Payday 2 Publisher Starbreeze Might Not Last Another Year

It’s been a while since bloody February, where thousands of people lost their jobs and several high-profile game studios were shut down, and thankfully things have calmed down considerably since. It’s still not perfect: in the follow-up we’ve learned a lot about crunch and other awful industry practices, but hey, at least people still have jobs… right?

Well, maybe not so much for the 500-some people currently working at Starbreeze. Because with the utter failure of their version of The Walking Dead game, the Payday 2 publisher has admitted that if nothing changes soon they might not last the next 12 months.

The company writes:
 

"Starbreeze and some of its subsidiaries have been in reconstruction since 3 December 2018. The company currently lacks sufficient secured funds to guarantee continued operations for the next 12 months and is expected to have a liquidity shortfall before mid-year 2019 if no additional funds are provided. These conditions indicate that there are significant uncertainties that can lead to significant doubts about the company’s ability to continue its business."

The CEO, Mikael Newmark, followed up:
 

"My main task is to secure financing for the company’s future operations. This involves both long-term financing we can use to build the Starbreeze of the future, but also making sure that the assets we have determined are unrelated to the core business are managed in a commercially viable way. Once this financing has been secured, we will be able to look ahead and present a more detailed strategy for the future."

If nothing else, we owe the studio credit for its transparency. Remember, it wasn’t that long ago that 800 people were fired abruptly and Telltale just shut down with maybe a few hours warning: telling us up to 12 months ahead of time that things are looking bleak is a nice thing to do for their employees. And maybe it’ll motivate them to work hard and keep the lights on.

…that, of course, will probably involve crunch.

Goddammit.