We now have a clearer picture of how things have played out when Krafton acquired Tango Gameworks, and their latest IP, Hi-Fi Rush.
As shared on Twitter by Genki_JPN, Stephen Totilo learned the finer details of this acquisition and reported it on GameFile. As it turns out, the deal was only made at the start of this month.
While Tango wanted to “inherit the entire development team” who made Hi-Fi Rush, half of their 100 employees had already found new jobs. So for those of you who were wondering if there was some vague business situation that would allow them to revive the entire team back, that never existed.
Zenimax’s closure of Tango Gameworks did go through, their offices really were closed, and Microsoft really did treat them to one last pizza lunch. Stephen shared this from Krafton’s PR:
“KRAFTON plans to transfer approximately 50 development staff from Tango Gameworks to KRAFTON’s Japan subsidiary. These transferred staff will continue to work on new projects, including the expansion of the HI-FI RUSH IP, at KRAFTON.”
As a result, Genki also found new job listings at Tango’s website. They may be meant to take the roles of the 50 staffers who left. But, once again, we have to acknowledge we lack some information here, and we don’t know if Krafton intends for Tango to continue to operate independently, or if they will be integrated to their Japanese subsidiary. Or for that matter, if Tango will be effectively Krafton’s Japanese subsidiary.
We did confirm early on that they managed to get John Johanas back, and one wonders if that could have been in contention. Johanas was not just director for Hi-Fi Rush, but also for The Evil Within 2 and The Evil Within expansions. With his resume, he would have been an easy hire to any other Japanese studios, or even Western studios. John may have very well turned down a few offers to return to this.
While it’s a little sad to think Krafton couldn’t bring the whole band back together, in a strange way, this is a good sign for the industry. It adds to the growing picture of game studios once again moving to hire developers once again, after the nearly two years that we had seen a wave of layoffs.
We won’t say that we’re sure this means the layoffs are ending, but we believe the industry is now in transition to making more pragmatic choices and projects, and rebuilding with that in mind.
We also can’t miss the unusual situation of a Korean game publisher now owning a Japanese game studio, but this probably isn’t the first time that’s happened. For everything that went wrong with The Callisto Protocol, Krafton have allowed Striking Distance Studios to keep going with new projects. So we think that they won’t be suddenly punishing Tango Gameworks if their next projects don’t make it financially.
But really, we hope Tango can find their path to breaking through to a dedicated audience. The studio has demonstrated they have that unique vision the way Grasshopper Manufacture and PlatinumGames does, and that’s why we want them to keep taking those bold risks to make exciting games no one else will.
