Electronic Arts has announced that it is laying off 5% of its employees, which is about 700 people. The company also plans to stop creating games under licensed franchises, reports VGC.
In an open letter to the company’s employees, CEO Andrew Wilson said the following:
“We are also sunsetting games and moving away from development of future licensed IP that we do not believe will be successful in our changing industry. This greater focus allows us to drive creativity, accelerate innovation, and double down on our biggest opportunities — including our owned IP, sports, and massive online communities — to deliver the entertainment players want today and tomorrow.”
EA confirmed in a commentary for VGC that as part of these changes, a Star Wars game was canceled, which was most likely to be the Mandalorian game that was reported earlier.
Nevertheless, the company has not yet completely abandoned its licensed franchises and continues to work on Black Panther and Iron Man games.
In addition, as part of the layoffs, the Ridgeline Games studio, which was founded in 2021 to work on the Battlefield series, is being completely closed. Last week, the co-founder of the studio, Marcus Lehto, left Electronic Arts, but he said that he was not aware of the intention to close Ridgeline completely.
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