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Yooka-Laylee studio Playtonic confirms layoffs
Game Reviews

Yooka-Laylee studio Playtonic confirms layoffs

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Playtonic, the developer behind the Yooka-Laylee series, has confirmed layoffs at the studio.

In a statement shared on social media, the studio stated it has “felt the knock-on effects” of recent changes in the industry and so, “after exploring every possible avenue” it has made “the incredibly heartbreaking decision to say goodbye to some truly brilliant members of the Playtonic team”.

It’s unclear if Playtonic’s next game, the remaster Yooka-Replaylee, has been affected. It’s set for release later this year.

Yooka-Replaylee | Console Announcement Trailer!Watch on YouTube

“We’ve all seen in recent years how the games industry has been changing, resulting in studio after studio finding themselves in situations where to continue to exist, they must make painful decisions – decisions that impact the lives of so many individual talented developers,” the statement reads.

“This isn’t a reflection of anyone’s talent or dedication, the people leaving have poured so much heart, creativity, and care into everything we do. They’ve helped shape our studio, our games, and our culture, and we’re incredibly proud of what we’ve built together.”

The studio surmised: “This isn’t simply a difficult moment, it’s a period of profound change in how games are created and financed. The landscape is shifting, and with it, so must we.”

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— Playtonic (@playtonicgames.com) 30 May 2025 at 13:32

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According to a LinkedIn post from Playtonic brand manager Anni Valkama, layoffs have impacted the production, art, game design, narrative design, and UI/UX design teams. Others affected have shared posts on LinkedIn over the past couple of weeks.

Kevin Bayliss, who designed Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong for Rare’s Donkey Kong Country games on SNES and now works as an artist at Playtonic, also shared his thoughts. “I love working in the games industry, but it’s been a sad couple of weeks for us at Playtonic Ltd since we’ve lost some great talent and friends due to redundancies,” he wrote. “I feel extremely lucky to still have a position doing what I enjoy, but also very lucky to have had the pleasure of meeting and working with the lovely people that we’ve had to say goodbye to.”

Yooka-Laylee, released back in 2017, was seen as a spiritual successor to Banjo Kazooie, inspired by 90s 3D platformers. It was followed by a side-scrolling sequel, Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair two years later.

In 2021, Playtonic announced its publishing label Playtonic Friends.

Yooka-Replaylee is aiming to launch across PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC with revised graphics, overhauled animations, and new challenges. Its trailer includes a Nintendo logo, suggesting it’s headed to Switch 2 too.



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Yooka-Laylee developer Playtonic is laying off over a dozen staff
Product Reviews

Yooka-Laylee developer Playtonic is laying off over a dozen staff

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Playtonic, the creators of Yooka-Laylee, is laying off some of its staff, the developer and publisher announced on social media. The post doesn’t mention how many members of Playtonic will be effected, but does credit the layoffs to the company’s struggle with “a period of profound change in how games are created and funded.”

Based on a LinkedIn post shared by Playtonic brand manager Anni Valkama, the layoffs include staff members who worked in production, various art departments, game design, narrative design and UI/UX design. Playtonic only lists around 50 staff members on LinkedIn, but given the studios growth into a publisher and its upcoming release of Yooka-Replaylee, its possible the actual team is a bit larger.

While Playtonic likely isn’t safe from the problems of funding and selling games that other developers have, hiring up for a new project like Yooka-Replaylee and then laying those new hires off before the game is released is a fairly common practice. There’s no way to know if that’s the case here without more information, but it’s worth stating.

Yooka-Laylee was pitched as a spiritual sequel to Banjo-Kazooie and other character-focused action-platformers when it debuted on Kickstarter in 2015, perhaps unsurprising given that Playtonic was founded by former developers from Rare, the creators of Banjo-Kazooie and newer hits like Sea of Thieves. In fact, many of the games Playtonic has published under its “Playtonic Friends” publishing label fall in that Rare sweet spot, whether its the cute action-adventure game Lil Gator Game or the difficult platformer Demon Turf.



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Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair
Product Reviews

Yooka-Laylee developer Playtonic confirms layoffs: ‘The landscape is shifting, and with it, so must we’

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Yooka-Laylee developer Playtonic Games has laid off an undisclosed number of employees, confirming reports of cuts shared by former employees on social media over the past week.

“We’ve all seen in recent years how the games industry has been changing, resulting in studio and studio finding themselves in situations where to continue to exist, they must make painful decisions—decisions that impact the lives of so many individual talented developers,” Playtonic said in today’s statement. “Like others, we’ve felt the knock-on effects and after exploring every possible avenue, we’ve had to make the incredibly heartbreaking decision to say goodbye to some truly brilliant members of the Playtonic team.

“This isn’t simply a difficult moment, it’s a period of profound change in how games are created and financed. The landscape is shifting, and with it, so must we.”


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Playtonic didn’t say how many people have been put out of work. However, brand manager Anni Valkama listed 14 employees impacted by the cuts, across production, art, and design teams, in a message posted to LinkedIn.

Playtonic was founded in 2014 by former Rare employees, and released Yooka-Laylee, a spiritual successor to Banjo Kazooie, in 2017. Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair followed in 2019, and that’s pretty much been it: A publishing division, Playtonic Friends, launched in early 2021, and Tencent invested in Playtonic late that same year. A new Yooka-Laylee game, Yooka-Replaylee, is currently slated for release this year, while the new game under the Playtonic Friends label, Cattle Country—developed by Castle Pixel—arrived earlier this week.

(Image credit: Playtonic)

The layoffs at Playtonic continue a crisis in the game development industry that began with 2023 and continues unabated: Earlier this week, Electronic Arts cancelled the Black Panther game that’s been in development since 2023 and closed Cliffhanger Games, the studio making it; less than a month prior to that it laid off a reported 300-400 employees while cancelling two “incubation projects” at Respawn. 2025 has also seen layoffs at Ubisoft, Cyan Worlds, Mighty Yell, Eidos Montreal, engine maker Unity, and others.



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Yooka-Laylee developers Playtonic announce layoffs: “the landscape is shifting, and with it, so must we"
Game Updates

Yooka-Laylee developers Playtonic announce layoffs: “the landscape is shifting, and with it, so must we”

by admin



Yooka-Laylee developers Playtonic are laying off staff across their operations, as they wrestle with what they call “a period of profound change in how games are created and financed”. It’s not clear what these “profound changes” are, exactly – soaring budgets? Evergreen service games drinking up all the oxygen? Falling interest in the genre of mascot platformer Playtonic are best known for? Either way, the outcome is that a bunch of artists, game designers, narrative designers, producers and UI or UX people are now looking for work.


“We’ve all seen in recent years how the games industry has been changing, resulting in studio after studio finding themselves in situations where to continue to exist, they must make painful decisions – decisions that impact the lives of so many individual talented developers,” reads a statement on social media. “This isn’t a reflection of anyone’s talent or dedication, the people leaving have poured so much heart, creativity, and care into everything we do.”


Playtonic brand manager Anni Valkama has shared a list of departing staff on LinkedIn. “Whether you are hiring yourself, your company is hiring or you know someone that is hiring, these are some of the best artists, designers, producers, and writer[s] you could have on your team,” she wrote.


In their social media statement, Playtonic further comment that “this isn’t simply a difficult moment” and that “the landscape is shifting, and with it, so must we.” All of which is slightly more sensitively worded than say, Microsoft’s “aligning” 1900 jobs into the sun, or Take-Two’s “rationalizing” away livelihoods by the fistful, but doesn’t answer many questions.


Playtonic were founded in 2014 by former members of Rare. Their first game, a dual-character hop’n’bopper, harkened back convincingly to the glory days of Banjo Kazooie, but didn’t set my world alight as a reviewer. Their subsequent 2.5D Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair found a warmer reception, however, and in 2021 they launched a publishing division, Playtonic Friends, partnering with projects such as Demon Tides and BPM: Bullets Per Minute. Tencent bought a minority stake in Playtonic later that year.


2020-2021 was a boom period for the games industry at large, thanks to a whole lot of us playing games at home during the pandemic lockdowns. Many publishers expanded to meet the demand, and were left up the creek when the lockdowns ended and the cash ceased to flow in sufficient quantities for their investors. This, at least, is the increasingly worn-out elevator summary I woozily mutter to myself as I try to scroll to the bottom of our layoffs feed. I’d like Playtonic to say more about why these layoffs were necessary.



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