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Meta announced another wave of layoffs this week effecting 10,000 employees, with developers Ready at Dawn and Downpour Interactive having reportedly been affected.
As reported by Game Developer, the pair of studios were apparently affected by this recent round of layoffs, with employees taking to Twitter to discuss losing their employment status. “Ready at Dawn was a wonderful studio full of incredible people,” wrote Colin McInerney, a now-former developer at Ready at Dawn, on Twitter. “If you seen anyone from M*ta (and Ready at Dawn in particular) looking for positions, please signal boost them.”
Numerous developers at Downpour Interactive also shared news of having been let go, multiple noting the difficulty of the situation. Downpour is currently working on Onward, a virtual reality, tactical first person shooter. Meta acquired Downpour in 2021, which had been working on the shooter since 2016. Meta acquired Ready at Dawn a year earlier in 2020. The studio had developed titles like Lone Echo 2 and Echo VR, the latter having been shut down in August of last year.
Job cuts are also expected at Reality Labs, the team behind the behind the Quest VR headset line, as well as other products like the Oculus, as well as Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram.
Last year, Meta laid off roughly 11,000 employees, cutting its workforce by 13%, following the news that the company’s stock fell by nearly 20% in October last year. The company has attempted to popularize the concept of the metaverse, but hasn’t been able to do so as of yet.
