Black Forest Games was one of the larger German gaming studios, with over 100 employees. However, it is now reported that nearly 50% of the workforce is to be laid off. This job cut is, like the one at Piranha Bytes, related to the crisis of the Embracer Group.
What kind of studio is this? Black Forest Games is a studio from Offenburg, primarily known for the remake of the quirky alien shooter Destroy All Humans! and its sequels. Since 2017, Black Forest Games has been part of the publisher THQ Nordic, and thus, part of the Embracer Group.
For a game with the working title “Super Shotgun”, Black Forest Games received 3.1 million euros from the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action in July 2023. This was the third-highest individual funding that a game has received from the federal government so far.
For the studio, this was already the second subsidy of this kind, after they received 2.2 million euros from the then-responsible Ministry of Transport for Destroy All Humans! 2 – Reprobed in 2021 (via Games Wirtschaft).
In August 2023, it was also announced that the studio is working on a game about the cult turtles from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It is supposed to be based on the dark comic spin-off The Last Ronin.
While the Embracer Group apparently took on too much in the traditional sense, others are ruining their business in a modern way on Twitch:
Managers are safe, employees must go
What is the current situation? Embracer announced a “restructuring” in June 2023, which was to be accompanied by studio closures and layoffs. According to Kotaku, Black Forest Games is to lay off nearly half of its workforce on January 24.
The management is said to have promised employees more information next week. Kotaku also reports an insider stating that hardly any employees in higher management positions are to be affected by the layoffs. The studio is reported to have employed approximately 110 people recently.
MeinMMO contacted Black Forest Games and asked for a statement regarding the layoffs. We will add it here as soon as we receive it.
Black Forest Games is already the second German gaming studio affected by the “restructuring” of the Embracer Group. It had gone on a major acquisition spree between 2020 and 2022, incorporating numerous studios – including the Borderlands developer Gearbox.
The company announced the austerity measures after a 2 billion US dollar deal fell through at the last minute. More about this can be found here: The most important German gaming studio for role-playing games is likely to close down
