Magic: the Gathering is casting lots for a union. Game developers at the popular digital and tabletop studio Wizards of the Coast, a subsidiary of Hasbro that develops online versions of the popular card game are seeking to join the Communications Workers of America.
The workers announced their intent to unionize Monday to join the CWA, which has organized thousands of workers in the tech and video game industry in recent years, including the largest certified union in the US video game industry in 2024 representing 600 quality assurance workers at Activision.
More than 100 game designers, programmers, producers, artists and other workers at the studio will be represented by the bargaining unit, with workers stating they have a supermajority of support. They are requesting voluntary recognition, but have filed for a union election at the National Labor Relations Board as well, offering to withdraw the petition if they are voluntarily recognized by 1 May.
Workers cited layoff protections, remote work protections, generative AI protections for workers, sustainable workloads and defined career progressions as some of the issues driving the unionization effort.
The Wizards of the Coast studio, based in Renton, Washington, has engaged in several layoffs in recent years, including about 30 employees laid off in March 2025 and a significant round of layoffs affecting 1,100 workers across Hasbro in December 2023.
Rogue Kessler, a designer at the studio, explained the unionization effort at the studio ramped up in response to a recent return to office mandate, where workers who work remotely are being told they must relocate to Washington or lose their jobs.
“We have people living all over the country, and many of those folks were hired remotely in the first place. They’ve never been to Washington. They’ve never lived here, and now they’re being told all of a sudden that they need to move to Seattle, uproot their families, sell their homes and relocate here in two years or lose their job,” said Kessler. “We’ve had a few round rounds of layoffs here at Hasbro and Wizards, and so that’s something that has a lot of us very spooked as well. We want to see some robust protections there.”
Valentine Powell, a software engineer at the studio, said management hasn’t been responsive in trying to address these issues.
“They just aren’t working with the people who are on the ground level and so unionization is our best effort to try and rectify that,” Powell said.
They added the union is also pushing for protections and guardrails for how artificial intelligence is used, arguing: “When it comes to the product that we’re trying to make, I believe that AI has consistently shown worse results. It takes longer and it just sort of harms the end product.”
Powell warned if initiatives like the return to office mandate are forced upon workers at the studio, it’s going to result in losing several skilled artists, developers and workers.
“What I would like to say to our players is the people who make your game love making it. The co-workers that I’ve had here are some of the most dedicated to trying to make a really, really outstanding game and trying to make their players happy and keep those lines of communication open. And it’s those people that we’re very likely to lose if some of the initiatives go forward,” Powell said. “I really believe unionization is the only thing that’s going to save the games industry.”
After the public announcement of the unionization effort, Wizards of the Coast and Hasbro were contacted for comment, but they did not immediately respond.
