Ahead slow.
Per a report from Kotaku, Nintendo of America has been forced to layoff members from their testing department.
NoA maintains a large number of contractors on hand to test both their hardware and software for the North American market. According to some of these contractors, the company has been forced to allow a number of these contracts to lapse, or otherwise end, due to the release date of the Switch’s successor reportedly being pushed back into 2025.
The bad news is that a significant number of these contractors will no longer be working for the company. The good news is that some of them will get those coveted permanent positions with the company. It’s worth noting, however, that this has been a bone of contention between these contractors and Nintendo for some time; they’ve been calling for a means of transitioning from a contractor position to something more permanent for a while. While that’s now a reality, the fact is that there won’t be positions for all of these contractors. The silver lining, though, is that everyone let go in this fashion will be given a severance package, according to the company.
When asked, a Nintendo spokesperson provided the following to Kotaku:
Nintendo of America (NOA) has reorganized its Product Testing functions to drive greater global integration in game development efforts. The changes will also better align NOA with interregional testing procedures and operations.
These changes will involve some contractor assignments ending, as well as the creation of a significant number of new full-time employee positions. For all assignments that are ending, the contractors’ agencies, with NOA’s support, will offer severance packages and provide assistance during their transition.
For those contractor associates who will be leaving us, we are tremendously grateful for the important contributions they’ve made to our business, and we extend our heartfelt thanks for their hard work and service to Nintendo.
This “lull” is a common occurrence between hardware generations. Typically, first party releases slow down or even stop during such periods, which means that the company doesn’t require quite so many testing staff on hand (likely the reason Nintendo issues a lot of it as contract work).
As far as the people affected by this decision, Kotaku estimates it to be over 100 workers. Those lucky enough to transfer into permanent positions will allegedly be moved away from software testing.
These layoffs are merely the latest in the overall tech sector drain this year, which is well over 20,000 jobs at this point. While around 100 is a drop in the bucket compared to many other companies, it’s still significant that even Nintendo has had to drop workers this year, tenuous as those positions may have been.
Source: IGN
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