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Amazon is cancelling game projects and laying off staff

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Amazon has some bad news for gamers looking forward to what the retail and tech giant had in the pipeline for their various game projects, but things don’t look so good for the future of a new mega-publisher in the games industry. Yesterday, a number of employees were laid off from Amazon Game Studios, according to a report by Kotaku. Additionally, the company canceled some undisclosed game projects.

The cancelled projects are all unnamed or otherwise unannounced projects, that were assumingly in varying states of development. But this basically sends the signal that the company wants to focus on their mainline projects. Those two projects are  New World and Crucible. Various other projects remain in the works, but haven’t been formally announced yet.

The changes were announced to employees within the games division this past week. Employees were told that they have two months to find new positions within the company. Those who couldn’t would “receive severance packages.” That basically meas they’re out of a job. So now it looks like there will be some stiff competition as developers and other employees jockey within other departments to keep a job.

The motivation for these layoffs and changes is being laid down to “reorganizing”. Amazon clearly wants to cut costs and refocus resources on the projects they feel have the best chance of success, so the approach seems reasonable, even if it really sucks for those that do end up being let go.

An Amazon spokesperson said these “moves are the result of regular business planning cycles where we align resources to match evolving, long-range priorities. We’re working closely with all employees affected by these changes to assist them in finding new roles within Amazon.”

Amazon Game Studios has had a rocky road these last few months. They may have published a handful of games and developed the Lumberyard engine, but the company offshoot has yet to complete development on any first-party titles, as they cancelled its first game Breakaway back in 2017.

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