Square Enix, the developer-publisher behind this year’s Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, is set to lay off an unspecified number of employees across its US and European offices, headquartered in California and the United Kingdom, respectively, this week. According to those present, Square Enix president Takashi Kiryu first reported the news at a company-wide meeting. Video Games Chronicle.
Such layoffs are suspected after Square Enix’s latest financial earnings report, which included a three-year company reboot plan with an “aggressive” multiplatform release strategy followed by a slide that cited “structural improvements.” You can see the slide below:
As you can see above, as part of Square Enix’s plan to rebuild its overseas business divisions from the ground up, the company “began to optimize costs at its European and American offices through structural improvements.” After more than 10,000 layoffs across game studios and publishers this year, it’s easy to read between the lines — structural improvements are “layoffs” and now VGC confirmed that.
The publication reports that these layoffs will occur over the course of the next month, with those affected finding out this week. The total number of expected layoffs is unknown, however VGCSources say staff have been told it will mostly affect those working in publishing, IT and Square Enix’s collective indie games division.
Dismissed UK employees will enter a “one-month consultation period” in accordance with local UK law, while affected US staff may be out of their jobs before the end of the month.
These layoffs join a string of other disappointing 2024 layoffs and closings, which now exceed 10,000 in the first five months of the year.
Earlier this month, Xbox closed four Bethesda studios, including Hi-Fi Rush developer Tango Gameworks and Redfall studio Arcane Austin. Take-Two Interactive closed rollerdrome studio Roll7 and Kerbal Space Program 2 studio Intercept Games along with major layoffs for its indie-publisher Private Division label. That same week, we learned that Deliver to Mars developer Keoken Interactive had laid off its entire staff.
Elsewhere in the year, EA laid off approximately 670 employees across all divisions, resulting in the cancellation of Respawn’s Star Wars FPS game. PlayStation laid off 900 employees across Insomniac, Naughty Dog, Guerrilla and more, closing a London studio in the process. Earlier in the day, Dawn developer Supermassive Games announced the layoff of 90 employees.
In late January, we learned that Embracer Group had canceled a new Deus Ex game in development at Eidos-Montreal, laying off 97 employees in the process. In January, Destroy All Humans remake developer Black Forest Games reportedly laid off 50 employees, and Microsoft announced layoffs of 1,900 across its Xbox, Activision Blizzard, and ZeniMax teams. Outriders studio People Can Fly laid off more than 30 employees in January, and League of Legends company Riot Games laid off 530 employees.
Lords of the Fallen publisher CI Games has laid off 10 percent of its staff, Unity will lay off 1,800 people by the end of March, and Twitch has laid off 500 employees.
We’ve learned that Discord has laid off 170 employees, layoffs at PTW, a support studio that works with companies like Blizzard and Capcom, and Steamworld build company, Thunderful Group, let go roughly 100 people. Dead by Daylight developer Behavior Interactive also reportedly laid off 45 people.
(Source: Video Games Chronicle)