Epic Games - previously - but not an Epic Employer - Senior Programmer Epic Games Employee Review

2.0
Oct 14, 2015
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Perks. CEO is a good guy.

Cons

CEO has lost control of the company. Epic has suffered as it has grown. The upper level management are far too corporate and don't understand the video games business well. There is no loyalty within the company, employees are made to feel worthless as they watch their friends be laid off when things don't go well (not always their fault). For example: manager asks employee to predict how long a task will take. Employee predicts. 2 days before delivery, the manager tells the employee that the task has changed completely and needs to be restarted - but delivered in 2 days. Employee says this is impossible. Management don't care - there's a milestone coming! Employee fails to deliver on time. This repeats for the next 2 tasks. Despite 5 years of excellent work and amazing performance reviews, the employee is brought into a meeting and encouraged to leave. Not fired, not redundant, the employee needs to sign a legal letter to say that he/she won't sue the company at a later date and, in exchange, the company will make some small payoff to recompense the employee so that they can afford to pay their mortgage and not end up homeless. It is also very clear that Epic will fail as an international business. ALL management is within the US HQ. Non-US employees are treat as second class citizens. US management will "give the talk", telling those employees that they are valued, but they really aren't. The vision of the company is completely disjoint now, too. With fierce competition from other games engines, Epic have invested a lot of time in Unreal Engine. But it doesn't bring income for the company. The games under development are flailing around, trying to be unique, but ultimately failing as well. Losing key designers badly hurt the company.

Explore other reviews about Epic Games

5.0
Jun 23, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Amazing company.Great work life balance, great people

Cons

Still acts like a start up, a lot of ambiguity

1.0
Jul 3, 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business Outlook

Pros

Cool products Great designers and engineers WFH flexibility They have 2 weeks off in the summer and winter (for 95% of employees)

Cons

They mostly hire people who don't play games now Those are the people who make final decisions on gameplay changes and are given more authority than actual designers They see players as something to exploit for money and seek monetization first with everything they do Executives and directors only surround themselves with yes-men these days, along with self serving AI bots Folks at the bottom can not be heard by those at the top, the structure has become very rigid and info doesnt trickle up anymore The call from the top has been to keep making more Fortnite for so long, even after layoffs they just double down on the bets that led to the layoff in the first place. They are allergic to promoting up too high and would rather bring in external folks for any senior leadership role They hire like crazy every time they get some money There is generally never consequence for failed bets, and so you see people failing again and again at the top for years and they're never held accountable In general they are allergic to setting success targets (at least that are shared to lower class). They do "if it works, great", "if it doesnt everything is on fire and we need to pivot everything." They intentionally avoid original work and exclusively copy other games and creators because its safer, even though those copy bets fail usually anyway. The top leaders, including Tim, have become unapproachable by anyone who isn't in their ear already. From the outside it looks like the king of Rohan and Wormtongue. Its a bunch of grifters guiding and lying to very powerful men.

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