Ninja Theory has begun laying off staff as Microsoft’s proposed closure of the Hellblade studio moves from consultation into real job losses.
Employees at the Cambridge developer have started posting about their redundancies on LinkedIn. The affected roles reported so far cover gameplay programming, technical direction, performance capture and audio, although Microsoft has not disclosed how many people will lose their jobs.
GameDev.net reports that gameplay programmer Katrin Mair, technical director Loong-Wei Ding and performance capture specialist Xoe Suvari are among the workers affected. Technical sound designer Alessio Mellina, who has spent 12 years at Ninja Theory, has also said his position is at risk.
“It’s incredibly sad knowing that we won’t get to finish what we were working on,” Mair wrote.
The losses follow Microsoft’s September announcement that two separate agreements to sell Ninja Theory had fallen through. Xbox subsequently opened a formal consultation process over closing the studio while saying it would continue to explore other options.
Ninja Theory was acquired by Microsoft in 2018 and is best known for Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II, DmC: Devil May Cry and Enslaved: Odyssey to the West. The team had been working on Senua, a third Hellblade game announced during the Xbox Games Showcase in June.
The timing leaves that project, and the people responsible for building it, in an increasingly uncertain position. Losing specialists across capture, sound, engineering and gameplay during production is difficult to treat as a routine reshuffle, particularly when the studio itself remains under threat.
The layoffs also land during a rough stretch for major game development. BLUNT recently reported on Ubisoft’s expansion of its Motherbrain generative AI operation, another decision arriving alongside aggressive cost-cutting and unresolved questions about creative labour.
Microsoft has not confirmed the final outcome of the consultation or the future of Senua. For now, staff are already leaving before either question has an answer.
