Ubisoft ends its game “XDefiant”, with new layoffs in store

In an internal memo posted on its website, during the night of Tuesday December 3 to Thursday December 4, the French publisher Ubisoft announced the dismissal of 377 people around the world. The entire Ubisoft San Francisco studio, where 143 people work, is affected, as well as the entirety of Ubisoft Osaka and part of Ubisoft Sydney, with a combined 134 other employees dismissed.

This decision accompanies another unexpected announcement: that of the discontinuation of their free online shooter XDefiantlaunched on May 21. It is no longer possible to download the title or create an account, and the definitive closure of the servers is planned for June 3, 2025.

“The game is far from achieving the results required to enable further significant investment, and we announce that we will end it”declares Marie-Sophie de Waubert, head of the publisher's studios. This sudden stop contrasts with recent comments from Mark Rubin, the game's executive producer, who explained on October 15 on the social network “There were no plans to stop the game”.

A bad patch that continues

According to the Game Industry Layoffs site, which lists the various layoff plans in the sector, Ubisoft has already separated from at least 378 people in 2023 and 2024, without counting the new job cuts announced on Tuesday. Ubisoft, which says it still employs 18,666 people, also declared to its investors, at the end of October, that it had reduced its workforce by more than 2,000 people over the last 24 months (which includes layoffs but also the non-renewal of positions after departures).

If the crisis affects the entire video game industry, which has experienced a record number of layoffs since 2023, the sequence that Ubisoft is going through seems particularly difficult. The publisher has suffered a succession of commercial failures – like its last title Star Wars Outlaws in which he placed a lot of hope -, cancellations and postponements causing growing distrust among shareholders towards management and especially Yves Guillemot, founder and historic boss of the company. Ubisoft must also face general discontent among its salary base, which is protesting in particular against the new revisions to the teleworking policy within the group.

The situation of XDefiant reminiscent to a lesser extent of that of the game Concordabruptly withdrawn from shelves on September 6 by Sony, barely two weeks after its release, due to catastrophic sales. At the end of October, the publisher closed the Firewalk studio which had developed it, causing the destruction of 50 to 200 jobs.