Many people celebrated Microsoft’s purchase agreement with Activision / Blizzard / King. What none of us knew is that, a couple of months later, the American company would start a wave of layoffs.
They are already up to nearly 2,000 employees fired, from all areas and companies. Xbox has fired people, Activision has fired people, Blizzard has fired people… and Toys for Bob has even had to close its offices.
It’s not just Toys for Bob, it also affects CoD
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, 86 workers will be affected at the Toys for Bob office in California. A state report has also revealed that the facilities will be closing. Yes, this news has been more financial than gamer.
Although it is not clear what exactly this means for the future of the studio, Jez Corden from Windows Central has already “received confirmation that Toys for Bob is not going to close.” Aside from the affected employees, they claim that the remaining team is still active as remote workers.
Sledgehammer Games (developer of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3), another Activision developer based in California, has been affected by layoffs in recent times, with 76 employees being let go.
As part of this apparent restructuring, they have closed their office, they have switched to remote work and are considering moving to a smaller office.
Last year, Toys for Bob released Crash Team Rumble and collaborated with Sledgehammer on the new Call of Duty. Now they see their future is more uncertain than ever, despite developing great games. This 2024 is being the darkest in the video game industry, by far. We will see how it ends.
