PlayStation Studios Visual Arts has been impacted by a new wave of layoffs, per reporting from Kotaku and former staff posting to LinkedIn. While the impact and scope of the layoffs is not currently known, Kotaku reports staff working on recently-cancelled live service games, as well as an array of other projects, have been laid off.
Staff were reportedly told earlier this week that March 7 would be their last day at Visual Arts. This move follows a mass layoff at a similar time in 2024, with 900 staff across all PlayStation studios impacted. For now, it doesn’t appear this round of layoffs will be as widespread, but the impact is still likely to be felt heavily by staff.
“With sadness in my heart, I was part of the PSVA layoffs today,” Lewis Labram, former Senior Material Artist at PSVA posted on LinkedIn. “I think the worst bit about this was this was the best job I have had to date, the dream team and the sick projects were outstandingly fun and I enjoyed every day.”
PlayStation Studios Visual Arts is one of the underpinning studios at Sony, functioning as art and technical support for many studios under the PlayStation banner. Most recently, the team was known to be working with Naughty Dog on the Last of Us Part 1 and Last of Us Part 2 remasters, alongside other projects.
Read: Sony cancels two more of its planned live service games
What may have led to this at PlayStation?
While Sony has not issued a public statement about these layoffs, it’s likely they were a result of recent game cancellations and restructuring at PlayStation. In early 2022, Sony announced a push into the live service genre, commissioning a range of its studios to produce new live service games – even as audiences pushed back on the live service model.
In the following years, a string of high-profile live service games failed dramatically, including Sony’s own Concord, which was live for two weeks before it was pulled, and then cancelled outright. Following this, Sony cancelled live service games in development at Bluepoint Games and Bend Studio, and seemingly began to rethink its live service ambitions.
Now, the company is stuck in a difficult place, with a need to overhaul development and reduce costs, to claw back resources spent on those cancelled games. Hermen Hulst, Head of PlayStation Studios announced a need to reduce cost pressures in 2024, with outsourcing and co-development mentioned as potential salves.
It appears layoffs are also now being implemented to reduce costs, with an unknown number of developers set to depart PlayStation Studios Visual Arts this week. Our thoughts are with those developers now out of work, in one of the most difficult times for the games industry yet.
