In its third round of layoffs this year alone, EA has canceled its single-player Black Panther game and shut down developer Cliffhanger Games.
First reported by IGN, developers at Cliffhanger Games and other EA employees received an email from EA Entertainment president Laura Miele explaining that the layoffs, cancelations, and other organizational changes are meant to "sharpen our focus and put our creative energy behind the most significant growth opportunities."
The exact number of impacted employees is unclear at the time of writing, but IGN reports that it's less than the 300-400 that were laid off as part of EA's April restructuring.
In addition to the entire staff at Cliffhanger, members of EA's mobile and central teams were also reportedly impacted by these most recent layoffs.
"These decisions are hard," Miele wrote. "They affect people we've worked with, learned from, and shared real moments with. We're doing everything we can to support them — including finding opportunities within EA, where we've had success helping people land in new roles."
EA announced Black Panther back in January 2023, when it was revealed that new in-house studio Cliffhanger Games would be handling the single-player adaptation of the Marvel superhero franchise.
Not much has been revealed about it since then, but it was described as a third-person game that would've given players "greater control" over Black Panther's fate than is typical in narrative-driven games, vaguely suggesting an open-world element.
Miele's email goes on to say that EA will continue to invest in Motive's Iron Man game and the third Star Wars: Jedi game, but going forward there will be a focus on a smaller number of franchises, including Battlefield, The Sims, Skate, and Apex Legends.
I've reached out to EA for comment and will update this article if I hear back.
Almost 200 members of Blizzard's Overwatch 2 team have unionized: "The biggest issue was the layoffs at the beginning of 2024"
