
Update #3 [Thu 7th Nov, 2024 01:05 GMT]:
Following the update on the sale of Private Division, Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier has noted the following:
Take-Two Interactive has now confirmed that it did, in fact, close subsidiaries Roll7 and Intercept. In May, following Bloomberg's report that the studios were closed, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick said, "We didn't shutter those studios, to be clear."
Update #2 [Wed 29th May, 2024 05:35 BST]:
Although the Take-Two CEO mentioned how Intercept Games and Roll7 haven't been shut down, it seems a layoff is on the way.
As highlighted in a LinkedIn update of a senior programmer at Intercept Games (Kerbel Space Program 2), employees will be let go next month (via VGC):
"The team at Intercept Games will be laid off as of June 28th so a great group will be out and about looking for their new roles."
If there are other developments about this studio or Roll7, we'll let you know.
Update #1 [Fri 17th May, 2024 01:05 BST]:
Following Bloomberg's report earlier this month, Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick has now shared an update, claiming the company hasn't closed these studios. Here's the full statement, courtesy of IGN:
Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick: "We didn't shutter those studios, to be clear. And we are always looking at our release schedule across all of our studios to make sure that it makes sense. So we are being very judicious because we are in the middle of a cost reduction program that we've already concluded and are now fully rolling out. We've announced that we're saving $165 million in existing and future costs, but we haven't shuttered anything."
However, when asked if Zelnick was "denying the reports" about Roll7 and the Kerbal Space Program developer Intercept, Take-Two's PR stepped in:
"What we've said is, in the 8-K filing that we put out we talked about the cost reduction plan is approximately 5% reduction in headcount worldwide, but we did not give a label-by-label breakdown of what that looks like...We have not provided any additional color beyond what I just said."
Bloomberg's reporter Jason Schreier has also released part of the documentation obtained earlier this month:
If we hear any other developments, we'll let you know.
Original article [Thu 2nd May, 2024 03:30 BST]:
There's already been a record amount of job losses within the games industry this year and it seems this trend is unfortunately set to continue with Bloomberg reporting the closure of another two studios.
According to "documentation reviewed by Bloomberg", Take-Two Interactive Software has announced it will be shutting down the Private Division and London-based subsidiary Roll7 (OlliOlli, Rollerdrome) and the Kerbal Space Program 2 developer Intercept Games, which is located in Seattle.
"The first outfit is London-based Roll7, developer of the action game Rollerdrome, according to a note to staff. Take-Two plans to close the studio and will offer severance agreements to its staff.
"The other is Seattle-based Intercept Games, maker of the space flight simulation game Kerbal Space Program 2, according to a notice filed with the Washington State Employment Security Department Monday. The notice revealed that Take-Two plans to close an office in Seattle and cut 70 jobs, or roughly the number of people who worked for Intercept Games."
Take-Two's vice president for communications says Kerbal Space Program 2 will continue to receive updates.
This latest round of layoffs follows on from many other similar stories this year including some bigger and smaller cases - from mass layoffs at Microsoft and Sony to project cancellations at smaller teams.
If we hear any significant updates or developments, we'll let you know.
[source bloomberg.com]
Comments 45
Missed the opportunity to say “Takes two studios down”. God, big publishers really hate players…
that sucks I really liked Olli Olli...good job take two
Is this another round of layoffs after the 500 job layoffs just after doubling the CEOs salary a couple weeks back?
Take Two are somehow becoming worse than EA, Ubisoft and Activision Blizzard in one fell swoop.
EDIT: I recall there Kerbal Devs being treated extremely poorly the week or so after Take Two bought them too.
This is so disappointing, Olli Olli and Olli Olli 2 are some of best arcade games ever. Never got around to Olli Olli world or rollerdrome, but I bought both and rollerdrome in particular looks awesome.
Never played Kerbal Space Program, but any game company closing sucks. Take Two makes billions off of GTA Online every year, you're telling me they can't afford to keep these studios open?
Both Olli Olli World and Rollerdrome are fantastic, straight up 9/10 games IMO. Wonder if they underperformed..
Bloody shameful. Even more so when you hear CEO Strauss Zelnik and the chairman doubled their salaries last year and doom home $72.3 million in 2023. Scumbags
So GTA 5 didn't print enough money?
I wonder how long it will take before they sell Gearbox again...
@citizenerased Kerbal Space Program 2 is probably a very demanding PC game like the first one, and it's a niche simulator.
Probably underperformed.
Olli Olli World. Got it on PC for 1$ in a charity bundle only 6 months after release.
I got Rollerdrome for 1$ too in a PC bundle too a year ago.
@Toastmaster KSP2 is still in early access as well. Unlike the first game, which was also originally launched in early access, it was not received well, and according to the reviews on the steam store page, it was already receiving glacial development prior to this announcement.
Hate to see it in general and even more so in this specific case based on what comments mentioned not only about the quality of the games these developers made (haven't played them yet myself), but also and especially what the CEOs did before this... as usual wish the best to those affected by this!
@AltCode Yes, but KSP2 is now officially abandonware as it won't get any more updates. A lot of Steam reviews is review bombing it. The score a week ago would be more accurate.
I have no clue why 2K Games would even buy a developer like this. Must have been because of the sales of the first KSP.
Remember when Iwata cut his salary when the Wii U underperformed? Those were the days...
Sad to hear as I love OlliOlli.
That being said perhaps indies should hold off on being purchased until they have a number of games under their belt and can be less disposable from an accounting perspective. Any studio can close but the ones that churn out hits are harder to justify. And it’s all about the balance sheet.
That’s unfortunate. I really like Roll 7’s unique art directions in their games. Olli Olli World had an awesome aesthetic as did Rollerdrome when I got it on PS Plus recently.. not to mention they are also great games as well.
Roll7 was profitable, made audience and critics alike loved games, and yet, they get shut down by a company with huge profits and a CEO whose earnings jumped from $16m TO $46m.
This is absolute greed, pure evil.
@Kirbyo Even more hateful, Nintendo was shedding money. Take2 is better than ever.
@themightyant What’s interesting is your comment lead me to Wikipedia to read the CEO’s background, and before video games the guy lead a Private Equity Firm, pulled an investor takeover, bought a majority share of Take Two and became CEO in 2007. This type of guy is absolutely about the bottom line and maximizing profit.
If an indie company is doing “just well enough” that’s not nearly enough.
This isn't looking good for Kerbal Space Program finally releasing on Wii U is it?
https://www.nintendolife.com/games/wiiu-eshop/kerbal_space_program
I loved the Olli Olli series. That's a real shame. I hope the talented workers get other jobs ASAP!
@Toastmaster Well... that's why steam has the "recent reviews" and the "all reviews" scores. The former very clearly shows that the review bombing that began today, but the latter still clearly indicates that the game has not been doing well since it lauched.
And there's also the reviews graph. If you exclude the reviews from today and onwards, it still quite mixed to negative...
TBF, the original developers of KSP, Squad, should have never sold the rights to KSP to Take-Two to begin with; that was an incredibly short-sighted decision by them.
@AltCode Yeah. They were desperate for a quick buck and now they are "paying" for that.
@RobotReptile wants even more maddening is that Roll7 only had around 60 employees, as of late last year, at a burn rate of about £10,000 - £15,000 per employee per month that means they only needed around £600,000 - £900,000 a month to keep the doors open. £7.2 - £10.8million per year. And meanwhile the top two increased their own salaries by around $29 million ($36m USD). It’s sickening. Roll7 never made a mid game.
OlliOlli was one of those games that’s fun for one hour. It got frustrating way too fast.
You may have ONE breath of relief.
Which just goes to show Jason Schreier is a smug scavenger of misery.
@HotGoomba
It’s corporate doublespeak unfortunately.
@SalvorHardin You may have ONE sigh of disbelief.
Ok the ceo is being obtuse to not spook investors. That being said if they haven’t publicly announced the closures (but instead info was leaked) then the company is gonna be tight lipped and limbo around the question.
In the complete interview they basically said (in corporate language, of course) the studios are not closed but that everyone working on them was fired. It's a similar situation with the bioshock studios 11 years ago, which was never oficially closed but... ya know.
I hate the state of the industry lately.
How about reducing the costs by not even necessarily getting rid of but at least cutting the most likely way-too-high salaries of the CEOs instead?
It is unbelievable that people are so blind and so many so-called CEOs manage to steal off so much jobs, passion, creation, and of course money.
Even countries left without a government manage everything just the same way as the others.
I dare a company to fire their expensive CEO and just look at how much more money they will be making. That, and how much better their games will be, and how much of a nicer place on this planet they will create around them.
If Zelnick has yet to acknowledge the closure of 2K Marin (the developers of Bioshock 2) even after 11 years, then there is no way he'll acknowledge the closure of any studio ever.
That is why I don't buy games from 3A publishers, especially from the west. Everyone that buys CoD, GTA or any other of similar caliber adds a brick to this situation.
No hard feelings.
Update: When Strauss Zelnick said "we didn't shutter the studio" what he meant to say was that literal shutters are expensive so they just put some cardboard over the windows.
"We aren't shutting the studio down, were just firing everyone that works in it"
So...games are getting cheaper to make?
“How could we have shuttered anyone in May when we were already planning to shutter them in June?” 🙄
It sucks that we've reached the point in which there is extractive industry for other real business as the norm (it's happened since GE). I feel for the people who love the games they make enough for it to be their livelihood, but it's hard to see how we have an industry years down the line once the talent responsible decides the love of their work doesn't keep them from losing their home and works for a telecom or something.
Maybe it's reading too far into it, but highly skilled labor in other industries don't typically accept that kind of volatility. I would probably start updating my resume the second the word 'equity' pops up in relation to leadership of my organization.
@GrailUK
Quite the opposite, and that's the problem
@westman98 Then I need the economics of it explaining to me like a child lol. 10 guys sitting at a computer costs more than 5. I get that. But those 5 are either going to have to work twice as long or twice as hard. Either way...it's horrendous. Games take longer to make...so laying staff off surely compounds this problem. And I get Microsoft's future vision is studios relying on AI to halve man power...but again...how does that make games more expensive. I dunno. Smacks of short term gain to me (as usual.) I think it's a profits initiative by a CEO who wants to make sure by the time he's out, he has a good resume. Certainly not long term thinking in an industry that is meant to be growing.
@GrailUK
Don't feel like you're "not getting it", a ton of obfuscation is actually built into how information like that is communicated to us. It's almost impossible to know what's really going on until we get full quarterly reports, and even then ...
If I was to speculate around Intercept Games I would say the project they are working on is moving to an internal studio. The game is not well received at this point and patches / changes are not winning people over. It's likely Take Two want more control, so they are likely moving the project to a team closer to home that works under much stricter oversight and is more agile. So while they might have shuttered a studio, the total people working on KSP2 might stay the same, or even increase for a while ... it's just going to be different people. These people will come from the human resource pool of Take Two ... maybe a cancelled early project or something like that. Take Two, as a US owned publicly traded company, is going to fire everyone at Intercept Games even if they need the headcount so they have a nicer looking balance sheet for a few months because that can translate to millions in stock price increase. Lack of meaningful regulation and worker rights allow them to rehire new people at lower salary and less benefits immediately.
If this was happening in, say, Japan, they would have found work for Intercept; maybe someone's else failing project that could use some new eyes. If it was happening in Germany, firing a bunch of people doing (job) locks you out of hiring new people to do (job) for some time, so things like this require a lot more consideration.
Roll7 is likely just not making enough money. The games are well received for sure, but 55 people making games that have gross sales in the single digit millions? I mean 5 decent programmers costs you a million a year, let alone the overhead of an office in London.
"we're saving $165 million"
No, you're funneling that money for the rich elites at the top of the company and to your shareholder masters. Big difference.
Never knew Take Two bought Roll7 but even I could tell you that'd spell doom for the company. What a shame, OlliOlli series was a classic.
Guess it's time for Microsoft to buy yet another studio, this one of course will be far cheaper, and not have any legal implications.
Cost reduction never includes adjusting the CEO's salary. Anything but that!
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