When Microsoft—a company that made “$198 billion in revenue and $83 billion in operating income” in 2022—made the decision to axe 10,000 workers last week, a number of those came from their video game operations, particularly 343 Industries, the overseers of the Halo series.
343, hit now by a combination of layoffs and key departures, does not appear to be in good shape. As we reported last week:
“The layoffs at 343 shouldn’t have happened and Halo Infinite should be in a better state,” former Halo Infinite multiplayer designer, Patrick Wren, tweeted Wednesday night. “The reason for both of those things is incompetent leadership up top during Halo Infinite development causing massive stress on those working hard to make Halo the best it can be.”
Even prior to yesterday’s layoffs, 343 Industries has been facing wave after wave of high level departures as Halo Infinite struggled to ship new seasonal updates and features on time. The most notable was studio head Bonnie Ross’ departure last September. More recently, multiplayer director and longtime Halo veteran Tom French revealed he was leaving in December. And yesterday, amid the chaos, Bloomberg reported that director and longtime Halo writer, Joseph Staten, was headed to the Xbox publishing side of the business as the studio made the “difficult decision to restructure.”
Those hits led to reports last week that development on future Halo games was going to be handed off to outside studios, with 343 being relegated to a supervisory role. Reports that have seemingly led 343 to tweet the following statement on the official Halo account, denying them (to an extent) and saying 343 “will continue to develop Halo now and in the future”.
Halo and Master Chief are here to stay.
343 Industries will continue to develop Halo now and in the future, including epic stories, multiplayer, and more of what makes Halo great.
Pierre Hintze
Studio head
That’s a short statement that does nothing to address the report that other studios could now also be making Halo games (which isn’t that new anyway, given Creative Assembly’s work on Halo Wars), nor does it address the scale of the layoffs it was just hit with, but it does at least affirm that 343 themselves will still be directly involved in some way in the series’ future.
Amidst rumors that 343 Industries has been taken off of lead development of the Halo franchise, the studio has taken to Twitter to state that it will continue to “develop Halo now and in the future.”
343 Industries’ studio head Pierre Hintze shared the message on Twitter, saying, “Halo and Master Chief are here to stay. 343 Industries will continue to develop Halo now and in the future, including epic stories, multiplayer, and more of what makes Halo great.”
pic.twitter.com/03Xm3a9s59
— Halo (@Halo) January 21, 2023
The news follows the mass layoffs of 10,000 people at Microsoft, which saw a number of employees at Xbox Game Studios, The Coalition, 343 Industries, and Bethesda let go. Shortly after, Halo Infinite director Joseph Staten reportedly left 343 Industries to rejoin Xbox publishing.
Rumors then started swirling that 343 Industries would be taken off lead development of the Halo franchise and would instead help third-party studios bring Halo to life in the form of new games. As reported by Metro, one such leaker named Bathrobe Spartan even said that initial plans for story-based DLC for Halo Infinite have been canceled already.
In response to the rumors, 343 Industries has planted its flag and said it is here to stay.
Halo Infinite has had a bumpy ride since it was announced, from its controversial E3 2020 demo to its unpopular original Battle Pass and progression system that has since been changed to the cancelation of split-screen co-op.
There have been a lot of positives as well, as we scored both Halo Infinite’s single-player campaign and multiplayer a 9/10, and the team has done a lot to address fan complaints.
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Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.
After today’s announcement that Microsoft will lay off 10,000 people, details on how internal restructuring will hit its gaming divisions continue to emerge, with Halo Infinite’s 343 Industries among the studios impacted.
According to Bloomberg, Joseph Staten, a Halo veteran who began his career with Bungie in 1998, will transition from his Halo Infinite creative director role and rejoin Xbox’s publishing division. Staten joined the team at 343 Industries in 2020 as the campaign project lead on Halo Infinite and later saw a title change to Head of Creative.
Bloomberg’s report includes an email from 343 Industries head Pierre Hintze, who explained the studio “made the difficult decision to restructure” and that support for Halo Infinite’s live service features will continue. Details on Staten’s new role and the exact degree of impact at 343 Industries remain unclear for now.
Microsoft Acquires Activision Blizzard: The Story So Far
The economy added 263,000 jobs in November. FOX Business’ Cheryl Casone with more.
U.S. job growth came in stronger than expected in November as a rush of hiring at bars and restaurants helped to offset payroll losses in retail.
Employers added 263,000 jobs in November, the Labor Department said in its monthly payroll report released Friday, topping the 200,000 jobs forecast by Refinitiv economists. It marks a slight deceleration from the upwardly revised job gain of 284,000 recorded in October.
The unemployment rate, meanwhile, held steady at 3.7%.
“The labor market remains tight and overheated,” said Joe Brusuelas, chief economist at RSM. “Competition for labor inside a workforce that is now shrinking supports higher wage gains, which is feeding into elevated inflation across the economy. While there is now evidence of residual weakness inside some areas of the economy and noticeable job losses in trade, transport, and retail, it’s being more than offset elsewhere.”
US ECONOMY ADDS 263,000 JOBS IN NOVEMBER, BETTER THAN EXPECTED AS HIRING REMAINS SOLID
Although job gains were broad-based last month, the leisure and hospitality sector – the hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic – led the way in hiring, adding another 88,000 workers last month. Bars and restaurants accounted for the bulk of those gains, adding 62,100 workers in November. Hotels, meanwhile, saw payrolls grow by 15,900.
Employment in the leisure and hospitality industry still remains about 980,000 – or 5.8% – below its pre-pandemic levels.
Health care accounted for the second-largest area of growth in November, with payrolls climbing by 44,700. The increases were widespread across the industry. Nursing and residential care facilities hired 10,400 workers, while both home health care services and outpatient care centers saw payrolls increase by 6,600.
THE FED’S WAR ON INFLATION COULD COST 1M JOBS
A pedestrian passes a “Help Wanted” sign in the door of a hardware store in Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S., July 8, 2022. (REUTERS/Brian Snyder / Reuters Photos)
The industry has returned to its February 2020 employment levels.
Another source of job creation in November was the government, which saw hiring climb by 42,000 last month. Within the sector, notable gains took place in local governments, which hired 32,000 workers – mostly in education – as well as state governments, which onboarded 11,000 new workers. The federal government, however, actually shed 1,000 workers last month due to a 5,700 employee drop at the U.S. Postal Service.
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Employment in other industries, including social assistance (23,400), construction (20,000), manufacturing (14,000) and professional and business services (6,000) also increased last month.
Former Chase chief economist Anthony Chan discusses what the better-than-expected November jobs report says about the U.S. economy and inflation on ‘Varney & Co.’
Those increases helped to make up for declines in retail trade employment, which tumbled by 29,900 in November. The losses largely stemmed from a 21,800 decline at department stores and a 10,300 drop at general merchandise stores, including warehouse clubs and supercenters. Certain sectors within the retail industry actually saw hiring increase last month, with auto dealers adding 6,900 new workers and food and beverage stores adding 4,500.
Transportation and warehousing, meanwhile, shed 15,100 jobs, while employment in the wholesale trade sector fell by 3,300.
Days before Thanksgiving, a Mississippi-based furniture company laid off 2,700 workers across the country—via text and email—while many of them were sleeping.
United Furniture Industries sacked nearly its entire workforce in the state, as well as employees in North Carolina and California, and in a heartless parting blow, discontinued the employees’ health-care benefits, according to reports. After the mass layoffs, one company driver was arrested for allegedly stealing furniture and a truck.
Now the firm is facing at least three federal lawsuits in the Northern District of Mississippi. Toria Neal, who has worked for the company since July 2014, filed a class-action suit this week alleging United fired all employees except for “over-the-road drivers” just before midnight on Nov. 21 in violation of federal law. She argues United didn’t give workers a required 60-day advance written notice. (Two other employees, Frances Alomari and Willie Poe, filed lawsuits making the same allegations against the company.)
The abrupt firings were a punch to the gut for longtime employees of United Furniture, which operates under the Lane Furniture brand.
Jimmy Herring, 24, told The Daily Beast that he was promoted to floor supervisor at a Lane plant in Trinity, North Carolina, a week or two before his termination. Herring said that before he and his colleagues were let go, they were making recliners for Lowe’s retail stores.
But at 11:56 p.m. on Monday, the firm sent him a text message while he was asleep. He wouldn’t see the digital pink slip until a day or two later.
Jimmy Herring and his girlfriend, Chey, are expecting a baby on Dec. 8.
Courtesy of Jimmy Herring
Instead, his boss texted him the next morning, without providing many details, and announced they didn’t have work. At first, Herring assumed they were getting a day off because of the upcoming holiday. Then he contacted his co-workers.
“They said we had all been terminated,” said Herring, who was with the company for six years. “I thought it was a joke or something.”
He said his reaction was one of “complete panic.”
“I didn’t know what to do, where to start,” said Herring, whose girlfriend, Chey, is expecting a baby on Dec. 8. Instead of shelling out for Thanksgiving dinner, the couple scrambled to buy supplies for their future child including a baby bath.
Herring is unsure if last Friday’s paycheck from Lane will be his last.
“Some people don’t even have cellphones,” Herring added of co-workers. “They had to go to the plant and find out they don’t have a job anymore.”
Multiple employees and their relatives took to Facebook to fume over the dismissals.
“Pathetic!! My brother who is 64 years old was sent a text to say you no longer have a job!” one North Carolina resident wrote. “I hope these ppl have to endure the same treatment my brother and the rest of these employees will have to face now, especially being the start of the holidays!!!”
“Fantastic business ethics United/Lane,” wrote TJ Martin, an employee of a Tupelo, Mississippi plant who also spoke to local news station WLBT. “We appreciate the termination news while on vacation and at 11:30pm at night.”
“I have spoken with numerous co-workers,” Martin added, “and we all completely feel let down by a company we have dedicated our time and energy to for years and loved doing so in order to provide for our families.”
Trade publication Furniture Today published United’s message to staff.
“At the instruction of the Board of Directors of United Furniture Industries, Inc., and all subsidiaries (the “Company”), we regret to inform you that due to unforeseen business circumstances the Company has been forced to make the difficult decision to terminate the employment of all its employees, effective immediately, on November 21, 2022, with the exception of over-the-road drivers that are out on delivery,” the firing notice stated. “Your layoff from the Company is expected to be permanent and all benefits will be terminated immediately without provision of COBRA.”
“We regret that this difficult and unexpected situation has made this necessary,” United continued, adding: “Thank you for your service and dedication.”
Last summer, the company fired its CEO, CFO and executive vice president of sales and laid off 300 employees, Furniture Today revealed. The firm then named Todd Evans as its new CEO. “Our industry is experiencing a drastic decrease in consumer demand,” Evans said in July. “Our inventory levels remain high and new orders from our customers remain slow.”
United Furniture Industries has yet to comment on the firings.
But in reality, only workers intwo industries — leisure and hospitality and retail trade — are actually coming out ahead, once inflation is taken into account.
Overall, wages and salaries for private industry workers roseby 4.2% between December 2019 and this past June, before rising prices are considered, according to an analysis of Employment Cost Index quarterly data by Jason Furman, an economics professor at Harvard University.
However, once inflation is factored in, paychecks actually shrank by 1.2% over that time period, the analysis found.
US consumer prices jumped by 9.1% year-over-year in June, the highest level in more than 40 years, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“Workers have had more bargaining power to get larger wages, but firms have also had power to set higher prices,” said Furman, also a former chair of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Obama administration. “And the prices are beating the wages.”
Where wages are rising
Leisure and hospitality workers, which includes waiters, cooks and hotel clerks, have been in high demand after being hit hard by job losses when nonessential businesses shuttered at the start of the pandemic. Their wages have grown by 0.9% since December 2019, after accounting for inflation, according to Furman’s analysis.
While the overall economy has now regained all the jobs it lost during the pandemic, the leisure and hospitality sector is still 1.2 million positions, or 7.1 percent, below its February 2020 level, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ monthly jobs report, published Friday.
Retail workers, such as salespeople, cashiers and customer service representatives, have also been wooed by employers. This has led to a 0.2% inflation-adjusted bump in wages for them. Employment in this sector is 208,000 above its level in February 2020.
But even employees in these industries have seen their pay boosts erode this year as inflation continues to climb. Wage increases for leisure and hospitality workers and for retail employees had been 2% and 1.2%, respectively, over the two years ending December 2021.
Employers in lower-wage industries really had to boost pay in order to hire and maintain the staff needed to meet demand in 2021, said Skanda Amarnath, executive director of Employ America, which advocates for a high-wage, high-employment economy.
“Right now, CPI is just way too strong relative to everything else,” he said of the Consumer Price Index, a popular inflation measure.
And where they are falling
In all other industries, inflation-adjusted wages have dropped since the end of 2019, led by utility workers with a 2.7% decline.
Those employed in construction and information technology have seen their pay slip by 1.8%, while manufacturing and financial sector workers have experienced a 1.7% drop.
Even wholesale trade workers, such as truck drivers, who have also been in demand during the pandemic as supply chains snarled, have lost ground. Their wages have declined 0.6% since December 2019. That’s a reversal from the end of 2021, when their pay was up 0.1% over the prior two years.
The Employment Cost Index report is watched closely by the Federal Reserve to monitor the extent to which skyrocketing inflation is boosting wages. The data helps the Fed determine how much to hike interest rates.
But the Fed looks at wage growth before the impact of inflation, and that has remained strong. The 5.3% jump over the year ending in June was the highest since the spring of 1983.
So despite the decline in inflation-adjusted wages in most industries, the Fed is expected to continue raising interest rates this year to try to slow the rise in prices, economists say.
While Halo Infinite has been positively received by many, the lack of new content in its multiplayer has led to frustration for some fans. 343 Industries has spoken up on this issue and has said that it does “understand the community is simply out of patience.”
343 community director Brian Jarrard took to Reddit to speak to Halo Infinite fans and let them know that the team is “certainly not happy to be unable to meet player and community expectations.” However, he also reassures that meaningful content is on the way, it just unfortunately takes time.
“There are indeed a lot of challenges and constraints,” Jarrard said. “We’re certainly not happy to be unable to meet player and community expectations, it’s a difficult situation that’s going to take the team time to work through. Right now the focus is on S2 and we’ll have more to share on that in the coming weeks.”
“Meanwhile a lot of production planning, costing, planning, hiring, etc.. is all happening which doesn’t really lend to detailed regular updates. We understand the community is simply out of patience and frankly, I think understandably tired of words. We just need some time for the team to get the details sorted and then we can certainly share as much as we can.”
343 has already revealed a bit of what fans can expect from Season 2, which is titled Lone Wolves, including new maps, armor, and characters that will push forward multiplayer’s story that will be told over “a mix of cinematics, story-themed Events, Battle Pass items, and more.”
Halo Infinite’s second season will begin on May 3, 2022, and will also see a free-for-all elimination mode called Last Spartan Standing, a new mode called Land Grab, and the return of King of the Hill.
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Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.
Pressure is mounting on Koch Industries, the conglomerate run by the rightwing billionaire Charles Koch, to pull out of Russia after it was revealed it was continuing to do business in Russia through three wholly-owned subsidiaries.
Hundreds of companies including Coca-Cola, KPMG, McDonald’s, Netflix and Starbucks have paused operations in Russia following its invasion of Ukraine. But, as news site Popular Information revealed last week, three Koch subsidiaries are still operating in the country.
“Koch Industries is shamefully continuing to do business in Putin’s Russia and putting their profits ahead of defending democracy,” the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, and Senator Ron Wyden, said in a joint statement. “As the democracies of the world make huge sacrifices to punish Russia for Putin’s illegal and vicious invasion of Ukraine, Koch Industries continues to profit off of Putin’s regime.”
“It must stop,” Schumer wrote on Twitter, adding that he and Wyden were “exploring legislation to add Russia to existing laws denying foreign tax credits for taxes paid to North Korea & Syria.”
Koch has defended its Russian operations. The company has three subsidiaries still operating in the country: Guardian Industries, a glass manufacturer; Molex, an electronic components manufacturer; and Koch Engineered Solutions, a provider of industrial products.
In a statement released on Wednesday Dave Robertson, Koch president, condemned the invasion. “The horrific and abhorrent aggression against Ukraine is an affront to humanity,” he wrote. But he said the company would not “walk away” from its employees.
“Koch company Guardian Industries operates two glass manufacturing facilities in Russia that employ about 600 people. We have no other physical assets in Russia, and outside of Guardian, employ 15 individuals in the country. While Guardian’s business in Russia is a very small part of Koch, we will not walk away from our employees there or hand over these manufacturing facilities to the Russian government so it can operate and benefit from them (which is what the Wall Street Journal has reported they would do). Doing so would only put our employees there at greater risk and do more harm than good,” he wrote.
Robertson said the company was “complying with all applicable sanctions, laws and regulations” and would continue to monitor the situation.
The statement was released on the same day that the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, made an address to Congress. “All American companies must leave their market immediately because it is flooded with our blood,” said Zelenskiy.
The Kansas-based conglomerate – the second-largest private company in the US – is one of 40 companies “digging in” and refusing to leave Russia, according to a tally compiled by the Yale professor Jeffrey Sonnenfeld and his research team.
Popular Information also revealed last week that a network of pundits and groups funded by Koch has been publicly advocating against imposing economic sanctions on Russia.
In a statement on Wednesday, Koch Industries announced its Guardian Industries subsidiary will continue to operate two glass manufacturing facilities in Russia that employ about 600 people.
“While Guardian’s business in Russia is a very small part of Koch, we will not walk away from our employees there or hand over these manufacturing facilities to the Russian government so it can operate and benefit from them,” Koch Industries President Dave Robertson said in the statement. “Doing so would only put our employees there at greater risk and do more harm than good.”
Beyond the two factories, Koch Industries said it employs 15 people in Russia but has no other physical assets in the country.
Charles Koch has been a frequent supporter of the Republican party. Senate Democrat leaders chastised the company for its decision and called on Koch Industries to immediately suspend its operations in Russia.
“Koch Industries is shamefully continuing to do business in Putin’s Russia and putting their profits ahead of defending democracy,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senator Ron Wyden, in a joint statement. “As the democracies of the world make huge sacrifices to punish Russia for Putin’s illegal and vicious invasion of Ukraine, Koch Industries continues to profit off of Putin’s regime.”
The announcement came on the same day that Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky called on America, including business leaders, to do more during what is the “darkest time” for his country.
“All American companies must leave Russia from their market, leave their market immediately, because it is flooded with our blood,” Zelensky said during his address to Congress on Wednesday.
Koch Industries said it is complying with all sanctions, laws and regulations within all countries it operates in.
The company condemned Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.
“The horrific and abhorrent aggression against Ukraine is an affront to humanity,” Robertson said.
Koch Industries said it has provided financial assistance to employees and their families from Ukraine and humanitarian aid to those impacted in neighboring countries.
343 Industries has confirmed that it is gearing up to make some changes to Halo Infinite’s in-game store, including reducing prices, improving bundles, putting individual items outside of certain bundles, and much more.
343’s Head of Design Jerry Hook shared the news on Twitter, saying that the team is going to begin implementing these changes on Tuesday, January 18, and they will continue to monitor and try new things throughout the remainder of Halo Infinite mutliplayer’s first season.
“We’ve been monitoring the discussions on the Shop, bundles, and pricing closely since launch,” Hook wrote. “Using data and community feedback, we’re going to begin rolling out changes to how we package and price items in @Halo Infinite – and it all starts next week.
“Starting Tuesday, the Shop experience will vary week-to-week. We are focused on reducing pricing across the board, providing stronger values in our bundles, starting to put individual items outside of bundles, and more.
“We will be trying new things throughout the rest of the season so that we can continue to learn and improve for the future. Please keep the feedback coming during this process and I hope to see you all next week for the Cyber Showdown event!”
Have you played Halo Infinite?
While Hook didn’t go into further detail as to how much these prices will be reduced and what other types of changes we can expect, we won’t have long to wait to see some of them put into action.
This is another example of 343 Industries communicating with the Halo Infinite community and committing to improvements, much like it did – and is still doing – for the Battle Pass, multiplayer progression, and lack of a dedicated Slayer playlist.
Halo Infinite’s shop isn’t the only focus of next week, as 343 has also promised that a fix for the Big Team Battle matchmaking bug is on the way that will hopefully solve the many issues players have been running into.
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Adam Bankhurst is a news writer for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @AdamBankhurst and on Twitch.
