Brenda and John Romero, games industry veterans who’ve worked on pioneering titles including Doom, Wizardry and Jagged Alliance, have claimed the modern industry is ‘crashier’ than ever before, with opportunities swiftly drying up.
Speaking to GamesIndustry.biz, the pair reflected on their experiences working in the games industry from the 1980s until now, outlining a connection between the historic video game crash of 1983 and current movements affecting developers of all sizes.
Brenda and John Romero on the games industry – quick links
‘This is definitely crashier [than the 1980s]’
Both Brenda and John Romero agreed that the modern games industry is under pressure like never before. They believe current circumstances are worse than the crash of the 1980s, which was only understood in retrospect as a significant turning point in modern games.
Currently, many global developers are dealing with layoffs or a lack of work, as investors and publishers close their wallets. Major studios are shutting down, reducing headcount, or cancelling games outright.
Romero Games, the studio founded by Brenda and John Romero, has experienced significant challenges over the last year, too. It had previously secured funding from Microsoft to develop a new ‘AAA FPS’ game. In 2025, this funding was terminated, amid a global reduction in head count and spending.
As a result, Romero Games shrunk from around 110 people, to just nine.
‘I feel like the industry’s in a really horrible place,’ Brenda Romero told GamesIndustry.biz. ‘I mean, we were there in the 80s for the crash, and this is definitely crashier. There are so few people that have not been affected, or their partner’s affected, or they’re worried about being affected. It’s a really difficult time right now.’
As the Romeros outlined, what’s not clear is the end point of this change. After all, developers can create a successful, thriving game – Battlefield 6 was used as a recent example – and still be laid off. Even studios with tenure and a rock-solid reputation haven’t escaped the financial blows.
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For those staff remaining at their studio, Brenda Romero described a feeling of ‘survivor’s guilt’.
‘It was really hard because a lot of us had been working together for 10 years,’ she said of Romero Games’ recent layoffs. ‘I mean, it was obviously hardest on the people who were ultimately made redundant. But yeah, it sucked. It’s the worst. There’s nothing worse than that.’
People are going to ‘keep playing games’
Despite this, the simple fact is that people are going to keep playing games and developers are going to keep making them. Regardless of any financial reality, there is a desire to keep creating, to keep playing, and to use games as a medium for escape.
‘I’m not going to stop making games,’ John Romero confirmed. ‘There’s so much cool stuff to make.’
How those games are made will need to change in future, however. Romero Games is now a much smaller team than it once was, with more work to tackle – even with a reduced vision for the unnamed AAA project currently in development at the studio.
‘The size of the game is dictated by the size of the team and the amount of time,’ John Romero explained. ‘We don’t want to take forever to get the game done, but we have a pretty big game to work with.’
While Brenda Romero explained the game won’t be ‘what it was going to be’, its creation remains driven by a passion for game-making, and a long-term belief in the experience. The Romero Games team is determined to press on.
Against a backdrop of significant challenge, the team is maintaining a positive approach, remaining committed to make the best game possible while they can. The future remains uncertain, but as Brenda Romero shared, there is a strong belief that ‘it can’t stay like this forever’ and that better times will eventually come to pass.
