EA, the American software house acquired for $50 billion by a consortium made up of the Saudi Arabia Pif, Affinity Partners of Jared Kushner (Donald Trump’s son-in-law) and Silver Lake, appears to be cutting back extensively.
The news, reported by the well-informed IGN and officially confirmed by the video game label to the trade press only later without including the exact number of employees involved, reports that the cuts are focusing on the internal teams at Electronic Arts, namely Criterion, Dice, Ripple Effect, and Motive Studios.
The US publication states that the laid-off staff have already received an internal email speaking of a “realignment” among the studios of the blockbuster video game Battlefield. All four studios will remain operational, although the layoffs seem to have a significant impact, it is further read, in several offices.
THE SUCCESS OF BATTLEFIELD 6 DID NOT STOP THE LAYOFFS AT EA
The news of the cuts is especially surprising because the latest developed video game, Battlefield 6, was the best-selling title of 2025 in the USA, selling 7 million copies in the three days following its market debut and representing the best launch ever for the series.
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IS THIS THE POST-ACQUISITION EA?
Emblematic and revealing could be the criticisms gamers subsequently made about Battlefield 6 and which IGN summarizes as: excessive monetization, heavy use of generative AI for in-game aesthetic elements, and fewer content updates than expected.
In short, the common denominator of the gamers’ complaints seems to be that the title was made in some ways “on a budget” (use of AI, less temporal support from the American software house) and with the precise intention of being as profitable as possible, even at the cost of sacrificing quality and thus sparking numerous negative comments. It is no coincidence, as highlighted by IGN, that simultaneous Steam users also dropped significantly after the record launch.
THE “SPRING CLEANUPS” AT EA IN 2025
Exactly a year ago, give or take a week, the US software house had laid off, according to Bloomberg, between 300 and 400 people globally. Among them, about 100 workers, according to the video game press, were part of Respawn Entertainment, known for blockbuster titles such as Apex Legends and Star Wars Jedi.
— Respawn (@Respawn) April 29, 2025
Among the most significant consequences of the spring 2025 reorganization was the cancellation of a game still in the early stages, known by the code name R7 and set in the Titanfall universe. Going even further back in time, Electronic Arts had laid off 6% of its staff, about 800 jobs in total at the time, in March 2023.
