Embracer Shuts Down Onoma, Eidos to Co-Develop Games With Xbox - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 01 November 2022 / 3,269 Views
Publisher Embracer Group has shut down Onoma, the studio that was formerly known as Square Enix Montreal until it was rebranded less than a month ago, according to a report from Bloomberg's Jason Schreier who cites people familiar with the situation and being confirmed by a representative for Embracer.
The studio's closure will impact around 200 employees with some of them moving to Eidos Montreal.
The move to close the studio is reportedly part of a cost-cutting initiative. Eidos has also cancelled an unannounced game and reduced the scope of another unannounced title.
Eidos is reportedly working on a new Deus Ex that is in early developing, as well as working with Xbox to help develop several titles, including Playground Games' Fable.
Embracer Group announced its plans to acquire Square Enix Montreal, as well as Crystal Dynamics and Eidos Montreal from Square Enix in May of this year for $300 million with the deal closing in August.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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Not massively surprising. Two studios in the same location? A new owner is always likely to consolidate them into one, which will always lead to a bit of overlap and thus some lay-offs.
Just weird that they shut them down about 2 weeks after a full rebranding of the studio...
I think it makes a lot of sense for embracer to consolidate some of these smaller studios that they've purchased and try to put together a few that are capable of producing AAA content. They don't need 70 small studios and just a couple bigger ones. They'd be better off with 25 small studios and 10 bigger ones.
Going from their overall record, they've only ever done mobile games, so not much of value is lost.
Though I do feel sorry for those Avatar TLA fans, their game may likely get canned with the studio being shut down.
they were extremely good mobile games. if you haven't then you should really give hitman go a shot, it is on pc and consoles too.
God bless aquisitions and consolidation.
SE was selling their Canadian ventures for a reason.
Though I think this is one of the first cases of Lars Wingefors ( The one-man army of macro economics behind Embracer ) shutting down a large studio after purchasing it.
Hopefully it won't become a habit. ^^
Honestly this news speaks more on Eidos than it does Onoma. A cancelled game, a budget decrease for another, and they also function as a support studio for MS currently. It's no wonder Onoma was shutdown with some employees moving over (good luck to those who have lost their job, hopefully they get work fast), because Eidos clearly needs some extra manpower.
Honestly, doesn't seem like Eidos is ever going to get the budget for a game that SE was giving them. Pity...
Sad for the people losing jobs, and bad for a recent purchase.
