Daedalic Entertainment has closed its development department and laid off its developers, opting to focus exclusively on game publishing. This news comes a month after Daedalic released “The Lord of the Rings: Gollum,” an in-house production that received widespread negative reception, to the point where the company released an apology regarding the state of the game.
“The Lord of the Rings: Gollum” was directly referenced in Daedalic’s press release announcing the internal shakeup, though the company did not directly attribute its negative reception as the reason for said reorganization.
“Even though ‘The Lord of the Rings: Gollum’ did not live up to the expectations we had for the game, we are very grateful for the opportunity and the learning experience it brought us,” the statement reads.
“Currently, we are working on another patch for ‘The Lord of the Rings: Gollum.’ A follow-up project in ‘The Lord of the Rings’ universe that has already been started will be discontinued. The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Protection, as the body responsible for the federal funding, was informed of this some time ago.”
For clarity: Daedalic is referencing the German government’s economic affairs department, as it is a German company.
Daedalic’s press release briefly touches on the fate of its in-house developers, saying the company wants a smooth transition.
“We will therefore support our former employees in finding new opportunities within our network,” the release reads. A Daedalic representative confirmed with TheWrap that the in-house developers have been laid off and will need to seek employment elsewhere.
At bigger game companies, the shuttering of a division can sometimes result in employees being relocated internally, hence the distinction here.
It’s not uncommon for a single rough release to put a game studio in trouble, especially when they’re magnitudes smaller than the industry’s heavyweights and lack financial insulation. Even so, it’s rare to see a company make such a hard pivot roughly four weeks after a flawed release.
