Survival MMO Dune: Awakening was "the biggest release we've had in our 32-year long history of making great games," developer Funcom says. So, in keeping with the games industry's storied tradition of jettisoning people who make successful games, it is laying off staff to an extent that it can't yet determine.
That's from a statement sent to GamesIndustry, in which Funcom confirms plans to lay off staff despite Dune: Awakening's successful launch.
"The game has already shown incredible potential," the company reiterates, "and the right way forward is to focus our internal resources on releasing new content, features, and enhancements."
"The transition from development to long-term live operation, while also building towards a major console release next year, will require us to restructure our teams and focus our resources from across projects and studios," Funcom continues.
"Unfortunately, this also means having to say goodbye to cherished colleagues. This difficult process is starting now, and we cannot yet determine the exact impact. We are working to find new opportunities for those affected."
GamesIndustry reports that Funcom gave no indication as to how many people will be let go as a result of these cuts – the latest in a long, long, long line of layoffs in the games industry.
Just this August, Dune: Awakening production director Ole Andreas Hayley told GamesRadar+ that player retention has been "extremely good," and alluded to the MMO's 10-year plan to fold in broader Dune lore across a breadth of content.
But while Dune: Awakening launched with solid if not sterling reviews and more than triple the peak Steam player count of Funcom's runner-up Conan Exiles, the MMO has slumped in recent weeks, around and after the release of the big Chapter 2 update.
Compared to 56,779 "Mostly Positive" Steam user reviews with a 72% average, 2,782 recent reviews for Dune: Awakening clock in at 62% positive with a "Mixed" rating. (Our Dune: Awakening review is pretty middle of the road.)
Its Steam player count, quite a ways down from that launch peak of nearly 190,000, has also seen it drop out of the top 100 games on the platform. There are 12,710 players online at the time of writing (the middle of the work day for the Western world), putting it at rank 131 on Steam. With a 24-hour peak of 19,125, Dune: Awakening could just eke out a spot in ranks 85-100 or so on the SteamDB charts, but these numbers fluctuate heavily.
Funcom is cagey in its statement, but this live operation transition certainly reads like a cost-cutting response to post-launch decline, with the company perhaps reevaluating how much it wants to put into this thing for the long haul.
MMOs are notoriously difficult to build and sustain, but if this plan is a reactive one then it's arguably a bit overreactive for a dip in a game explicitly designed as a long haul and regarded as the biggest thing Funcom's ever released. I have to wonder how these layoffs will do anything but compound existing concerns in the game's community.
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