Storm Clouds and Silver Linings: Takeaways from DICE and GDC 2025
By Jonathan Downing, the “Storyteller”
Greetings from the other side! In February I had the distinct pleasure of attending the annual DICE Summit in Las Vegas for my third year running, and then in March I once again immersed myself in the localized chaos of GDC here in downtown San Francisco. At both events I spoke with publishers, developers, artists, engineers, and business leaders in the games industry (along with a few of my fellow games attorneys that also managed to sneak in) not only to catch up and talk shop, but also to get a more direct sense of where the industry is at and where it may be going. Facing what has become a years-long series of layoffs and industry-wide belt-tightening, coupled with an uncertain political landscape in the United States and abroad, it would be surprising not to sense some degree of unease among attendees. But that stormy horizon was not without some glimmers of silver.
What’s In Our Wake
A common theme in many conversations was that the games industry as it has existed for some time has begun to show its age, and for many publishers and developers it is proving unsustainable. One needs only look at the mass layoffs that have seemed almost endemic to the industry since at least 2022 to get a sense of this. While a single reason why the layoffs started—and continue to occur—is difficult to pin down, we do know that studios began ambitious expansions and acquisitions during the COVID-19 pandemic in response to a surging global interest in games. Development budgets, especially for AAA titles, have also increased as the technologies supporting them and the marketing to advertise them—and the costs associated with each—have evolved. And finally, global economic concerns and rising interest rates have warned off large segments of investment capital, closing off what may have been a resource for cash-strapped or up-and-coming studios to turn to.
There have also been significant shifts in the user base and in gamers’ expectations. For example, many live services models are starting to be met with a degree of wariness, as sustaining such games requires both dedicated communities and substantial studio resources. Where once a live services shooter like Apex Legends could debut and make major waves in the gaming community overnight, today it’s examples like Concord making the news, and tragically for all the wrong reasons. Coupled with new technologies like NFTs and “metaverses” failing to truly materialize and capture the interest of broad segments of the gaming population, for many it can seem like a situation of a supply without demand.
What’s also true is that we’re not out of these rough waters yet. In 2025 we have seen more layoffs occur across dozens of studios, including the likes of Ubisoft and Unity, and the complete closure of studios like Monolith. Combined with an increasingly unpredictable global economy, what the future holds remains anything but clear.
The Voyage Ahead
With all this doom and gloom, it might be surprising to then hear that there was and remains an undercurrent of resolve among many in the industry. Game developers are, among their many varied talents, builders. And when given a box of scraps, they’ll make something out of it.
This was reflected in the theme at DICE this year, “Built to Last,” which recognizes that games are a major part of the global entertainment industry and probably aren’t going anywhere. But it also does not ignore the difficulties the industry has been facing and serves as a rallying call to find and forge the way ahead. What that future looks like remains anyone’s guess, however.
Structuring studios with sustainability in mind has been one common theme that speaks to this possible future. Presentations at DICE from executives at Riot and Obsidian discussed the creation and maintenance of a studio’s vision, the challenges of balancing long-term thinking with short-term decision making, and determining the pillars and principles of your company. Among the most important takeaways from these talks was not only to understand what it is your business does and to focus on doing it well, but to be just as transparent about what you don’t do as a studio, to avoid spreading yourself too thin. On the labor front, GDC saw the formal announcement of the United Videogame Workers union, whose organizers also emphasized their goal of long-term sustainability for workers in the games industry.
Artificial intelligence remained a hot topic of discussion and debate at both conferences. Unlike the NFTs and metaverses that came before it, AI appears to have some staying power, though its ultimate role in game development remains to be seen. There is considerable optimism about the technology’s potential applications, but that is tempered with a general wariness about its risks known and unknown, ethical and moral.
Finally, many discussions turned to what future games themselves will look like. In one DICE presentation on what teenagers—88% of whom play video games today—seek in their experiences, they emphasized authenticity and escapism as key drivers for that audience. In another conversation, the strength and sustainability of known franchises and “evergreen IPs” like Warhammer was offered as one way to contribute to development and growth through thoughtful and strategic licensing partnerships (see, e.g., the recent success of Marvel Rivals). And the scale of what future games and game studios will be is another topic on many minds. Not everyone can create a AAA game, but the wild successes of lower-budget indie games like Balatro, which won Game of the Year among other accolades at the GDC Awards, demonstrate that not everyone needs to.
The overall sense then is that while the games industry has undoubtedly taken a beating, it is far from beaten. Trends and technologies change over time. Thankfully games, and the creative minds behind them, remain ever nimble.