Unity CEO John Riccitiello calls game devs who don't focus on monetization "fucking idiots". The comments were made in a recent interview, where he also undermines the severity of Unity's global layoffs, which were revealed just before the industry giant bought another company.
Speaking to Pocket Gamer (via Mobile Gamer), Riccitiello and other Unity executives speak about how developers should consider monetization opportunities as early in development as possible. When it's pointed out that many indie devs are against this, Riccitiello says that these people are "beautiful and pure", but also "some of the biggest fucking idiots."
"It’s a very small portion of the gaming industry that works that way," says Riccitiello, when asked about developers who don't wish to consider monetization early in development. "Some of these people are my favourite people in the world to fight with - they’re the most beautiful and pure, brilliant people. They’re also some of the biggest fucking idiots."
He then goes on to explain that he "respects" devs who just want to focus on their work, admiring their "dedication and care". However, he suggests that these people need to "figure out what makes a successful product."
In response to the criticism these comments received, Riccitiello seemingly denies that he meant to refer to his peers as "fucking idiots." Taking to Twitter, he responds: "Clickbait. Out of full context. Deeply sorry if what I said offended any game dev. Absolutely love the people that make games. Creative, hard work."
In the full context of the interview, Unity general manager Marc Whitten had just talked about how he hopes to get indie devs thinking about how to reach their audience as early in the development process as possible. Pocket Gamer follows this up by pointing out that such discussions have seen "pushback from some developers." This is when Riccitello responds that "they’re also some of the biggest fucking idiots" for not following their development philosophy.
Later on, Riccitiello also spoke on the controversy surrounding global Unity layoffs. While admitting that four percent of Unity workers did lose their job, he also claims that "over half of them got rehired within other parts of Unity." He doesn't elaborate on this, so it's not known if they were rehired with the same pay and benefits as their previous positions.
Riccitello is yet to respond to his critics in the wake of the merger with known Malware distributor, Ironsource.