A massive sweep of layoffs has rocked various Sony first-party studios today, including Naughty Dog, Guerilla Games, and Insomniac. Another victim is Firesprite Games, the UK studio behind The Playroom games and The Persistence, and an additional casualty from that studio is reportedly a new Twisted Metal title.
According to Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier, Firesprite had a Twisted Metal game in the works that has now been canceled. He reports that the game was a live-service title and very early in development, so it was not yet officially greenlit. You can read his full report here.
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) February 27, 2024NEW: As part of today's mass layoff, Sony has canceled a Twisted Metal live-service game that was in development at UK-based studio Firesprite, Bloomberg has learned.
Firesprite will also lay off an unspecified number of people. https://t.co/pvCDsS7yxe
Twisted Metal was PlayStation’s original flagship series, launching a couple of months after the PS1 was released in North America in the fall of 1995. The series includes eight sequels/spin-offs, the last of which remains the 2012 reboot for PS3. Peacock’s well-received live-action series has at least kept the series alive and is getting a second season.
The number of layoffs to hit Firespirte is currently unknown. Sony acquired Firesprite in 2021, where it helped co-develop Horizon Call of the Mountain with Guerrilla Games. 900 employees have been laid off across several Sony 1st-party studios in various department. Blood & Truth creators London Studio has been shut down entirely. PlayStation Studios Hermen Hulst has cited overgrowth as the reason for the layoffs, and that the publisher has examined its portfolio of upcoming projects to determine which ones will cease production. It would appear that whatever this Twisted Metal project would have been, it's among several titles getting the axe.
[Source: Bloomberg]