alt Hacker NewsI think they just want, broadly, to divest from the American tech work force, whether that's via AI or outsourcing. If "the remaining employees just collapse" it's a data point in support of the thesis that developing software in HCOL markets is unsustainable, and if they don't, margins are better!
So I think decision-makers are seeing layoffs as win/win.
Yes, absolutely. US games developers are paid a lot more than elsewhere.
There has been a growing trend over the past couple of decades to outsource more and more game development to cheaper parts of the world, trending towards keeping only a small core team in the home country, supported by for-hire remote developers in Eastern Europe and Asia.
The other big advantage to work for hire is not needing to keep a large team of specialists employed throughout development, when they may not be required for all of that time. Keeping everyone fully utilised has always been one of the big challenges for game studios.
Ironically, AI may actually reduce the amount of outsourcing that a core team needs to do (though a lot of it is content and AI is still pretty bad at generating content).