Media: Bilibili plans large-scale layoffs in its gaming division, up to 200 people may lose their jobs
The Chinese company Bilibili has canceled an unannounced AAA game codenamed Codename: UE after two years of development, reports GameLook. Now the project team faces mass layoffs.
According to GameLook, the Codename: UE team currently consists of about 200 people. It is expected that Bilibili will lay off if not all, then the majority of them.
The reason why Bilibili took this step is unknown. GameLook suggests that the ambiguous situation in the Chinese AAA game market may have prompted the company.
As GameLook explains, recently many studios from China have started working on big-budget open-world titles inspired by the folklore of the Celestial Empire. This trend especially became evident after the success of Black Myth: Wukong, whose sales in January were estimated at 25 million copies. However, creating such projects costs a significant amount, prompting some developers to make commercial compromises. Not being confident that the game would earn enough on PCs and consoles, they began working on a mobile version to the detriment of their projects' quality. The situation is further complicated by the fact that not all developers fully understand which audience their AAA games should target and how to engage with it.
There have already been several failures in China. For instance, in 2024, NetEase released the game Condor Heroes (射雕) in the country—a project with high expectations that ultimately launched below predictions. A similar story can be recounted by the authors of Sword and Fairy: Far Beyond Time (仙剑世界), whose Chinese release took place last month.
GameLook believes Bilibili took note of others' mistakes and doubted Codename: UE's chances of success. As a result, the company decided to shut down the costly project and disband its team before it incurred significant losses.
Bilibili has not commented on either the game's cancellation or the layoffs.