Star Wars Zero Company studio Bit Reactor is laying off staff, a month after it started bringing back furloughed devs
The game sold roughly 1 million copies in its first month and a half
The studio behind Star Wars Zero Company has laid off some of its staff as it continues to attempt to reach financial stability.
Around 80% of Bit Reactor’s staff were reportedly furloughed without pay ahead of its release in August, because the studio was running out of money.
Studio CEO Greg Foertsch then stated last month that some of these sidelined staff were returning to work, with reports suggesting it was bringing the studio’s pay-rolled headcount to more than half of what it was before the furloughing took place.
Now, however, a new report from Bespin Bulletin notes that a number of Bit Reactor developers have posted messages on LinkedIn in the past couple of days, saying they’ve been been affected by layoffs at the company.
Senior environment artist Ryan Lopez, UI engineer Tyler Eichten, producer Michael Blackard and senior QA analyst Ryan Mosher have all posted messages saying they have been laid off.
It’s not yet clear whether some of the laid off staff had recently returned after furlough, or whether all those affected had been furloughed but not brought back last month. Lopez has confirmed that the latter was the case with him.
“I was laid off from Bit Reactor this week after a three-month furlough, and while it stings, I’m really proud of what we built together,” he wrote.
Star Wars Zero Company was released in late August to widespread critical acclaim, with a Metacritic score currently sitting at 84. By the time the game had launched, however, most of its developers had been sidelined without pay as the studio started running out of money.
When the studio started bringing back some of its staff last month, CEO Greg Foertsch said: “Having to ask team members to step away after we navigated unexpected business developments outside of our control and so close to launch was an incredibly difficult decision, but one that was necessary to help us eventually bring as many people back as possible.”
On October 9, around a month and a half after Zero Company’s release, the official EA Star Wars account on X announced that the game had sold 1 million units.
