The main events of the weekend (November 7-8)

Developers at Star Wars Zero Company faced layoffs, the audience of the Death Stranding franchise reached 28 million people, and sales of Probably Stolen surpassed one million copies — we cover the main events in the gaming industry over the past weekend.

• The studio Bit Reactor, which developed Star Wars Zero Company, unfortunately couldn’t avoid layoffs. The round of reductions was reported by its former employees on LinkedIn. The total number of people who lost their jobs is unclear, but among them were artists, programmers, testers, and other specialists. Recall, two months ago, Bit Reactor, amid financial difficulties, placed 80% of its staff on mandatory unpaid leave. In October, its situation started to improve gradually, allowing some people to return to their duties. However, it seems the situation couldn’t be fully stabilized, making layoffs the next inevitable step.
• Layoffs also occurred in the gaming division of Skydance — a corporation recently formed by merging Warner Bros. and Paramount. According to posts by affected employees, the cuts primarily hit the teams at Paramount Games and Skydance Interactive. Details of the reductions are unknown, but it can be assumed that this is how Skydance is eliminating duplicate positions, which usually happens after a merger.
• The Death Stranding franchise turned seven years old — the release of the first part of the duology took place on November 8, 2019. In honor of the anniversary, Kojima Productions announced that to date, a total of 28 million people worldwide have become acquainted with its games. Note that this figure includes both direct purchasers of Death Stranding 1 and 2, as well as subscribers to Game Pass and PlayStation Plus services.
• The cyberpunk shop owner simulator Probably Stolen has seen new successes. According to Questing Goose Studio, the project has been purchased more than a million times in just a week and a half since its release. That's not all. On the evening of Sunday, November 8, Probably Stolen once again broke its own record for peak online players on Steam, reaching 186,095 concurrent players.