Riot Games Laid Off 500+ Employees

One of the leading video game developers in the world, Riot Games, has surprised the community by announcing they will be eliminating 11% of their workforce. The company decided to “refocus on fewer, high-impact projects” that will help them improve and sustain their business model in the future.

Minutes ago, we shared an important update with Rioters about the future of Riot Games. Here’s what these changes mean for our games and what players can expect from us going forward: https://t.co/SPjvtANGdK pic.twitter.com/WGSr6fkvjp

— Riot Games (@riotgames) January 22, 2024

Why Is Riot Doing This?

In Riot’s official statement, the billion-dollar company has doubled its employee count to work on more recent projects such as Legends of Runeterra and Riot Forge. However, Riot’s management remained unsure if these focuses were what the players needed and wanted the most. 

What Can We Expect From This Change?

With this action, Riot intends to shift its focus to its top four titles: Valorant, League of Legends, Teamfight Tactics, and Wild Rift. These four titles are, by far, the most popular and successful games Riot has produced. 

The company will restructure their teams to focus on these games, producing more content, features, and updates that will “directly respond to what players have been asking for.” Riot has promised frequent events, new game modes, and a clear plan for the future of these games.

Riot also highlighted their strategy will look at esports, music, and entertainment. This statement can be proven with the recent Valorant Champions Tour format changes and the second season of their Netflix League of Legends show, Arcane, which will be released in November 2024. 

Their official statement continued to mention that these promises require financial flexibility, one of the primary reasons they had to lay off more than ten percent of their team. 

Community Reactions To The Announcement

Though Valorant, League of Legends, Teamfight Tactics, and Wild Rift fans can be happy their games will be nurtured and cared for, we must remember that Riot staff have families to feed. The reactions surrounding Riot’s Twitter post were not very optimistic.

A Tweeter complained that Riot tends to “overcharge” players for their skins, mentioning fans would have to pay $60 for the newest bundle. They asked where the money from these skins was going and why Riot could not pay their staff with the revenue. Keep in mind that the Valorant 2024 Champions skin bundle generated over $20,000,000+ in sales. 

Y’all make so much money and you can’t keep your staff ? This is insane. You guys charge $60 (A Full price for a NEW GAME) for a Valorant Bundle and that’s till not enough?

Where is the money going ?

— Options 🔥 (@OptionsUS) January 22, 2024

One of the 530 employees who were laid off shared his thoughts on Twitter. He was in shock and was terrified whether he could secure another job anytime soon. 

Unfortunately I was impacted by this. Honestly in shock and don’t know how to feel other than a combination of sad and terrified in this moment.

I guess if anyone knows of any esports, project management, or product lead roles available hit me up. https://t.co/oMi1VMgoJo

— Derek Dennis (@RiotIceChest) January 22, 2024

Another employee mentioned he had a zero-day notice when he was laid off and received no severance pay. Apparently, Riot had promised to offer a minimum severance pay of six months of salary.

Most people didn’t bother reading. 6 months of severance pay, 100% of their annual performance bonus AND access to a company laptop for home? When I was laid off, I had 0 day notice and no severance pay. Exceptionally bad news, but they’re handling it better than most companies. pic.twitter.com/zxA6QhUTjM

— Kelly 켈리 (@kelgogi) January 23, 2024

Fortunately, most people know Riot staff are talented individuals. Some business owners are already offering jobs for the employees who were affected.

to all artists affected, send me your portfolios in dms
willing to give job offers out starting at 60,000$/y

— viii (@visionofviii) January 23, 2024