Rockstar Games parent company Take-Two Interactive has announced a round of layoffs and cancelled multiple projects. The layoffs will impact about 5% of its overall workforce or 579 employees. The news follows CEO Strauss Zelnick’s claims that it had “no plans” for layoffs after discussing its cost reduction program.
As reported by IGN, Take-Two Interactive says it’s “eliminating several projects in development and streamlining its organizational structure”, which unfortunately includes laying off around 579 workers. The company added that it expects to incur between $160 million and $200 million in total charges – at least $140 million is related to project cancellations, though those scrapped projects weren’t named.
Back in February, Zelnick claimed that due to the effective cost reduction program, it had no plans to lay off any employees:
“We haven’t put any meat on the bones of that yet. I would just note that our biggest line item of expense is actually marketing. We do think we can optimize that. We also have third-party expenses, software, other vendors, supply services. And we always find opportunity there. The hardest thing to do is to lay off colleagues, and we have no current plans.”
These layoffs are particularly upsetting as it not only contradicts Zelnick’s previous assurance but as many outlets pointed out, seems unnecessary considering the amount of revenue GTA V continues to bring in for the company annually. To date, it’s the highest-selling AAA game in history, selling 185 million copies worldwide as of August 2023.
The layoffs follow a return to office mandate that Rockstar Games implemented for all employees a couple of months ago. The subscription price of GTA+ was also recently raised by 40% after it added the Red Dead Redemption remaster to its offerings.
GTA 6 is seemingly still on track to release sometime in 2025 for PS5 and Xbox Series X/S, though we suspect that morale among employees must have been impacted by these recent rounds of terminations.
Source: IGN
