People Can Fly has laid off 30 employees, and reallocated 20 others, from Project Gemini.
As reported by Video Games Chronicle, an internal email revealed that the company had to make cuts because Project Gemini was going to shrink in scope, and would consequently have a smaller budget.
People Can Fly development director Adam Alker shared this message in that internal email:
“We understand that this decision impacts each of you, and we want to express our gratitude for your hard work, dedication, and contributions thus far,” Alker said in his email to affected staff.
To those individuals transitioning out of the studio due to these changes, we extend our sincere appreciation for the skills and expertise you brought to the team. We will keep our fingers crossed for your next steps in game dev and offer all our support.”
People Can Fly revealed Project Gemini all the way back in 2022, describing it as a “AAA game around the same scale as Outriders. Square Enix will fully own the IP and publishing rights. Set to release in 2024.”
This is one of five projects that People Can Fly revealed in 2022, produced after they ended development on Outriders, which is also published and owned by Square Enix. Since that time, rumors had come out that People Can Fly also have games in production with PlayStation and with Xbox.
As of July 2023, we know that People Can Fly have seven titles in development. It seems that the studio’s fortunes are tied to its most recent release, Outriders, but it isn’t really clear how the game did at all. We do know that Outriders was not profitable in its year of release, in spite of selling six million units. Subsequently, People Can Fly had not been paid royalties as of at least May 2022.
Square Enix has not revealed final sales tally for Outriders, or if it was profitable. So, we don’t know if People Can Fly made any money from it at all. Perhaps, if the title was a failure, that is the reason Square Enix is shrinking down their ambitions for Project Gemini. If it doesn’t sell as well due to not being a full AAA scale title, it will at least have a better chance of being profitable.
GameRanx wishes the best of the outgoing staff at People Can Fly and hope they can find placement back in the video game industry.
