Black Rock Studios Hit with Layoffs

One of the saddest things about working as a games journalist is having to report on layoffs in the industry, and unfortunately today we have to do just that, as it looks like Disney owned Black Rock Studio is at risk. According to a source within the Brighton-based developer, close to 100 staffers are at risk of losing their jobs.

Talking with Eurogamer, the source had the following to say about the situation:

It seems Disney have been unable to provide us with a project to work on, and our concept pitches clearly haven’t gone down well (despite there being many of them).

He continues on to talk about sequels for both Split/Second and Pure, which the studio had begun work on.

After SS wrapped, we started work on SS2 pre-prod which was cancelled last December due to DIS’s new management and their changing priorities (the push towards freemium etc) – SS2 didn’t really fit in with that (despite some efforts to shoehorn it in).

Even with these layoffs, the source has stated that a “good proportion” of Black Rock Studio is still employed and are working on a “promising title” that is “new and risky, so I imagine [Disney] don’t want to risk putting two teams on it.”

We here at PlayStation LifeStyle wish Black Rock employees the best of luck at finding future career opportunities.

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