[Bridger]

https://gameworldobserver.com/2023/1...-restructuring

Jesse Heinig and Kael are looking for a new job.

[Solace]

Oh damn, it sucks to lose your job.

[Jestersmith]

Come out and said they have not but if he has opened himself to looking for work he looking to move or the axe is looming

[Petrarch]

If several of them are opening up to other work all at the same time it does make it seem like Cryptic is potentially in the firing line and they just don't want to openly say it.

Neverwinter and STO are probably safe for a few years yet in the worst case scenario but they may well take another step towards maintenance mode. Champions could finally see itself sunset though.

[darthnovawave]

I did my own browsing of Cryptic Studios employees out on LinkedIn and it definitely looks like something is brewing. I'd say there was probably some sort of announcement made last week internally and they are probably not allowed to talk about things yet. Kael's post is worded in a way that allows the possibility for layoffs to have been announced, but nothing has been enacted as of yet. The people with the open to work hashtags seem to be from different parts of Cryptic including folks attached to Neverwinter and this unannounced new project they've been building in Unreal 5, but there were a few other STO people like Tumerboy (the environment artist that brought us the recent Borg environment updates) and ship artist Mauricio Tejerina among those now on the lookout for other opportunities.

It is hard to say if these are the folks actually on the chopping block though. They may or may not even know names internally yet. Usually companies like to target "low performers", junior employees, and "nice to have" support teams for layoffs (one of the open to work peeps I saw described themselves as the Cryptic Studios Yoga Instructor...), but usually layoff announcements drive off a company's best talent, since there is a good chance that being a "high performer" means you have a strong set of skills that other companies might want too. Thus, the names we are seeing might not actually be the heads on the chopping block here, or indicative of the size or scope of any would-be layoffs. Unfortunately between Microsoft finally closing on Activision Blizzard (which will probably mean a hiring freeze if not a layoff there), and with Embracer buying up so much of the industry's market competition only to be laying off all over the place now, there probably aren't a ton of opportunities actually out there and all too many looking for them, so not sure how many will actually end up departing from this.

At any rate, I hope things work out for any and all impacted. STO and Neverwinter have been by all reports still pretty profitable, so hopefully any impact will ultimately be minimal, but layoffs are rough both for those that are let go and for those that remain.

[Sorotia]

Just what Cryptic needs is layoffs, sucks for the people....but also upset about some of the decisions like getting rid of Trendy then someone like Kael getting promoted even

Something that STO doesn't need is layoffs, then again sometimes it feels like the game is almost already in maintenance mode with how 95% of the game is events on repeat

[JByb04]

Let's hope our beloved-ish game is unaffected by these potential layoffs.

I know Kael isn't the best CM in the world, but nobody should have to worry about making a living. The team has done a lot with a little and I fear further cuts would just put the game on life support.

[Bridger]

[RavenSplat]

I do hope this doesn't affect the people working at Cryptic too much. The current way the industry is going is making it even harder for people being laid of to get job. The people who work on this game do help us to enjoy it and I hope these layoff are not far reaching and those who are affected are able to find work somewhere else easily enough.

I fully agree with Mentioned User JBY04 that even the more public facing people who we sometimes don't seem to be the best at their job deserve to not have to worry about how to make a living. The team has done some great work amid many cuts and anything further would put the game in potential jeopardy if it stays at Cryptic.

I don't know how Paramount see it but they evidently don't hate it by the inclusion of the Enterprise F Odyssey Class in Picard 3 along with other classes in larger scenes from that series. If Cryptic has more cuts we could see it potentially change hands or be remade as a very similar game and for now, as annoying as certain things are I'm not sure that would be for the best for the game and community.

[Three of Seven]

Looking at the list of companies that the Embracer Group has aquired, it looks like it makes sense to restructure, and it's a task that will no doubt take a long time. Looking at the Wikipedia page for the company, which says "As of September 2023, Embracer Group has 129 internal game development studios and is engaging more than 15,000 employees and contracted employees in more than 40 countries.", that really sounds like a logistical nightmare.

I wish the best for those who have been layed off, though it shouldn't be too difficult to pick up a job in another company, it's just if it's on a contract or as a freelance, which is an issue, working freelance doesn't have the same stability.

Also found out that they closed Volition, which sucks.

[darthnovawave]

I found the dataset Spencer used in his video out on Reddit and poked at it a bit. Looks like they captured layoff data on 6 Embracer studios so far. Volition's closure is by far the largest, impacting about 240 employees. They also appear to have shuttered Campfire Cabal, which was pretty small studio at only 18 employees. The rest of the layoffs so far seem to have been relatively small. Interestingly, Crystal Dynamics is about 2x the headcount of Cryptic, yet only had 10 layoffs, released Remnant II earlier this year and supposedly has an untitled Tomb Raider release in the pipeline still. We don't really know much of anything about this new project Cryptic has been working on too, but given Cryptic's typical modus operandi of developing games based on the IP of other companies, there may be a financial hit incurred for backing out of that development deal that might incentivize Embracer not to cut too deeply.

Anything is possible here, but given that Star Trek Online was the first game mentioned in Embracer's Top 10 back catalog in their most recent financial report back in August, and it has been routinely cited along with Neverwinter ever since Cryptic was acquired, so again it seems like it would be...unwise...to cut too deeply there, but sometimes companies make snap business decisions without really thinking through the nuances of what might happen.

[Bridger]

It might depend when the Star Trek license is due for a renewal.

[Noram]

it seems like it would be...unwise...to cut too deeply there

The problem, from what I understand, is that Cryptic is a pretty bare bones operation to begin with. They don't have to cut very deeply before they start hitting veins

[Three of Seven]

It might depend when the Star Trek license is due for a renewal.

Looking at some of the Star Trek mobile games, I don't think there is anything to worry about with the license, seems anything will get rubber stamped.

[Petrarch]

With how many of them are putting out the feelers, it's obvious that either they've been told it's happening be it as voluntary/compulsory redundancies - maybe even both - or they know it's hurtling down the runway towards them and they're trying to get out ahead of it and have something else to ready to go when the axe falls. That many people in one company don't decide to look for other jobs en masse unless something disastrous is going on in the background.

As Noram points out, Cryptic is fairly bare bones as it is these days, a lot of the ship remasters in particular came about because the artists worked off the clock on their own time to get them done. If more of it gets carved off that's going to make it less attractive for someone else to buy the company as they'll have a lot of setup and ramping up costs they perhaps don't want to shoulder on top of the purchase price. So another possibility might be Embracer will sell off the properties and perhaps include a few of the staff with it, some other developer takes up the mantle and Cryptic will ultimately join Volition and become a memory.

They do need to be clearer about what's happening. When rumours like this come around, it spooks investors and doesn't inspire confidence from the customers, so there is likely more than few folks out there closing their wallets to wait and see what happens and it can be very difficult to recover from that sort of change if things spiral out of control.