Crystal Dynamics has announced yet another round of layoffs, its third since the studio was acquired by Embracer Group in 2022. The news comes in the wake of the cancellation of Perfect Dark, which Crystal Dynamics was developing alongside Xbox studio The Initiative.
"Today we made the very difficult decision to part ways with a number of our talented colleagues as the result of evolving business conditions," the studio says in a LinkedIn post (via GamesIndustry.biz). "This decision was not made lightly. It was necessary, however, to ensure the long-term health of our studio and core creative priorities in a continually shifting market."
The post concludes by noting that development of the next Tomb Raider "remains unaffected by this decision." Very little about the game has been revealed since it was announced in 2022, other than the fact that it's in development on Unreal Engine 5 and will be published by Amazon Games.
Crystal Dynamics did not disclose how many people were affected by today's layoffs. The company laid off 17 employees earlier this year, citing the need to "better align our current business needs and the studio’s future success." A further 10 people were laid off in 2023, that time to "align the studio with our current business needs." I guess the layoff form letters don't change much over the years.
The last new game from Crystal Dynamics launched in 2020, while the studio was still a subsidiary of Square Enix. That game was Marvel's Avengers, a live-service mishap that launched to mediocre reviews and eventually shut down in 2023. The studio has contributed to some remaster projects, including Tomb Raider and Legacy of Kain, in recent years, but we're all still waiting to see what its next big game is.
Crystal Dynamics is responsible for reviving the series and bringing us some of the best Tomb Raider games of all time.
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