Fae Farm developer Phoenix Labs lays off 34 staff

Phoenix Labs, the developer behind recent indie success Fae Farm, has laid off 34 staff.

This is the second round of layoffs for the studio this year.

“After a rigorous review we made the decision to change the structure of our support teams, and we have made the tough decision to reduce our workforce by a total of 34 people, across our publishing, HR, IT, and shared services teams,” a studio representative told GamesIndusty.biz.

“Our games teams were unaffected and our work continues across our titles at Phoenix Labs. Fae Farm’s DLC and Dauntless updates are on track, and we have exciting unannounced projects in the works.

“We thank each of the affected team members who have helped to build Phoenix Labs into what it is today. Their impact will be missed and live on through everything the studio does moving forward.”

In May, the developer cut nine percent of its workforce to focus on fewer projects, including the recently released Fae Farm. The life sim RPG launched back in September across Steam and Switch and has garnered positive reviews.

Fae Farm will receive a frog-themed DLC called Coasts of Croakia on 14th December, available for free.

Back in February, the Vancouver-based Phoenix Labs regained independence from parent company Garena. Then, in September the studio’s CEO and co-founder Jesse Houston and COO Jeanne-Marie Owens stepped down.

“After nearly a decade, I feel like I can step back from the day-to-day operations at Phoenix Labs,” said Houston at the time. “The future has never looked brighter – we’ve got an amazing pipeline of games in development and our incredible Fae Farm [just launched] for the Nintendo Switch and PC.”

Last week, more layoffs were made by Embracer, this time around 50 positions at Chorus developer Fishlabs. The conglomerate laid off 900 employees in the previous financial quarter.

Other studios to have recently laid off staff include Ubisoft, 505 Games parent company Digital Bros, Humble Games, and Warframe developer Digital Extremes, in what has been a tumultuous year for the industry.

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• Source: https://www.eurogamer.net/fae-farm-developer-phoenix-labs-lays-off-34-staff