2K confirms layoffs at Civilization developer Firaxis

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2K confirms layoffs at Civilization developer Firaxis

2K says the decision will "restructure and optimize" its teams within Firaxis. Sources say dozens could be impacted.
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2K has confirmed that it has laid off workers at Civilization developer Firaxis Games.

In a statement, a 2K spokesperson told Game Developer that there was a "staff reduction today at Firaxis Games," as the studio "restructures and optimizes" its development process for "adaptability, collaboration, and creativity."

The statement doesn't disclose numbers, but sources close to the situation told Game Developer that dozens of workers have been impacted by the cuts.
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On LinkedIn, multiple developers have mentioned being laid off throughout the course of the day. This includes writer Emma Kidwell, senior quality assurance tester Logan Blackwood, lead character artist Matthew Davis, and producer Maya H.

"I was affected by the layoffs at Firaxis, and am open to full time writing work at your studio," Kidwell wrote. "I'm an incredibly adaptable writer who wrote on Civilization VII and Marvel's Midnight Suns during my (nearly) 5 years at the studio, and I encourage you to keep an eye out for my former colleagues who were also laid off."

"I was laid off this morning from Firaxis, which was my favorite job I've had," echoed H.
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2K continues to lay off workers after its parent company Take-Two projected annual growth in 2025

As part of Take-Two's annual financial report for the year ended March 31, 2025, the company said it was still projecting about 5 percent growth revenue and net bookings (consumer spending on digital goods) for the year ahead, even after delaying Grand Theft Auto VI to 2026. The expectation was for Borderlands 4, Mafia: The Old Country, and the 2026 iterations of NBA 2K and WWE 2K to accrue $6 billion in revenue and net bookings by March 2026. In a Q&A call with investors, CEO Strauss Zelnick said this will be "the new baseline" for the company.
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Civ VII was an obvious disaster.



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No wonder. Those idiots were so focused on pushing their propaganda, that they forgot to make a good game.
No mater how many games flop, this kind of people will never learn.

Now all that is missing is for them to blame gamers...
 
Yea they fucked up Civ 7 bad. I remember them coping by saying "bu bu bu all the other civs were rough at launch!" Well not really, they got better with DLC but they got good reviews and were popular from day one. I wouldn't recommend Civ 7 over say Old World to anyone. It's a mess.

winjer said:
No wonder. Those idiots were so focused on pushing their propaganda, that they forgot to make a good game.
No mater how many games flop, this kind of people will never learn.

Now all that is missing is for them to blame gamers...
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I still can't get over that fucking advertisement. In 2025 what the fuck were they thinking?
 
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winjer said:
No wonder. Those idiots were so focused on pushing their propaganda, that they forgot to make a good game.
No mater how many games flop, this kind of people will never learn.

Now all that is missing is for them to blame gamers...
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Also moronically targeted the Switch as a main platform.
 
diffusionx said:
Yea they fucked up Civ 7 bad. I remember them coping by saying "bu bu bu all the other civs were rough at launch!" Well not really, they got better with DLC but they got good reviews and were popular from day one. I wouldn't recommend Civ 7 over say Old World to anyone. It's a mess.
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Even ignoring the obvious modern dayisms, the game is fundamentally ass.
 
winjer said:
No wonder. Those idiots were so focused on pushing their propaganda, that they forgot to make a good game.
No mater how many games flop, this kind of people will never learn.

Now all that is missing is for them to blame gamers...
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And that wasn't even the main issue. They butchered the whole premise of Civilization games.

Now they are trying to back peddle and course correct, but hype is gone and I doubt they can get this into a state that folks would want to play long term.

They really need a full on free expansion that would retire the game, kind of what Paradox has done with Stellaris.

Edit: What's also annoying is that the game seems to be technically competent. It's the same issue as Veilguard where actual developers (who wrote code) suffer for the sins of morons in charge.

Edit 2: And targeting Switch was just mind boggling as bread and butter for Civ games have always been PC.
 
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Minsc said:
Would be cool to see the numbers for Civ 1 and Civ 2, along with III and IV I guess! I wonder if VI is the peak of the series, I always felt Civ 2 was the most popular.
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Relatively. I guess if you could work out the total market size during each period of release you could see how proportional a success each version was. The market is so big now that success/failure is a different metric.

I remember 2 being about as AAA level as you could get on PC at the time. With all the mods that came out it only grew in being the very definition of the genre.
 
Dick move. Rush the development and release before it's finished to make up for the GTA6 delay. And now Strauss Zelnick lays out a bunch of scapegoats. What a sad existence that of the video games industry's executive.
 
Katajx said:
Not a Civ player, but why is 7 so unpopular or worse?
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Wildebeest said:
Bad user interface. Big changes to the main progress mechanic mean it feels less satisfying and predictable to build your civ.
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I didnt play it, but if I remember correctly wasnt the gameplay done in a such a way that a gamer goes through eras/stages? And after that ends, the gamer has to start over in the new era.

So instead one one giant gameplay from 0 BC to 3000 AD kind of thing, it was chopped up into pieces.
 
StreetsofBeige said:
I didnt play it, but if I remember correctly wasnt the gameplay done in a such a way that a gamer goes through eras/stages? And after that ends, the gamer has to start over in the new era.

So instead one one giant gameplay from 0 BC to 3000 AD kind of thing, it was chopped up into pieces.
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Yep. You pick a new civilization and it makes it hard to feel invested. Felt like a change for the sake of change and didn't make a lot of sense.
 
Deserved. Hope some other dev can take advantage of this situation and make a proper civ replacement.

They didn't even ship the game with a competent map generator. Missed tons of options and civs that would normally be in the initial release too.
 
StreetsofBeige said:
I didnt play it, but if I remember correctly wasnt the gameplay done in a such a way that a gamer goes through eras/stages? And after that ends, the gamer has to start over in the new era.

So instead one one giant gameplay from 0 BC to 3000 AD kind of thing, it was chopped up into pieces.
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I guess they copied the idea from Humankind, which wasn't that popular there. But with Humankind the whole idea was you could time and plan your era switch as you liked. In Civ it feels more like an FU from the game, along with random disasters.
 
Kacho said:
Yep. You pick a new civilization and it makes it hard to feel invested. Felt like a change for the sake of change and didn't make a lot of sense.
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I thought so.

For any kind of Civ game where the point is to start with nothing but cavemen spears and then try to dominate into modern day or future settings, who the hell would want their mega builds to be chopped up?

Defeats the purpose of Civilization advancing from beginning to end as a total gameplay loop.

I didnt play the game, but there must had been some stupid reasons they did it that way.
 
I think we were talking about this on the forum a couple of months ago when someone asked about a new XCOM game. And yeah, this seems overdue based on how they've been doing.
 
StreetsofBeige said:
Defeats the purpose of Civilization advancing from beginning to end as a total gameplay loop.

I didnt play the game, but there must had been some stupid reasons they did it that way.
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It was stupid that they didn't see this coming because another game called Humankind came out a year earlier with a similar mechanic and it wasn't well received.
 
StreetsofBeige said:
I thought so.

For any kind of Civ game where the point is to start with nothing but cavemen spears and then try to dominate into modern day or future settings, who the hell would want their mega builds to be chopped up?

Defeats the purpose of Civilization advancing from beginning to end as a total gameplay loop.

I didnt play the game, but there must had been some stupid reasons they did it that way.
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They are trying to solve a fundamental issue with Civilization that they have tried to solve since Civ 2 but never were able to actually solve totally. The biggest flaw with Civ games is that the mid-to-late game drags and isn't nearly as fun, fast, or dynamic as the early game. So they tried to build out this system where you basically start anew in 500 and 1500 and whatever else and those mid and late game eras play more like the early game.

I think it's a good idea. But I also don't know how you implement it well without a major discontinuity. It's also ahistorical (the British didn't become the Zulus over time, they just became a different form of the British), but that's a secondary issue.
 
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diffusionx said:
They are trying to solve a fundamental issue with Civilization that they have tried to solve since Civ 2 but never were able to actually solve totally. The biggest flaw with Civ games is that the mid-to-late game drags and isn't nearly as fun, fast, or dynamic as the early game. So they tried to build out this system where you basically start anew in 500 and 1500 and whatever else and those mid and late game eras play more like the early game.

I think it's a good idea. But I also don't know how you implement it well without a major discontinuity. It's also ahistorical (the British didn't become the Zulus over time, they just became a different form of the British), but that's a secondary issue.
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Does the game at least give players the option to play the old way or as the new chopped up phases method?

That would give gamers choice how to play the game.

If they dont, just give the option in Civ 8.
 
StreetsofBeige said:
I thought so.

For any kind of Civ game where the point is to start with nothing but cavemen spears and then try to dominate into modern day or future settings, who the hell would want their mega builds to be chopped up?

Defeats the purpose of Civilization advancing from beginning to end as a total gameplay loop.

I didnt play the game, but there must had been some stupid reasons they did it that way.
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I mean the idea was good because Civ 6 had a huge snowball problem, where early game was basically the entire game - after that there was no coming back if you were behind and it was autopilot if you were ahead. This also created a situation where if your civilization had no early game UU or bonus, you had no bonus at all.

I think it was the right approach but they botched the launch and execution - now they are basically splitting Civ 7 in two different games to appease all players.

Edit: also I hope they keep all the stuff 7 did well:
- combat in general
- map generation
- experience and promotions
- domination victory
 
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StreetsofBeige said:
Does the game at least give players the option to play the old way or as the new chopped up phases method?

That would give gamers choice how to play the game.

If they dont, just give the option in Civ 8.
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No, it's a fundamental design decision. Well, I think they may have added an on off switch.

I don't think every one of these games needs to play the same - in fact, they are all different from each other. I don't even think this is the core problem with the game, the core problem is that the UI was horrible, it was unfinished, and they basically said "buy the deluxe edition to get the DLC that will fix the game" and people told them to fuck off.
 
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Katajx said:
Not a Civ player, but why is 7 so unpopular or worse?
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Shit user interface, age system that for forced you to switch civilisations, holding popular civilisations like the British and ottomans behind dlc.

Just all around liquid bum sauce of a game
 
Are they working on anything other than Civ VII? I haven't played it, but the game seems to have been a big letdown. This outcome was not unexpected.
 
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