![Adam Jensen thinking about the shareholders.](https://i.kinja-img.com/image/upload/c_fit,q_60,w_645/d01ee02c8234a73b7052375b7fca928c.jpg)
Embracer Group, the proverbial grim reaper of online game acquisitions, has been wreaking havoc on the studios and IP it has acquired previously few years. From layoffs throughout a number of corporations to shutting down of beloved studios like Saints Row developer Volition, and cancellations of massive, thrilling initiatives like a brand new Deus Ex recreation, Embracer has been shopping for up (and shutting down) corporations with virtually nothing to indicate for it.
In its newest fiscal report, Embracer Group CEO Lars Wingefors mentioned the corporate has extra plans within the works to unload a few of its investments, which might line up with stories that Borderlands developer Gearbox Software program could also be up on the market. However he additionally says that additional “restructuring” could occur within the meantime, that means extra layoffs inside the firm and its subsidiaries are doubtless coming. This follows the corporate shedding over eight % of its workforce previously 12 months, which is round 1,387 jobs, and canceling 29 video games throughout its firm.
Why? Properly, Wingefors says Embracer’s “overruling precept is to at all times maximize shareholder worth in any given state of affairs.” It is a factor everyone knows, however it’s not usually you get a swimsuit keen to say the quiet half out loud and on the document.
That is Embracer’s legacy, and folks on social media are already blasting Wingefors’ remark given the present business local weather. And Embracer’s not the one firm that’s been buying studios and shedding scores of workers quickly after. Microsoft just lately lower almost 2,000 individuals’s jobs after it finalized its acquisition of Activision Blizzard. Maybe we will lay to relaxation any notion that acquisitions on this scale are an excellent factor for video games—and we must always cease hyping them up with celebratory trailers.