Microsoft has just announced massive job cuts and studio closures for the Bethesda portion of its gaming business. They impact the teams that made excellent games likeHi-Fi Rush.
IGN revealedthese studios’ closures had happened and shared an internal email about them written by Matt Booty, the head of Xbox Game Studios. The four studios impacted areRedfall’sArkane Austin,Mighty Doom’sAlpha Dog Studios, internal development studio Roundhouse Games, andHi-Fi Rush’sTango Gameworks.
With the closure of Arkane Austin, Booty says Bethesda will stop active development on futureRedfallupdates. It will keep its servers online for now, though, and Xbox “will provide make-good offers” to those who purchasedRedfall’shero DLC. On the mobile game front,Mighty Doomfrom Alpha Dog Studios will be sunset on August 7. Microsoft has turned off the ability to make in-game purchases.
Roundhouse Games will be merged into ZeniMax Online Studios to support their development work on games likeThe Elder Scrolls Online. All Booty had to say about the closure of Tango Gameworks was the following: “We are thankful for their contributions to Bethesda and players around the world.Hi-Fi Rushwill continue to be available to players on the platforms it is today.” He also confirmed that “a small number of roles across select Bethesda publishing and corporate teams will also be eliminated”
Booty prefaced these announcements by saying that “these changes are grounded in prioritizing high-impact titles and further investing in Bethesda’s portfolio of blockbuster games and beloved worlds which you have nurtured over many decades.” He also referred to upcoming games and expansions likeStarfield: Shattered SpaceandIndiana Jones and the Great Circle. This is the second massive wave of layoffs to hit an Xbox Studio this year, as nearly2,000 developers were let gofrom Activision Blizzard in January.
