It’s only Tuesday, and we’ve already had a story about a studio closing and layoffs at a completely different studio. So what happened?
To take the stories in order, Rovio announced that it’s closing its Copenhagen location following a redundancy process. The studio was working on Sonic Blitz, an endless runner/collectible card game hybrid that Rovio has since cancelled. According to a spokesperson, around 20 people worked on the project, and those who can’t be relocated to another project will be laid off.
In a statement to Mobilegamer.biz, which reported on the story, Rovio CEO Alex Pelletier-Normand said, “We need to concentrate our bets both in terms of the games that we’re making and where we’re making them.” He added that Sonic Blitz “looks great on paper” but showed less retention than the company was hoping for.
Pelletier-Norman added, “I still am convinced that there is a way to reach more players on mobile with Sonic, it turns out that it’s much more complicated than I think both Sega and Rovio thought. We’re still very proud of the game, very proud of what the team achieved, but it didn’t work.”
The second story is not much cheerier. According to a report from Game File, most of the team at Bit Reactor was furloughed, days before the launch of its debut title Star Wars: Zero Company. A source told writer Stephen Totilo that there was only a skeleton crew of staff at the moment to support the game post-launch, with 80% of staff having been furloughed without pay.
Another source told Totilo that the studio hopes to bring back the furloughed workers and award them back pay. Amidst all of this, Bit Reactor is also at the center of a lawsuit involving co-founder Alison Kelly, who has alleged breach of contract and unjust enrichment on the part of owner Greg Foertsch. The lawsuit has been postponed to early 2027.
These stories, about layoffs, studio closures and even staff furloughs, have become common in the games industry within the last few years. Most recently, thousands of workers were either laid off or put in fear of layoffs at Microsoft. Gaming jobs champion Amir Satvat provided data to GamesBeat that put the projected layoffs for this year at 14,259.