Two studio closures and deep layoffs at id make for a rough start to 2012.
The video game industry is a volatile one, especially around this time of year. As projects wrap up, layoffs are common. However, the recent collection of layoffs is rather shocking, with many people having lost their jobs in rapid succession.
First on the chopping block is BigBig Studios, which was shut down by Sony. The company was formed in 2001 and is probably best known for the quirky racing/action PSP game Pursuit Force. BigBig Studios is the team behind Little Deviants, which is planned on inclusion in the Vita: First Edition bundle.
Monumental Games, the studio behind the popular and long-running MotoGP series, let its remaining 20 staff members go. The company had gone into restructuring in 2010, but sadly was not able to turn things around. The company was reportedly working on an unannounced project for a large publisher, but the deal fell through.
While those two studios are rather small, we also got word of big layoffs over at id Software. It is unknown exactly which team received the cuts: Rage or Doom 4. Rage underperformed at retail last year, and with the game having been completed, it would make sense that the layoffs would come from that department. “Id is still recruiting and hiring qualified developers, and development work on future id titles continues unabated,” says id Software VP of marketing and PR Pete Hines.
“Id is still recruiting and hiring qualified developers, and development work on future id titles continues unabated..."
So why are they laying off staff if they're still recruiting and hiring? Need to get some young blood in the trenches?
It sucks when these layoffs happen. Hopefully the people affected get picked up ASAP.
I imagine that the layoffs come from the Rage team. They were probably contract workers brought in to get the game shipped. That's usually the case in these stories. Still sucks though.
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