Comment on I'm A Game Dev Who Got Layed Off From His Non-Game Dev Job
nullify3112@lemmy.world 2 days agoWell that is an over-saturation of games. Isn’t that mainly due to AI tools making it easy to make all the elements you would need for a game in a mediocre way? People are still playing games and buying them and game devs still have to make them. Are you saying that the industry has been automated enough that the need for talent really isn’t there anymore?
kazerniel@lemmy.world 1 day ago
On the 2nd link it shows that in 2022, even before genAI tools broke into game development, Steam released 12,248 games, so on average 34/day. So genAI at most only doubled the output rate.
Yes, there were many low-effort asset flips out there even before AI, but I think the main factor is that game development is a global industry, and from the pool of billions of gamers, tons and tons of talented and hard-working game developers emerge who all compete against each other for attention. And like in other creative industries, the handful of most successful companies on top command most of the audience’s interest, while the vast majority of aspirants can’t make a livelihood from this work.
I found this article from early 2022 that says that at the time there were 44,000 game developers on Steam, 3/4 of whom only released a single game. (It doesn’t say the reason why - I suppose could be just starting their career, or their first release was so unsuccessful they didn’t continue trying.) 57% of developers at the time made less than 1,000 USD lifetime revenue.