Developer People Can Fly has announced the cancellation of not one but two major projects.
The studio, known for games like Bulletstorm, Gears of War: Judgment, and more recently Outriders, has released a statement revealing projects Gemini and Bifrost are no longer going ahead.
Project Gemini was an unannounced game in partnership with Square Enix, and is being cancelled due to "lack of communication" and other factors.
Meanwhile, Project Bifrost would seemingly have been a self-published game, but because of a lack of funds, among other reasons, it too is no longer in the works.
As a result of these cancellations, People Can Fly is having to "significantly regroup as a studio and scale down our teams, which hurts the most," says CEO Sebastian Wojciechowski.
"We wish to express our deepest regret and sadness over how these events have unfolded and our sincere gratitude for everyone's contribution up to this point," the statement concludes.
It's not known how many people may be affected by these layoffs. The developer, across multiple locations, currently employs over 600 people, according to its website.
Unfortunately, this isn't the first time the studio has had to make redundancies and shut down projects; it was only back in December when a similar story came about.
People Can Fly has several other games in development; it's co-developing Gears of War: E-Day, and has several unannounced titles in the pipeline, including a project utilising a Sony IP.
Here's hoping the developer can turn its fortunes around in the future.
[source x.com, via videogameschronicle.com]





Comments 20
How many games did they have in development there at once? Always seemed like they were all over the place from a time and resourcement commitment standpoint
How awful. I can only hope to god that those laid off land on their feet.
@Titntin
No need to pray, they can fly.
these guys poked me linkedin and made me do interviews + a lengthy technical test and even showed me some projects they had in the pipeline under NDA and ghosted me afterwards, not once but twice. Absolutely ***** behaviour. They even contacted me a 3rd time afterwards!
PCF have always been a so-so developer and I'm surprised they are still open. Still sad news for the people affected by this.
I think they only made a single good game, and that was more than 20 years ago.
Outriders and Bulletstorm are great games. I hope they will be able to find success in their next endeavors.
@jberg They poked you ?? Should it not be the police you should be telling this to ??
@Jrs1 People Can Poke
@jberg Hahaha only if permitted 😃 where's that damn carry on kenneth williams "ooo er" meme when you need it 😃
While I wasn't a fan of Bulletstorm or Outriders (both were ok to me and never played GoW Judgment), layoffs suck. Hope they can bounce back rather than fully close.
@jberg Poke Mongo
lots of western developers have problems with square enix. If its not unrealistic sales expectations its something else with square enix.
@trev666 i don’t think its solely Square problem as thats just a partnership. Most western devs need to look at why their products cost so much and efficiency issues compared the East. Plus i imagine there are a ton of people in western companies (not gaming specific) where u have a ton a people who really dont do much and drive up the cost
@RagnarLothbrok people can fly are a polish developer so are no where near as expensive as American developers. so im not sure that argument can be used.
Also even squares own games Final fantasy 16 and Rebirth haven't sold as many as they had hoped. and the take away they had from this was to make bigger games and less smaller ones.
Painkiller reboot is on the horizon and no mention of it in the article about the original developers?(
Best of luck to all people being let go
Square Enix never changes.
It's very sad to hear. I love Outriders (bought it twice on PS4 and XS) and GoW: Judgement.
Bulletstorm and Outriders were terrible. The studio just isn't very good and add Square Enix on top of that mess and this will happen.
You'd think with so many projects they'd have learnt from Nihilistic who had Resistance Burning Skies, COD Declassified, PS Move Heroes, etc. or Telltale, but apparently not....
Otherwise sigh. Outriders is a fine game but has it's moments I don't like so hold off on it and I hate always online games anyway. There is a reason only GT Sport was the other I experienced and wiki documented it's ending of pre and post offline state of usability of features.
Bulletstorm is fair, got to get further through it, Gears of War Judgement was alright from memory, not played in years, still own.
Whatever the Sony project was, Gears next project and others will see but yeah layoffs are sad, but also questionable as well of how things can, or do go.
Release a offline patch for Outriders.
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