The latest Halo release has been celebrated with another round of layoffs as part of Xbox CEO Asha Sharma’s “reset” of the business.
Last night, several LinkedIn posts from Halo Studios developers revealed that an unknown number of people have been let go mere days after the launch of Halo: Campaign Evolved, in a continuation of a thinning of Microsoft’s gaming business that began with 1,600 layoffs last month, and will continue.
“After 6.5 years working on Halo and dodging just as many rounds of layoffs – it has finally caught up to me,” producer Nick Treitman said on LinkedIn. “I have nothing but love for Halo and the folks at the studio, this is just a tough reality in the gaming industry right now.”
Halo Studios is one of several Xbox developers that have been slammed with layoffs, while others have been spun off or allowed to go independent. Arkane, Compulsion Games, Double Fine, Ninja Theory, Undead Labs, and id Software are just some of the others that have been affected.
“Today, I learned my time at Halo Studios will be coming to an end following the successful launch of our latest game, Halo: Campaign Evolved,” said producer Paul Morris. “I know this is one of the most challenging job markets our industry has seen, and I know the road ahead won’t be easy. But I’m not done, and my purpose has not changed.”
The remake of the original Halo game was met with positive critic reviews, but player’s have been iffy on the title, leading to a Mixed rating on Steam and 5.7 user score on Metacritic. Regardless, these new layoffs felt inevitable, as Sharma’s “reset” will continue to restructure the business by cutting jobs across Microsoft’s gaming sector throughout the fiscal year.
“Our business today is not healthy,” Sharma said on July 6. “We are operating at margins that are 3–10x lower than comparable platform and publishing businesses. We entered Gen 9 with a smaller install base and a higher cost structure. To grow, we bet on Game Pass, multi-platform, and a broader portfolio of content. While those businesses have created meaningful value, they did not grow at the pace we expected. As that happened, our core business weakened, and we added more teams, more investment, and more time, hoping for a better outcome. And now the industry is facing the most severe hardware crisis in its history. We must reset Xbox.”
