Jason Schreier

I want to re-emphasize one part of this Xbox story: Half of the 3,200 cuts are happening today and half are happening in the next 12 months. In other words, even people who survived today's layoffs will have to spend the coming year wondering if they're going to be next.

Even now there's misinformation floating around, so let me make this clear: Xbox is cutting 3,200 jobs, or 20% of the organization. 1,600 jobs will be eliminated today, and then another 1,600 (including the studio divestments) in the next 12 months.

Full story: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Microsoft’s Xbox to Cut 3,200 Jobs, Divest Five Studios in Major Overhaul

Compulsion and Double Fine studios will become independent; Undead Labs and Ninja Theory will be sold. Xbox will also look to sell or spin out Arkane Studios.

BREAKING: Xbox will cut 3,200 jobs as part of a major reorganization, and divest from five studios:
- Compulsion and Double Fine will go indie
- Ninja Theory and Undead Labs will be sold
- Arkane to enter consultation process

Here's the full story: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Microsoft’s Xbox to Cut 3,200 Jobs, Divest Five Studios in Major Overhaul

Compulsion and Double Fine studios will become independent; Undead Labs and Ninja Theory will be sold. Xbox will also look to sell or spin out Arkane Studios.

Despite a report this morning, I can confirm that Obsidian is *not* in negotiations to avoid shutting down. Plenty of details are still up in the air surrounding the layoffs (picture will be clear on Monday) but Xbox is keeping Obsidian, according to people familiar with the situation.

BREAKING: Obsidian Entertainment is making a big pivot as part of the Xbox restructuring. It has laid off a quarter of its staff, canceled a planned sequel to Avowed, and is now beginning work on a new Fallout game, according to people familiar with the plans www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Microsoft’s Xbox to Shift Obsidian Studio to New ‘Fallout’ Video Game

The game maker is also canceling a planned sequel to last year’s ‘Avowed’

BREAKING: The legal battle over hit game Subnautica 2 has come to an end. Krafton has reached a settlement with the executives it fired (via ChatGPT's advice).

Krafton has agreed to pay the studio significant bonuses while CEO Ted Gill has departed (again). Story: www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Krafton Agrees to Pay ‘Subnautica 2’ Bonuses as Developer’s CEO Resigns

After being fired over a $250 million payout dispute and then reinstated, Unknown Worlds Entertainment boss Ted Gill is leaving again

A lot of people (accurately) point out that premium video games are cheaper today than they were 30 years ago thanks to inflation, but discussed less often is how much bigger the margins are for game companies now that sales are 80-90% (soon to be 100%) digital. No more retail or packaging costs!

Studios in the Bethesda organization like id Software (Doom) and ZeniMax Online Studios (Elder Scrolls Online) are not shutting down but are cutting a significant number of staff this morning, per sources.

The massive Xbox layoffs won't happen until after the fiscal year ends, but the company is already ending contracts and cutting vendors. So Assembly, Xbox's main PR agency, is laying people off today.

The cruelest part of this Xbox bloodbath? More than 1,200 job cuts are still looming, and nobody knows when they will happen or who will be impacted.

This week's column: www.bloomberg.com/news/newslet...

Delayed Xbox Layoffs Leave Employees Scared And Nervous

Xbox cut 1,600 jobs this week and plans to cut another 1,600 over the next 12 months, leaving remaining staff on tenterhooks

FWIW I think it's a little strange that "Arkane's Blade is late and over budget" is becoming a lingering news story when the total number of big video games that were *not* late and over budget could be counted on one hand

I spoke to the director and top designer of Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League. They were remarkably candid, telling me that the experience made them dislike making games.

But now they're teaming up on an indie project to get their passion back. New column: www.bloomberg.com/news/newslet...

Top ‘Suicide Squad’ Developers Say the Flop Made Them Not Want to Make Games Anymore

The director and top designer of Rocksteady’s failed game open up about their experiences

NEW: Xbox confirms to Bloomberg News that it has pulled out of IO Interactive's 'Project Fantasy' video game.

“We expect to invest about the same in content as we did last year. What's changing is where we're investing and the kinds of projects we're backing.”
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Xbox Pulls Out of ‘Project Fantasy’ Video Game From IO Interactive

The ‘007: First Light’ makers had teamed up with Xbox for the new video game

Reply to @jasonschreier.bsky.social

I didn't think this needed to be spelled out (thank you Bluesky), but the point is that even if the prices are the same, companies are making more money per sale now than they were back then, and none of that is passed to the customer

I've been getting some emails lately from companies wanting me to do sponsorships, but for some reason they stop responding when I tell them what I charge

Watching simultaneous fireworks and lightning bolts is a surreal experience, like we’re going to war with the sky and it’s fighting back

Reply to @jasonschreier.bsky.social

Case in point: the staff of Blizzard Entertainment were told today that they won't hear how the reorganization impacts them until "further communications"

Valve's new Steam Machine was 14 years (and one big failure) in the making. Here's the twisty story behind the Steam maker's decade-long quest to bring PCs to the living room: www.bloomberg.com/news/newslet...

Valve’s 14-Year Journey to Make the Steam Machine

The company first began laying the groundwork for this year’s hardware way back in 2012

This is the story of a game studio that was ditched by Amazon Games... and how it set them up for a whole lot of success www.bloomberg.com/news/newslet...

Getting Ditched by Amazon Helped Revitalize One Game Studio

Maverick Games, the maker of ‘Clutch,’ was ditched by Amazon but is doing just fine

Reply to @jasonschreier.bsky.social

ZeniMax will be impacted significantly by the reorganization but will NOT be reduced to only Fallout and The Elder Scrolls, despite rumors over the last few weeks. The publisher will also still work on Wolfenstein, Doom and Quake.

Reply to @jasonschreier.bsky.social

Correction: Today's Assembly layoffs were part of an agency-wide reorganization and were not related to Xbox ending contracts. People on the Xbox account were laid off but the agency is still continuing to work with Xbox, I'm told

Another excellent entry in the deductive/metroidbrainia/investigation/thinkygame genre is out today: store.steampowered.com/app/3641000/...

Save 10% on The Incident at Galley House on Steam

In 1936, something terrible happened at Galley House. Decades later, with a strange contraption that reveals echoes of the past, you must uncover the truth behind this grisly mystery.

Uhhh this kinda feels like a threat

Reply

Don't read into what I have or haven't commented on. I only report on what I can confirm with 100% certainty