Unfortunately, it’s that time of the month again. Yesterday, Splitgate 2 developer 1047 Games shared a post on LinkedIn announcing that layoffs had taken place at the company. It was described as a “small group of valued 1047 Games team members,” but as is par for the course for games industry layoffs, there was no mention of how many have been laid off – though of course the usual spiel about “redirecting resources” to make the game better. You know, classic corporation speak.
Notably, co-founders Ian Proulx and Nicholas Bagamian have apparently “opted not to take salaries as we lock in to deliver the next phase of the project.” This is normally where I’d say something like “credit where credit is due”, because Proulx’s father Tom Proulx is literally the co-founder of Intuit, a huge American software company, so I don’t imagine him to be particularly hard done by with this decision. And, you know, this is the same guy who wore that ridiculous hat at Summer Game Fest, so you’ll be hearing no compliments from me.
It’s unclear as to whether this means Splitgate 2 is underperforming at all at the moment. The hat thing wasn’t the only controversy the shooter faced, as the game also launched with some pretty ridiculous prices for some of its in-game items. A one-two punch of a bad PR move and extortionate prices does not a healthy community make. In any case, as always I hope everyone that’s been affected by the layoffs is able to land on their feet.