably 'fairer' future, but at the same time they have been extremely financially draining and unfortunately coincided with a broader downturn in Epic's games business.
Companies
People