Digital Bros Group, the parent company to publisher 505 Games, has announced plans to lay off 30 percent of its staff. It says it is doing so to align with “the new competitive market.” 505 Games is the publisher behind games like Ghostrunner 2, Control, Payday 2, the PC version of Death Stranding, and more; it’s unclear how much of that team will be affected by Digital Bros’ overall plan.
“Digital Bros has reviewed its projects to align with the new competitive environment,” it writes in a press release. “This is expected to represent a reduction of approximately 30 percent of the global workforce, but no significant effect of restructuring costs is expected on the annual project results for [Fiscal Year 2024].”
The company goes on to say that the video game market has evolved since the pandemic to be more selective with new games, noting that consumers are increasingly reverting to established IP and playing individual games for longer periods. “Digital Bros strategy has had to adapt to this new and evolving competitive scenario and will focus its efforts moving forward on the release of sequels and new versions of previously successful and established games, with a limited number of new larger budgets productions,” a press release reads.
While it’s unclear how many people at Digital Bros’ various arms will be affected, the company does note that the majority of the 30 percent laid off will be “concentrated within the studios.” It sounds like Digital Bros is making the decision to lay off employees – right as the holiday season begins, mind you – but keeping itself safe from the job terminations, instead reducing the workforce of the studios under its umbrella.
These Digital Bros layoffs join an unfortunately ever-growing list of layoffs happening in the gaming industry. Yesterday, Amazon Games laid off 180 employees. Last week, we learned Free Radical Design is on the verge of closing down and that Ubisoft laid off more than 100 employees. The week before that, roughly 100 employees were laid off at Destiny 2 developer Bungie.
In January, Microsoft laid off 10,000 employees amidst its ongoing $69 billion acquisition of Activision Blizzard, which it completed last month.
In August, Striking Distance Studios, the team behind last year’s The Callisto Protocol, laid off more than 30 employees, and that same month, Mass Effect and Dragon Age developer BioWare laid off 50 employees, including long-time studio veterans. The following month, in September, Immortals of Aveum developer Ascendant Studios laid off roughly 45% of its staff.
Just last month, The Last of Us developer Naughty Dog laid off at least 25 employees, and Telltale Games underwent layoffs as well, although an actual number of laid-off employees has not yet been revealed. And in late October, Dreams developer Media Molecule laid off 20 employees.
The hearts of Game Informer‘s staff are with the people laid off from Digital Bros, along with everyone else who has lost a job this year.
