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[Mibu no ookami]

Sony studios by size according to linkedin

Bungie - 1,428
Naughty Dog - 725
Insomniac - 499
Guerrilla - 407
Santa Monica Studio - 362
Firesprite - 262
Sucker Punch Productions - 183
Haven Studios - 112
Bend Studio - 108
Media Molecule - 102
Housemarque - 97
PlayStation London Studio - 92
Polyphony Digital* - 74
Bluepoint Games - 71
Nixxes Software - 63
Valkyrie Entertainment - 46
Savage Game Studios - 21
Team Asobi* - 8
San Diego Studio - ??
Pixelopus - 1

Total: 4,661

* - I don't know how prevalent Linkedin is for Japanese studios, so these could be wildly inaccurate representations.

 

[ABnormal]

Are those official numbers? In that case, there would be many surprising ones. Several monstrous groups, well above I thought, and some surprisingly small (Team Asobi 8 people??)

 

[legacy24]

Sucker punch making GoT with under 200 people is impressive

 

[lh032]

Pixelopus - 1

JIMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM what have you done to Pixelopus!!!???

 

[FalsettoVibe]

Using LinkedIn for employee counts is pretty inaccurate. A bunch of those numbers are way off.

 

[Bonfires Down]

Pixelopus is at least 11 people according to Wikipedia.

 

[GHG]

Pixelopus - 1

JIMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM what have you done to Pixelopus!!!???

Found him:

 

[kyliethicc]

Sony studios by size according to linkedin

Bungie - 1,428
Naughty Dog - 725
Insomniac - 499
Guerrilla - 407
Santa Monica Studio - 362
Firesprite - 262
Sucker Punch Productions - 183
Haven Studios - 112
Bend Studio - 108
Media Molecule - 102
Housemarque - 97
PlayStation London Studio - 92
Polyphony Digital* - 74
Bluepoint Games - 71
Nixxes Software - 63
Valkyrie Entertainment - 46
Savage Game Studios - 21
Team Asobi* - 8
San Diego Studio - ??
Pixelopus - 1

Total: 4,661

* - I don't know how prevalent Linkedin is for Japanese studios, so these could be wildly inaccurate representations.

wrong

 

[Trogdor1123]

1500 at bungie… wow

 

[Kdad]

#TeamREAL

 

[Kdad]

Found him:

See chart...

 

[Mibu no ookami]

Are those official numbers? In that case, there would be many surprising ones. Several monstrous groups, well above I thought, and some surprisingly small (Team Asobi 8 people??)

These are not official numbers, these are numbers as reported from linkedin which is not necessarily accurate. Some employees don't use linkedin and some employees don't update their linkedin after they leave, especially if they don't have another company yet.

Sucker punch making GoT with under 200 people is impressive

They could have utilized quite a few contractors, but yeah, they're a small-ish studio. GoT does a lot to "trick" the gamer into thinking it's a bigger game than it is. No criticism but it's a pretty empty game with a lot of repetitive design. Unlike games like The Witcher, the villages and NPC aren't elaborate and really neither is the story. The game reminded me so much of Way of the Samurai, only done better. Hope GoT2 takes things much further in terms of size and scope.

According to Linkedin they have 10% headcount growth in the last 6 months. Their medium tenure is 4.8 years which is extremely high compared to their peers in the industry.

Pixelopus - 1

JIMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM what have you done to Pixelopus!!!???

The company started with 6 employees and they haven't produced a game in 3 years. I'm not sure if this listing is necessarily accurate though, but I wouldn't be surprised if many of the original crew have moved on at this point.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

Using LinkedIn for employee counts is pretty inaccurate. A bunch of those numbers are way off.

I wouldn't say way off, especially for the larger studios, they should be fairly much in the right ballpark.

The smaller studios might be very off, especially as some employees just state that they work for Sony or PlayStation or SIE e.t.c.

 

[vivftp]

LinkedIn is not a reliable source for this information. This is a subject that keeps coming up and every time it has to be pointed out that LinkedIn can't be used to accurately estimate studio size.

 

[gow3isben]

I guess this could be a general barometer relatively speaking to each other but likely underrepresents most of them. Sucker Punch should be vastly more than 200.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

I guess this could be a general barometer relatively speaking to each other but likely underrepresents most of them. Sucker Punch should be vastly more than 200.

From Infamous to Ghost of Tsushima: Sucker Punch on the six-year journey it took to deliver its magnum opus

Jason Connell, creative and art director for Ghost of Tsushima, on how the studio left Seattle behind for Tsushima island

www.gamesradar.com

this article was from 2020 and states they were at ~160 at the time.

They currently have 11 job openings to give you a sense of the rate in which they might be growing.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

It's seems pixelopus is making the next AAAAA game.

 

[EDMIX]

Sucker punch making GoT with under 200 people is impressive

it was actually a little less.

160 was made with Ghost Of Tsushima, after they hired more to get to 200.

Mibu no ookami beat me too it lol

 

[bitbydeath]

October 2022

• The PlayStation Studios head is centrally located to orchestrate expansion efforts, coordinating the work of some 4,000 developers across 19 studios from Japan to California.

PlayStation will make more live service games, but won’t abandon roots, studio chief says

Hermen Hulst talks PC, mobile, combatting crunch and a whole lot more.

www.axios.com

 

[remember_spinal]

Yeah….this list is meaningless. You can't use linkedin for this. The only numbers we have is when each studio personally announce them like Team Asobi recently saying they had just over 60 employees or haven saying they had 106.

But it doesn't make sense because a lot of the bigger studios hire a lot of contractors for projects and they leave after. Haven has been hiring like crazy this year getting a lot of ubisoft france and Montreal devs and completely absorbed another studio tehy didn't talk about. Same thing happening at Firesprite they seemed to absorb a large portion of Lucid's staff.

 

[Mibu no ookami]

Yeah….this list is meaningless. You can't use linkedin for this. The only numbers we have is when each studio personally announce them like Team Asobi recently saying they had just over 60 employees or haven saying they had 106.

But it doesn't make sense because a lot of the bigger studios hire a lot of contractors for projects and they leave after. Haven has been hiring like crazy this year getting a lot of ubisoft france and Montreal devs and completely absorbed another studio tehy didn't talk about. Same thing happening at Firesprite they seemed to absorb a large portion of Lucid's staff.

You say the list is meaningless, yet you say Haven recently announced they had 106 and the list shows 112... That's pretty much on the money...

As for contractors, obviously, they aren't going to be counted, they aren't employees.

As for hiring like crazy, they only have 15 open jobs listed

 

[Captain Toad]

1 person isn't a studio. It's a guy.

 

[remember_spinal]

You say the list is meaningless, yet you say Haven recently announced they had 106 and the list shows 112... That's pretty much on the money...

As for contractors, obviously, they aren't going to be counted, they aren't employees.

As for hiring like crazy, they only have 15 open jobs listed

I mean, im pretty sure more than one person works at pixelopus they are currently working on a big game with sony pictures animation

 

[Mibu no ookami]

I mean, im pretty sure more than one person works at pixelopus they are currently working on a big game with sony pictures animation

"These are not official numbers, these are numbers as reported from linkedin which is not necessarily accurate. Some employees don't use linkedin and some employees don't update their linkedin after they leave, especially if they don't have another company yet."

"I wouldn't say way off, especially for the larger studios, they should be fairly much in the right ballpark.

The smaller studios might be very off, especially as some employees just state that they work for Sony or PlayStation or SIE e.t.c."

 

[Ozzy Onya A2Z]

I didn't realise Bungie was over the $1K mark these days. Looking forward to their next online game, hopefully not platform exclusive.

 

[Magic Carpet]

8 people made Astrobot Rescue mission? I think these numbers represent the number of Busses needed to drive a studio to the game awards show.

 

[NightmareFarm]

I always had the idea there would be way more people in studios. Like 2000 people being the average at the very least.

 

[Black_Stride]

Where is XDev.
Where is ICE Team.

Do ICE Team employees list themselves on LinkedIn as Naughty Dog employees or ICE Team employees?

I always had the idea there would be way more people in studios. Like 2000 people being the average at the very least.

Way more people make the games, but they dont count as being employeed by the studio.
They are contract workers or work at a support studio.

 

[NightmareFarm]

Where is XDev.
Where is ICE Team.

Do ICE Team employees list themselves on LinkedIn as Naughty Dog employees or ICE Team employees?


Way more people make the games, but they dont count as being employeed by the studio.
They are contract workers or work at a support studio.

Would you say most of the staff are contract workers?

 

[_Ex_]

That discounts the contractual outsourced workers.

 

[EDMIX]

That discounts the contractual outsourced workers.

Agreed.

That makes up most of game development, as in The Last Of Us 2 was literally worked on by like well over 2,000 plus people

Over 2,000 People Worked On The Last Of Us Part 2—But That Number Should Have Been Higher

The Last of Us Part 2’s production was made possible by 2,169 developers, as noted on the title’s MobyGames credits and reported by VG247 Monday.

www.forbes.com

 

[AmuroChan]

Using Linkedin for employee count is akin to citing VGChartz for game sales numbers. Neither are accurate.

 

[ParaSeoul]

 

[vaibhavpisal]

Team Asobi at 8 is just criminal.

Not interested in big Japanese studio?

 

[El Pistolero]

Sony studios by size according to linkedin

Bungie - 1,428
Naughty Dog - 725
Insomniac - 499
Guerrilla - 407
Santa Monica Studio - 362
Firesprite - 262
Sucker Punch Productions - 183
Haven Studios - 112
Bend Studio - 108
Media Molecule - 102
Housemarque - 97
PlayStation London Studio - 92
Polyphony Digital* - 74
Bluepoint Games - 71
Nixxes Software - 63
Valkyrie Entertainment - 46
Savage Game Studios - 21
Team Asobi* - 8
San Diego Studio - ??
Pixelopus - 1

Total: 4,661

* - I don't know how prevalent Linkedin is for Japanese studios, so these could be wildly inaccurate representations.

Team Asobi is around 60, I think, and Pixel Opus has certainly a few dozen people...not one guy sitting in a lonely room with a clown hat...

 

[El Pistolero]

Team Asobi at 8 is just criminal.

Not interested in big Japanese studio?

They are way bigger than that. Stop regurgitating false information and check for yourself.

 

[Black_Stride]

Would you say most of the staff are contract workers?

Naughty Dog is ~500 employee studio.
The Last of Us 2 had well over 2000 people working on it.

 

[EDMIX]

Team Asobi at 8 is just criminal.

Not interested in big Japanese studio?

a simple google search could have cleared this up btw

Team Asobi: “We want our games to feel like they’re made in Japan”

Team Asobi interview

www.gamesindustry.biz

" Team Asobi was around 35 employees, and has since grown to more than 60, and Doucet expects that number to reach around 100 people."

so yea..people need to stop repeating some of this stuff and just look it up before post or something. I've heard a lot of theses hot takes and it seems many would rather repeat myth, then look up factual information to support their post or something

 

[ANIMAL1975]

I think Firesprite was said to be around 400 people when was bought. That was stated in the thread we had back then.

 

[Pedro Motta]

Team Asobi at 8 is just criminal.

Not interested in big Japanese studio?

Being Anti-Sony is getting in the way of you being smart.

 

[sankt-Antonio]

How / Why is Bungie that big? Haven't they made Destiny only for like ten years.

 

[vivftp]

How / Why is Bungie that big? Haven't they made Destiny only for like ten years.

Bungie was around 900 people when Sony acquired them. Since then they've been on a massive hiring spree to grow. I'm not sure what the real current figure would be.

As for what they're working on, a live service game like Destiny needs a large team to continuously keep it fed with content. On top of that Bungie have been developing a new game under the codename Matter that's due out in 2025. Then on top of that, there's speculation that they could have another couple games at various stages of development. Also, part of this acquisition is that they'll be developing film/TV content. We dunno if they'll collab with PlayStation Productions, but that'd no doubt require some staff to make that happen.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Is bungie profitable?

I think these numbers could be way off, what happens if people don't use LinkedIn?

 

[vivftp]

Is bungie profitable?

I think these numbers could be way off, what happens if people don't use LinkedIn?

The numbers could be way off. Some may be in the general ballpark, but that's more a coincidence than anything.

As for Bungie being profitable...

 

[Cyborg]

The output of Insomniac with 500 people is insane...

 

[EDMIX]

The output of Insomniac with 500 people is insane...

The fact that they even did that in 4 years is even more incredible. Many failed at open world titles even given double the time lmfao!

 

[Ronin_7]

Team Asobi - 8
Pixelopus - 1

Seems legit.

 

[GymWolf]

I wasn't expecting bungie to be this big.

 

[ZoukGalaxy]

I would take those numbers with a huge grain of salt, even maybe a grain of pepper, linkedin is definitively not a reliable way to size studios accurately because linkedin is obviously not mandatory.

 

[NahaNago]

Wiki has Polyphony at 300 employees.

I'd love it if Sucker Punch like quadruple in size so we could also get some Infamous games this gen. Honestly I'd like for them to combine the abilities of infamous plus the ancient civilizations of ghost for a fantasy medieval like game.

Bluepoint should also triple in size so that they could release more remaster/remakes as well as make something new. It would be cool if they could continue some series that they have remade.