On July 17, Xbox-owned Bethesda announced a whole bunch of stuff about the future of Fallout and, more distantly, The Elder Scrolls and Starfield. That same day, studio union OneBGS says devs hit by recent layoffs at Bethesda's Montreal branch were told that their severance pay would be as low as legally possible despite the billions in profit recorded by parent Microsoft and investment in the IP they helped build.
In a post on Bluesky, OneBGS - Bethesda Game Studios Union claims, "Montreal workers are being treated especially poorly by XBOX and we won’t stand for it."
The union says that, when the layoffs were announced on July 6, employees "across the US and Canada were told via video call" that they would "remain employed until September while the company negotiated severance with our union."
The union says the "breathing room" these terms provided evaporated on July 17. Behind the Fallout info explosion, the union says Xbox "told their laid-off Bethesda Montreal employees that they would receive the smallest severance legally possible without bargaining with the union."
This news reportedly came via "termination letters" delivered via email. The union says this left affected employees with "the bare legal minimum in terms of severance: eight weeks of pay in lieu of the minimum legal notice, any outstanding vacation pay, etc."
Additionally, the union says impacted staff "were to also immediately lose their group benefits health insurance."
In response, the union has filed "yet another legal complaint against Bethesda," alleging it continues to "violate labor laws in Canada."
"Bethesda and XBOX leadership depend on our labour to make them millions, and yet when we do, we are disposed of," the union concludes. "The cycle of workers paying for the mistakes of management ends here."
This news was shared on Bluesky by Bethesda lead character artist Ben Carnow, who adds, "Microsoft did not negotiate with the Union over layoffs in Montreal as they are legally required to do. Folks lost their healthcare with zero notice. Unconscionable."
The union's post also links to feedback listed under Xbox's new "Player Voice" forum. The post collectively calls out the thousands of Xbox staff and developers that Microsoft has laid off in just a few years, demands executive penalties and accountability (like "no executive bonuses when there is a layoff"), asks for an end to layoffs, and requests "transparency for players."
The United Videogame Workers CWA union, an industry-wide organization, previously argued that the Fallout 5 and Elder Scrolls 6 news was meant to distract from the blows dealt to Bethesda employees in the background.
"The timing of this kind of press is intentional," the UVW-CWA said. "How are they going to make these games when Bethesda and Obsidian collectively laid off hundreds? Don’t fall for it."
