Tips for surviving layoff roulette in the gaming industry

Band together with your former co-workers - Start a Facebook group for alumni from your company.  Organize happy hours.  Get and share everyone's contact info.  The people you worked with are by far the most valuable asset from your previous job.  Stay close with them.

Find out what really happened, so you can screen for this situation in the future and be better prepared - Did the company run out of funding? Was a particular game performing badly?  Were the costs to acquire users higher than the LTV of those customers?  Did the market shift to a new technology or platform?  Did the corporate office decide to restructure?  Each of these can be turned into questions that you can ask your future potential employers as you evaluate each opportunity.

Start your job search immediately (save the vacation until you've found something) - If the layoffs were publicized, which they usually are in gaming, it's likely that recruiters and headhunters will start reaching out to you and your co-workers almost immediately.  This is the time when you should try to line up several interviews, and hopefully get a few job offers to come in around the same time.  Having more than one option is the best way to negotiate a better compensation package, and since you're no longer working a full-time job you might finally have the time to line-up your job offers correctly.  Then, once you've made your decision, you should be able to squeeze in a vacation before your start date.

Learn a new skill - Hunting for jobs all day can be exhausting and monotonous.  Consider learning something new in the downtime, or when you just need a break.  Take a tutorial on that new programming language, start hacking something together, experiment with a new piece of software, learn to play guitar, take a toastmasters class, etc.  I'd recommend picking just one thing that you really want to focus on during this time.

Submit your unemployment claim right away - Unemployment eligibility is calculated and paid out on a weekly basis.  So don't wait even a couple days or you might get delayed to the next week, which could potentially cost you hundreds of dollars.

Consider starting your own thing - If you have some savings to tap into, a layoff may be a 'founding moment' of sorts since you have a group of like-minded and talented co-workers who are all in the same situation as you. This is the route my co-founder and I chose, but it remains to be seen if it was the right one!