LogInAccording to 80 Level's sources, there is a growing divide between Starbreeze's developers and management.
UPD: Starbreeze's Year-End 2024 financial report mentioned in the original article has been released, shedding some light on the potential reasons behind the layoffs.
Starbreeze
Original article: I know it's usually a faux pas to ask readers to jump between articles, but if you haven't read our January report on the quiet layoffs at Starbreeze, the studio behind the PAYDAY franchise, I strongly encourage you to do so, as this article builds on one key point from that piece – the potential closure of Starbreeze Paris – so knowing how this debacle came to be would be helpful.
If you'd rather not go back to the previous article, the TL;DR is that a former Starbreeze developer told 80 Level that the studio had been quietly laying off employees over a three-month period without making it public – something we were able to confirm – and claimed that Starbreeze's Paris office was on the verge of closure, a point we couldn't verify one way or the other.
Starbreeze
Over the weekend, however, a current Starbreeze developer, who wished to remain anonymous, reached out to us with additional details about the situation, and if their account is accurate, the studio's French branch is indeed about to shut down. Even more interestingly, the information shared by the developer paints a picture of a growing rift between Starbreeze's developers and management, with the former reportedly having lost all trust in the latter.
So, the story goes like this: On February 13, game/gaming industry workers across France participated in a one-day strike to protest layoffs and exhausting working conditions, supported by the country's largest game industry union, Le Syndicat des Travailleurs et Travailleuses du Jeu Vidéo (STJV). According to our insider, nearly the entire Starbreeze Paris team took part in the strike, as its core issues purportedly resonated with them due to the studio's impending closure, which could leave all employees either jobless or forced to relocate to Sweden.
A day later, a lengthy message was allegedly posted in Starbreeze's internal chat by one of the French employees, stating that the studio intends to terminate 23 more people – around 12% of its total workforce – in addition to the 13-16% mentioned in 80 Level's January investigation, and the only reason this hasn't happened yet is due to the strictness of French labor law on the matter of layoffs. Here's the message as shared with us by an insider:
"First, we'd like to set the record straight: in previous town halls and Q&A answers, it was stated there was some ongoing negotiation with French employee representatives about the future of the French entity, there was not: the "negotiation" that took place is simply a legal requirement for the CEO to sit down with French employee representatives and try to justify firing 23 people. We were never consulted about whether or not the entity should be closed but only presented and consulted about how and when, because that is imposed by the French legal procedure.
We want to point out the purely economical reasoning behind the decision: While removing senior employees and replacing them with less experienced and less expensive workers may cut costs, it is short-sighted. The French tech team played a crucial role in the timely release of Payday 3 on consoles, reducing bugs, and optimizing server costs by a factor of 5.
We want to point out the poor vision behind these layoffs: A post-mortem for Payday 3 has been done, highlighting major failures in the organization of our work; from our point of view, not only we have not seen any big improvement on this aspect, but we are now facing the fact that management seems totally unable to measure the work that is actually done by the teams.
We want to point out the lack of consideration for the work achieved by employees: it seems management has totally forgotten how most of the French team stayed and took an active part into a successful reconstruction; forgotten how it went when Payday 3 was released and how many French employees worked their asses off to be able to go through certification, to fix many difficult bugs, to reduce server consumption and to correct all mistakes so that we could reach a decent performance; forgotten also the fact that in the 7 people of the Irons strike team that managed to get the project started, 3 were French; forgotten also the 2 French engineers that crunched to port Payday 2's engine on EOS in a very short time and brought a very welcome financial income from Epic.
We want to point out the lightness of the decision: from the answers we've had, it doesn't seem that Starbreeze is in such a bad cashflow position that would justify laying off 23 employees at once, but there it is: during a crisis in which finding a new job is especially difficult, we are facing potential career disruptions without any apparent effort from management to explore alternatives to these layoffs.
The French team is hurt, morale is low, but we will keep fighting for our rights until the last day."
In response to the message, the company's interim CEO, Mats Juhl, issued a statement of his own, claiming that the layoffs are being carried out in accordance with the law and requesting that the topic not be discussed in Crew, which I assume is an open channel in Starbreeze's Slack:
"We acknowledge the ongoing strike in France and fully respect the right of the French employees and industry. However, we want to emphasize that discussions regarding the French entity should take place through the proper channels and not in Crew.
We want to be absolutely clear that all processes with employee representatives have been conducted in full compliance not only with French labor law, but also in accordance with the priorities and choices of the CSE-union representatives in France, including extra time to answer additional questions and hold discussions. We have engaged in these discussions in good faith, ensuring transparency and adherence to every legal and procedural obligation.
While the post above does not reflect our view of the discussions, position, and priorities of the discussions held during many hours we will not discuss this further in open channels.
We also recognize and respect the role of unions and their representatives in our French entity, and we remain committed to honoring all agreements and obligations in this process.
There will be an invite to a Town Hall tomorrow, already in planning, to present the current situation and the way."
While back-and-forths between developers and management aren't exactly new or interesting, the seven-page document shared with us by the anonymous developer, containing the team's questions for Juhl – most of which he apparently "refused to answer or ducked" – certainly is. While we can't share the full document here out of respect for the studio's developers and artists, the general sentiment is clear: the divide between executives and creators, which is common in many companies, is growing wider by the day at Starbreeze.
If real, the list of questions confirms not only the upcoming closure of the French division but also reveals that the tech team from France was largely responsible for patches and DLCs in Starbreeze games – raising concerns about the future of Payday titles – with one dev summarizing it perfectly in their question: "How can Starbreeze survive when we can barely survive when our French colleagues are on vacation?
Additionally, the list also appears to confirm that the layoffs that have already taken place were not due to financial difficulties or employee performance, and the workers who were let go were not offered severance packages, making one question why the job cuts were even needed in the first place. According to the list, some devs worry that if Project Baxter – a multiplayer adventure game based on the Dungeons & Dragons franchise that Starbreeze is developing in partnership with Wizards of the Coast – fails, the studio may not have enough funds to continue its operations.
The overarching theme of the Q&A centers on developers' lack of trust in top management, with topics like disrespect, distrust, transparency issues, executives misleading both developers and their partner Krafton, and managers and HR being unfair in how employees are assessed or selected for hiring or firing woven throughout the entire list. One developer half-jokingly remarked, "Can we make a poll to see if we want to keep Mats as CEO or the French Team?" illustrating the level of disdain many Starbrezzers currently have for the company's upper echelon. As a cherry on top, the list reveals that the employees "are not legally allowed to share the news and progress on the French entity layoffs," which explains the lack of information on the layoffs within the company and developers' hesitance to provide additional details.
That said, I'd like to emphasize that at this point, the authenticity of the insider's report can't be definitively, 100 percent confirmed, as there's still a chance – albeit a small one given the amount of information provided – that the two screenshots of Slack chat, the seven-page document, and the Starbreeze's All-Hands Meeting presentation from January 10 sent to us could have all been fabricated. Tomorrow, on February 18, Starbreeze's Year-End Report 2024 is set to go live, and hopefully, it will officially address both the layoffs and the future of the company's French division, dismantling the aura of uncertainty that has been lingering around the studio for the past few months.
Don't forget to join our 80 Level Talent platform and our new Discord server, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, TikTok, and Threads, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.