Embracer Group has laid off an undetermined number of workers at Cryptic Studios, the company responsible for the MMOs Neverwinter and Star Trek Online.
Several developers confirm that there has been “a reduction” in staff, although at the moment the exact number of those affected is unknown.
Screenwriter and community manager Mike Fatum, for example, explained that “many of the best people I know have been fired today.”
Lead stage artist Scott Boyd added that “a lot of fantastic people” have lost their jobs.
This move is one more within the aggressive restructuring plan that has been suffered throughout the last Embracer, and that has caused layoffs at Crystal Dynamics, Gearbox, Beamdog, Zen Studios or Rainbow Studios, and the complete closure of studios such as Volition or Campfire Exact.
This entire restructuring, announced in June by CEO Lars Wingefors, is due to the failure of an agreement that was going to represent a large economic injection for the group and that caused a forty percent drop in Embracer’s stock market value. Although there has been no official confirmation, several sources pointed out at the time that this agreement was going to be signed with Savvy Games Group, the Saudi Arabian investment fund.
