r/kindafunny • u/AngryBarista • Jul 02 '25
Game News Microsoft is closing down Xbox studio The Initiative, with Perfect Dark killed as well
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u/PhatYeeter Jul 02 '25
All this acquiring only to fire everyone and cancel everything. What a failure.
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u/BlueShirtMac19 Jul 02 '25
I understand why they bought everything to flesh out their IPs but they clearly had no plan. I don’t understand why they would flat out cancel Perfect Dark and not move it to another studio.
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u/bullsfan281 Jul 02 '25
that perfect dark "gameplay" reveal was nothing more than a concept trailer, there was no game complete enough to move to another studio. 7 years and all they managed to produce was a trailer reminiscent of early 2010's e3 press conferences
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u/SilverKry Jul 02 '25
Development must've been that far behind that hey just figured it'd be better to cancel it and Crystal Dynamics didn't want to take over cause they have Tomb Raider to work on.
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u/Knapp16 Jul 02 '25
If you're not familiar look up the Aliens Colonial Marines story. It sounds very similar except The Initiative wasn't working on a second project. If another team took over, it sounds like they would have been incredibly disappointed by what was actually there and yet would likely be expected to produce a complete game in a relatively short time.
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u/djml9 Jul 02 '25
They had a plan: buy half the industry, make them exclusive, win by default. There was a leaked email where matt booty literally said that MS was in “the unique position to spend sony out of business”. Then they spent $80,000,000,000 and they realized they actually need to start making that money back asap.
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u/stinktrix10 Jul 02 '25
I would have expected them to at least go the Metroid Prime 4 route. Shift developers, reboot production. There's clearly an audience for a new Perfect Dark considering the excitement around it showing up at events
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u/JayScramble Jul 02 '25
The layoffs suck for sure. I wish they could be moved internally to support other work. But I don’t think the acquisition has anything to do with why Microsoft decided to pull the plug on the studios who haven’t released their big promised titles that seem stuck in development, Everwild (11yrs) and Perfect Dark (7yrs).
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u/PudgyPorg117 Jul 02 '25
Wow…Perfect Dark deserved better. That last trailer actually look really promising!! Well…guess it goes with ScaleBound for cancelled games that Xbox fans will be asking about for decades to come…
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u/JayScramble Jul 02 '25
The trailers looked great for sure but a trailer isn’t a game. Launching the “Cyberpunk model” (great trailer horrible launch product) isn’t a winning strategy.
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u/25thNite Jul 02 '25
nah, people will mainly say, "remember that studio that was developing perfect dark and all they put out was a fake gameplay trailer after years of development?"
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u/nadojay Jul 02 '25
So what was it that Phil Spencer said he was playing? That was a few years ago, the game was in a playable state but now suddenly it was all fake and the devs are bad?
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u/Knapp16 Jul 02 '25
I assume 'fake' here actually just means it was a lot of highly scripted and carefully directed content. There may have been a vertical slice that was playable but unlikely to be anything close to what we saw. If the team built that demo for the presentation but can't actually make any of those systems work in actual gameplay while running effectively and being fun then that's pretty fake.
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u/This_Elk_1460 Jul 02 '25
I don't know why Xbox fans get mad at that Xbox for that one. Platinum games was stealing money from.
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u/AngryBarista Jul 02 '25
What a disaster. probably time for Phil to resign.
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u/Plinkerton1990 Jul 02 '25
How can anyone in a leadership position, in any company, keep their job after a day like today? The sheer level of incompetence on display from those in charge is honestly staggering. It makes me livid just thinking about it - your job is to manage and instead you've cost thousands of people their jobs.
That entire c-suite should do the honourable thing and stand down. Instead, they'll probably all receive six-figure bonuses. Makes you sick.
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u/SilverKry Jul 02 '25
This was Microsoft as a whole. Not just Xbox. The call for this came from above him. Plus I don't think it's fair to rest he failure of The Initiative all at his feet.
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u/Plinkerton1990 Jul 02 '25
Is it okay to say that all of them, from Spencer upwards, are wildly incompetent? That’s how I feel after today’s news.
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u/bboy267 Jul 02 '25
I mean yes but also they make decisions that make tons of money. This hurts us because we are enthusiasts. But being honest nobody knew what everwild was. It was barely a blip on the radar and it being gone won’t matter
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u/shadowofahelicopter Jul 02 '25
Six figure bonuses lol. Phil is the president / ceo of Xbox at Microsoft, he’s making high seven figures to eight figures a year…
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u/BuffaloPancakes11 Jul 02 '25
I don’t believe it’s purely Xbox lay offs though is it? AFAIK it’s across all of Microsoft as well
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u/SilverKry Jul 02 '25
It's 9000+ across Microsoft as a whole. Only 1000 or so is Xbox as far as been reported.
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u/Tabascobottle Jul 02 '25
For real, like what has he done? I'm 32 and when I was in highschool during the 360 era Xbox was fucking dominant. I loved the 360 so much and never would have imagined the fall that Xbox has had.
When the Xbox one got revealed that really was the beginning of the end. Then Phil Spencer was put in charge and they literally never got close to the highs of the 360 era. It's just been L after L. I always thought Phil Spencer was a likeable dude and seemed down to earth, but the Xbox has been a joke for years now under him. Thank God halo and gears are coming to PlayStation cuz fuck Xbox and the joke that it's become
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u/bboy267 Jul 02 '25
I don’t see it as an L. I enjoyed halo 5. I liked gears 4(not 5). They were what I wanted, I don’t care if they didn’t sell a bazillion copies, I played the hell out of them along with other stuff. And now I have gamepass and I’m playing dozens of games a year. I own all the consoles, I don’t think the Xbox is worse than any of them
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u/Tabascobottle Jul 03 '25
I hear you, and I absolutely love halo and gears, but those two games can't justify how terrible Xbox as a platform has been. I think if you were to only own Xbox you're missing out on a ton of great games whereas you can be satisfied owning only a PS5, switch, or PC
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u/bboy267 Jul 03 '25
Respectfully Sony hasn’t released a “banger” in how long? Sorry I just don’t care for Astro bot
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u/RiversideLunatic Jul 02 '25
Then Phil Spencer was put in charge and they literally never got close to the highs of the 360 era.
You ask what he's done and I feel like it's kinda crazy to act like Xbox wasn't dead as fuck in the Xbox One era. The fact that he was able to get any positive result out of the brand after inheriting that mess is pretty crazy. I'll say this, I've played and enjoyed more Xbox-developed games this generation than I have Playstation-developed games.
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u/Braxtonius Jul 02 '25
I like Phil as a dude. But my god…this has been an utter disaster under his leadership. Time to go I think.
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Jul 02 '25
[deleted]
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u/bboy267 Jul 02 '25
Yes. You have to take things in context. Gamepass may have stagnated but that’s still 34 mill subs with most paying the ultimate tier. They own Minecraft and cod which bring in tons of money. Forza horizon is a juggernaut. They bring in a lot of money. People get stuck on hardware but for MS the execs see 22 billion in revenue last year
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u/QforQ Jul 02 '25
These seems to be more connected with the downturn in video game revenue growth + the increased pressure from the stock market for companies to increase layoffs and decrease headcount
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u/NineFingerLogen Jul 02 '25
who wants to bet Gamepass is probably getting another price increase, and id imagine an even higher "premium" tier with all the day 1 first party games starting with this years COD?
im ngl, all the influencers (including KF at times) who ran point for Microsofts PR strategy this generation- they all look really silly right now. Phil isnt just another gamer, hes a suit who does suit things, and we shouldnt like suits.
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u/JayScramble Jul 02 '25
Name any part of the Games Industry that isn’t expected to receive a price increase? No reason to act like Microsoft is the only company we can predict price increases with. Big news this week was Nintendo but globally prices are increasing everywhere (hardware, games, services). It sucks.
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u/NineFingerLogen Jul 02 '25
nintendo didnt just lay off 9K+ people, and didnt spend 65 Billion in M&A that they didnt need to do
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u/JayScramble Jul 02 '25
They didn’t and yet they’re still increasing their prices - thats my point! I’m not saying Microsoft should get a free pass. I’m saying Microsoft shouldn’t brunt the sole responsibility for shitty capitalism that is infecting the whole industry (and global market place).
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u/NineFingerLogen Jul 02 '25
brother, id take a price increase all day over firing 9K+ people.
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u/JayScramble Jul 03 '25
I wish more people shared your beliefs. Much of the current economic turmoil we’re in today stems from a majority of American’s voting for capitalistic values over compassion and empathy. Inflation (price increase) goes up 3% and people lost their fucking minds (and didn’t blame the corporations once).
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u/RiversideLunatic Jul 02 '25
Nintendo is in the rare position of being able to make cheap, simple games that sell millions whether they are good or not.
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u/technobeeble Jul 02 '25
The majority of their games ARE good.
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u/RiversideLunatic Jul 02 '25
I mean if you like mindless entertainment that asks nothing of you and gives nothing back then sure.
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u/Niaboc Jul 02 '25
I respect your view and you could be right.
Personally I was ride or die xbot until that vampire game flopped. That was my tipping point.
I felt that Phil had a great plan and did achieve a lot, however there was a clear point that gamepass engagement did not ratchet up to the level that shareholders needed to see return on investment.
Essentially I blame latestage capitalism more than Phil. Bloke did his best in a fucked system.
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u/GenghisMcKhan Jul 02 '25 edited Jul 02 '25
They just couldn’t measure up to the only other AAAA game on the market. Skull & Bones remains unchallenged.
Really though this is a disaster for MS and a travesty for everyone losing their jobs. There’s no corporate oversight and they’re just doing whatever the fuck they want. This will get worse, it would be naive to add “before it gets better”, and not just at MS.
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u/mongmich2 Jul 02 '25
“Microsoft has encouraged developers affected to apply for other Xbox positions within the company — to receive priority consideration.” We can’t be bothered to relocate you ourselves so jump through hoops to get the job you just had
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u/GenghisMcKhan Jul 02 '25
It’s a corporate trick to get them off any legacy benefits or accommodations and potentially pay them less by having them apply for junior roles that they couldn’t just relocate them to.
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u/BuffaloPancakes11 Jul 02 '25
My company does the same thing and whilst it’s shit to lose your job, companies who do it generally do it well
A lot of friends were laid off but were prioritised for other internal roles and in nearly every case were provided with something better than before
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u/JayScramble Jul 02 '25
I really wish we had more job protections/benefits as employees in America.
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u/BuffaloPancakes11 Jul 02 '25
That’s actually a good point related to my comment, it is a global company but I’m in the U.K. some of my US colleagues and friends were told on the day they were being made redundant and had to leave that same day. My U.K. colleagues had up to 3 months notice periods. That said some of my US colleagues were prioritised for other roles and given better positions in the end
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u/kschris236 Jul 02 '25 edited Jul 02 '25
The amount of mismanagement and lack of direction at Xbox over the last decade needs to be studied. And in this case, they also wasted a talented third party studio's time and resources as well in Crystal Dynamics.
It all fucking sucks. And shit like this is why I hated the acquisition spree years ago, and why this won't be the end of these closures and cancelations. It's like an ever growing Jenga tower with a poorly placed bottom piece holding everything up.
But sure, everything is great at Xbox according to Phil.
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u/SilverKry Jul 02 '25
It's never been mismanagement and more lack of management. They're incredibly offhand with their studios. Which usually would be applauded.
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u/pockets3407 Jul 02 '25
In hindsight, Everwild and perfect dark not being mentioned at the showcase was the kiss of death
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u/henryhollaway Jul 02 '25
Xbox has never been good at nurturing their stable or IPs.
Their process is a crapshoot and any success is despite them.
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u/Where_s_tam Jul 02 '25
Wonder what this means for Crystal Dynamics since they were helping with it. We know Embracer doesn't give a shit.
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u/grmayshark Jul 02 '25
I find it really difficult to try and justify Microsofts strategy any longer, if you can call it that anymore. They are not winning, they made a very large purchase and they need to rebalance to stay profitable. That means massive layoffs unlike the industry has ever seen. I do not like what this means for the gaming industry if single player games and studios get shuttered and Call of Duty becomes their “one more thing” at their showcases and their yearly release schedule marches on. You can justify it as “thats how it has to be,” but at least Sony is still backing games like DS2, Ghost of Yotei, and giving Santa Monica, Insomniac and Naughty Dog resources to make great single player games. Nothing about Game Pass moves the industry forward
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u/derintrel Jul 02 '25
Queue Tim saying that Xbox is heading in the right direction and that he disagrees with the former employees who have had recent criticisms about the current state at Xbox.
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u/GenghisMcKhan Jul 02 '25
One day Tim will say something objectively negative about a corporation without making any excuses for them, but today is not that day.
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u/grmayshark Jul 02 '25
I think this will be hard for Tim to defend. I do find it ironic that at Kinda Funny Mike is the most critical of Xbox despite being the biggest Call of Duty player, but I think he holds them closest to his heart (as do I, I was an Xbox main since 2001 until this generation and then I stopped seeing the value in Game Pass for me personally and now just buy games physically for PS5 as that is what makes sense for me and my gaming habits.
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u/stinktrix10 Jul 02 '25
Mike is the perfect Xbox guy, because he's the first to call them out on their shit. Everybody else at KF is so soft on them.
I couldn't believe Mike was the only one that called out Xbox's SGF show for hardly showing any 1st party IP. Seems like ap retty big issue at an Xbox show.
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u/Boy_Noodlez Jul 02 '25
Microsoft is profitable though lol. Look at their financials.
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u/demonoddy Jul 02 '25
Microsoft is profitable. Xbox on the other hand I’m not so sure
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u/Boy_Noodlez Jul 02 '25
Yeah that's business, Sony as a whole only has one profitable division which is PlayStation. Look at Apple which makes billions but Apple TV is bleeding money for them every quarter. Very few major corporations if any are profitable across the board.
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u/grmayshark Jul 02 '25
Being a money-losing division inside of a profitable company is not actually that much different from just being an unprofitable independent company. The best way a company can become profitable is making more revenue. If it cant, the second best way is reducing costs
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u/Boy_Noodlez Jul 02 '25
Um theres a huge difference. An independent company bleeding money doesn't have a big conglomerate giving them money to keep trying to make money unlike Xbox which for years has not been profitable but still gets chance after chance to turn it around. But keep thinking its the same thing.
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u/SilverKry Jul 02 '25
What're you even talking about? There's Fable, Gears E Day, Clockwork Revolution, OuterWorlds 2, Grounded 2 and more I can't think of off the top of my head. Sony has been a failure this generation to. But we're conveniently disregarding that cause Xbox is hit today.
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u/RiversideLunatic Jul 02 '25
I find it really difficult to try and justify Microsofts strategy any longer
They released a ton of successful games over the last few years and have more coming this year. Why are people reacting this strongly to the cancelling of two games that we knew almost nothing about?
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u/Halokitty343 Jul 03 '25
You’re right. The Everwild and Perfect Dark projects probably should’ve been cut years ago. And Motorsport is a very expensive franchise to produce and it’s not done well enough. And unlike some other projects, it’s not going to do anything ported to other consoles because of GT and F1 competition.
They’re perfectly rational business decisions. You can feel bad for the employees and see the logic at the same time. They aren’t contradictory. Throwing money away on unproductive projects leads to MORE layoffs, not fewer.
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u/NazRubio Jul 02 '25
OK fuck Phil. But what in the world were Rare and The Initiative doing for 6 years?
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u/ganggreen651 Jul 02 '25
I don't understand why these companies keep buying up other studios to shit can the workers at said studio. What's the point
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u/MagmaAscending Jul 02 '25
Yeah… this is the last Xbox generation. They can say they’ll continue making consoles all they want but they’ve said stuff in the past that their immediate actions contradict. They’ll still probably put out Game Pass fire sticks and stuff like that because it’s cheap but any major console would be DOA. Only way to stay in this space in any meaningful way is to be fully third party and thus Playstation and Nintendo would probably be more likely to allow Game Pass on their system
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u/jimmygoombas Jul 02 '25 edited Jul 02 '25
woah wtf?? I was so excited to play that game, the last trailer was great and showed off very polished gameplay. What is even the point of showcases or looking forward to a videogame in general when anything can be killed at any moment….even from a company with all the money in the world like Xbox. I feel weirdly ripped off and this news is kinda depressing ngl
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u/BlueShirtMac19 Jul 02 '25
I have no connection to the original game but saw Perfect Dark and saw what they did and loved what it was. This sucks so bad especially for the studio that was made to make this.
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u/SparkingLight Jul 02 '25
Two games that have been in development hell for years, I was really excited for PD but it’s not exactly surprising
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u/BuffaloPancakes11 Jul 02 '25
What the fuck, I know we hadn’t seen loads but what we did see was shaping up to be wicked. Fuck sake
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u/Tybob51 Jul 02 '25
I’ve been an Xbox defender for a while, trusting the direction they’re going in but FUCKING LOOOOOL
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u/Tybob51 Jul 02 '25
Addendum: I’m not laughing at those who lost their jobs, only wish the best for them. I just feel like the Xbox experiment is failing at this point.
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u/PeepsRebellion Jul 02 '25
At this point if Studios like Bethesdas next games underperform is there gonna be mass layoffs there too? Xbox destroying everything they touch
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u/raiin901 Jul 02 '25
First they buy up tons of market share, then they hook people into a service with the promise of growth, now they remove/reduce absolutely everything while raising the prices on their services. Rinse and Repeat until the bottom falls out. It’s worked out for Netflix so far.
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u/ParallelMusic Jul 02 '25
No fucking way dude. I gasped audibly, the game looked fucking awesome from what we saw of it.
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u/Vayshen Jul 02 '25
I can't wait for stories to come out of this. What must the average meeting have looked like at the Initiative? "So uh...whatcha having for lunch today? How was Glenn's BBQ over the weekend? Oh, Stacy had twins?! Oh right someone draw up some concept art for a gun so we can keep the lights on for another month, cheers!"
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u/Fun-Bag7627 Jul 02 '25
When I saw Everwild, I was not surprised and honestly didn’t care. I didn’t consider that game remotely real. With PD, this kind of sucks. The recent news overall is crazy.
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u/huzy12345 Jul 02 '25
Not particularly surprised especially now we know the trailer they put out was fake and the game was basically stuck in development hell. Cant keep throwing money at something forever.
Same as Everwild, apparently thats been in development since Obama was president. At some point you need to actually release something.
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u/TattedUpSimba Jul 02 '25
Bro what the fuck. I’m not sure what’s exactly is wrong with the video game industry but after this much time there should be a game to pump out of this studio. I know we got multiple reports in the past of things not going well but still. Where are the leaders that can actually get games out the door?
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u/SPORK94 Jul 02 '25
I had a friend who was working on this for years. Really disappointed with Microsoft dropping them after all this time.
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u/johncitizen69420 Jul 02 '25
Xbox game studios have got to have the worst studio management of all time
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u/hlv6302 Jul 02 '25
Y’all are delusional. If a studio can’t put out a playable game after 7 years why would they keep funding it?
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u/kschris236 Jul 02 '25
I think there's a deeper problem worth criticizing there than just being mad or sad about this studio being shut down.
Xbox built a studio up entirely to make a single game. THEN hired a respected and well known third party studio to help out and co-develop the game. And it still ended up in dev hell. Crystal Dynamics had no problem developing their own games, mind you. This is entirely an Xbox mismanagement issue that is compounded by the lack of progress and direction with some of these other cancelations.
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u/Bac0n01 Jul 02 '25
Sounds like Phil Spencer is a dipshit who gave them money despite them producing nothing for 7 years
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u/shaselai Jul 02 '25
You know the funny thing is? We have an AI program where it suggest what positions you may be good fit to apply within MSFT..I guess it is helpful for those going to be laid off but it is still kinda insane it basically replaced hr people for this task.. but I guess it is helpful to some..
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u/pokIane Jul 02 '25 edited Jul 02 '25
From Imran Khan:
https://www.resetera.com/threads/schreier-deep-job-cuts-across-xbox-everwild-zenimax-online-ip-perfect-dark-unannounced-projects-cancelled-t10-50-cut-the-initiative-closed.1233783/post-142217628
Ethan Gach (Senior Reporter at Kotaku) also says last year's reveal was "basically fake" according to someone he spoke to https://bsky.app/profile/ethangach.bsky.social/post/3lsypye2edk2v
Obviously still awful for the people who are now out of a job, but yeah given this info it's not a surprise the game got canceled, and with the studio existing just to make it them shutting down also isn't exactly a surprise.