Microsoft has announced that it’s cutting 1,900 jobs from its gaming division’s workforce of around 22,000, with the massive round of layoffs set to impact employees across Xbox, Activision Blizzad, and ZeniMax. Given the scale of the layoffs, the full extent of their impact likely won’t become perfectly clear immediately, but it looks like game cancellations will also be involved.
As reported by The Verge, Blizzard Entertainment’s unannounced survival title has been cancelled. Matt Booty, Microsoft’s president of game content and studios, says the company will be “shifting some of the people working on it to one of several promising new projects Blizzard has in the early stages of development.” It’s likely, however, that many who were working on the game will be impacted by the layoffs.
Blizzard Entertainment’s survival game, which has been in development for over six years, was officially confirmed to be in the works by the company in January 2022. Reports claimed that it would be called Odyssey, and would be a first-person experience with a fairy tale aesthetic.
Amidst the layoffs, it has also been confirmed that Blizzard Entertainment president Mike Ybarra is leaving the company.