The economy might be slowly on its way to recovery, but in the meantime it's definitely taking its toll on video game companies. MTV Games has confirmed to Joystiq that Rock Band developer Harmonix is the latest to feel the pinch. The blog reported that 39 positions were eliminated at the studio today.
The move apparently came as part of a restructuring effort by MTV Games to "better align [the] staffing to best suit [Harmonix's] product development plans and schedules moving forward." Furthermore, MTV noted that "those affected were primarily in QA. The others affected ranged from administrative to other various roles within the company."
Although Electronic Arts helps to distribute Rock Band through the EA Partners business, it should be noted that these Harmonix layoffs are "totally and completely unrelated" to EA's substantial employee reduction.
Layoffs are always an ugly part of the business, but it looks even worse when it happens right before Christmas. We wish those affected the best of luck in quickly finding new work.
1 Comments
December 10, 2009
If Harmonix had to lay-off people, just imagine how bad things must be at the ATVI music division that has been spamming out guitar hero games, put out the weak selling DJ Hero, and put out the weak selling Band Hero.
Definitely collapse of the rhythm genre. But it was to be expected. After creating full four-piece bands . . . there was really not much more room to grow the genre. Just issue DLC and occasional track packs.