Narrative journey developer Telltale Video games, the studio at the moment engaged on The Wolf Amongst Us 2 and which simply launched The Expanse: A Telltale Collection, has undergone layoffs which one former worker says impacted “most of” the studio.
The information first circulated by way of a publish on X (previously Twitter) by former Telltale cinematic artist Jonah Huang, who mentioned that these layoffs came about in early September:
This can be a sore topic, however I really feel it needed so as to add to the gaming layoff information: Telltale laid most of us off early September. Standing of TWAU2, I can not say (NDA).
Now, I concentrate on what issues to me—my very own sport, and the next phrases:
Video games trade, we should UNIONIZE.
1/5
— jjonahjonahson (@jjonahjonahson) October 5, 2023
Telltale has confirmed that it has undergone layoffs in a press release despatched to IGN, however didn’t verify the quantity or extent. Its assertion is as follows:
On account of present market circumstances, we regrettably needed to let a few of our Telltale group go lately. We didn’t take this motion calmly, and our dedication to storytelling and discovering new methods to take action stays the identical. We’re grateful to everybody for his or her dedication alongside this journey, and we’re working to help everybody impacted. All tasks at the moment in improvement are nonetheless in manufacturing, and we have now no additional updates right now.
Notably, Huang was a part of the primary iteration of Telltale Video games as nicely, which equally underwent important layoffs earlier than closing fully in 2019. The shutdown was attributed to buyers backing out, however a 12 months later, LCG Leisure revived the enterprise identify and a number of other of its property, hiring various its former staff as nicely. At The Sport Awards in 2019, it introduced it was making a sequel to Telltale’s The Wolf Amongst Us for a deliberate launch in 2023. Then earlier this 12 months, we sat down with Telltale CEO Jamie Ottlie, who defined the sport was being delayed attributable to struggles porting it from Unreal Engine 4 to five and a want to keep away from crunch. It doesn’t at the moment have a brand new launch date.
As Huang notes, these layoffs appear to have occurred simply weeks after Telltale acquired UK-based studio Flavourworks.
These layoffs come as a part of an ongoing pattern of trade mass layoffs which have impacted various main studios this 12 months and final. These embrace layoffs at Naughty Canine, Group 17, Ascendant, Blizzard, BioWare, Epic Video games, Blackbird Interactive, Putting Distance, BioWare once more, Ubisoft, Scavengers Studio, CD Projekt, Embracer Group’s quite a few subsidiaries, Deviation Video games, The Molasses Flood, Relic Leisure, Xbox, Riot Video games, Unity, and plenty of extra.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Received a narrative tip? Ship it to rvalentine@ign.com.
