Morale at The Elder Scrolls 6 developer Bethesda Game Studios is said to be “really low” following Xbox’s recent mass layoffs.
Last month, Xbox layoffs saw major cuts to Elder Scrolls Online developer Zenimax Online Studios, Fallout New Vegas studio Obsidian Games, Bethesda Game Studios and others. While the larger cuts focused on ZOS, which was cut in half, many devs have been cut from The Elder Scrolls 6, including workers who have spent 20 years at the studio.
Following the news, Bethesda and Zenimax workers are protesting outside of the company, demanding that cut jobs be restored. “I worked at Zenimax for about five years. We are having a march and a rally to demand respect and an end to the cycle of layoffs,” QA worker Autumn Mitchell told Montgomery Community Media.
Developers that are still working at Bethesda Game Studios attended the rally to support their affected co-workers, revealing that morale is at an all-time low. “Everyone is really struggling to move forward after this, after losing so many of our colleagues, especially in such a heartless and demeaning way,” Bethesda software engineer Tyler Fischesser told the news team.
“Morale is really low,” added technical producer Nathan Hahn, who worked on Bethesda’s Starfield. “Because we’ve been told that we’re making great games that players love and that we’re doing well. And to have this suddenly hit us has been a huge shock to us.”
Jay Woodward, an AI programmer that has worked at Bethesda since 2007, explained that they are one of the affected workers of Microsoft’s layoffs. “We love doing our jobs,” the developer said. “I love working here so much.”
“It feels like there’s plenty of room to keep us all employed in terms of Microsoft’s budget,” he continued. “We know that it’s possible so it would be really nice if we could just go back to work and make those games that will define a generation of video gaming.”
Right now, Bethesda is working mostly on The Elder Scrolls 6, which is now being assisted by Zenimax Online Studios as well. Additionally, more content is coming for Starfield and years of expansions for Fallout 76 are in the works. Furthermore, Fallout 5 is in pre-production and will be the studio’s next project after The Elder Scrolls 6 wraps.
While Bethesda has been targeted in this round of Xbox layoffs, Microsoft has confirmed that a second round of layoffs will occur later this year. Following a rough generation, despite being owned by one of the largest tech giants in the world, Xbox is slimming down pretty much every studio under its umbrella.
