Greedfall 2 studio Spiders set for layoffs that’ll affect “most” of their animators and riggers, dev claims

Greedfall 2 developers Spiders are going ahead with a layoff plan that’ll see “most” of their animating and rigging team affected, according to a post from a lead animator at the Nacon-owned studio.

This LinkedIn post by Erwan Perrin, whose profile cites him as having been a permanent Spiders staffer since 2021, has been reposted by at least four other workers at the the studio.

“We’ve recently been informed that, like most of the industry, Spiders Games will proceed a layoff plan and sadly most of the Animation and Rig team will be affected,” Perrin wrote. As of writing, Spiders gameplay animator Lucas Dubois, game designer Antoine Dieulesaint, game animator Raphaël Brousseau, and dialogue artist Yaseen Lalmahomed are among those who’ve reposted the message.

It’s currently unclear how many staff have been affected by these alleged cuts. We’ve reached out to Spiders for comment.

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Spiders released Greedfall 2 into early access last September, with the game’s reviews sitting at mixed on Steam as of writing. Shortly before that release, 44 of Spiders’ 95 workers signed an open letter calling for a strike over working conditions and wider management practices at the studio. Among the issues cited were “global mismanagement, turnover and recruitment problems, unacceptable delays in achieving gender equality and parity, important lack of transparency, denial of problems, refusal to acknowledge worker representation and blocked negotiations”.

Spiders responded by saying that these were “false and even defamatory accusations” which “in no way reflect the reality of the day-to-day working life of the company’s employees”, adding that the studio’s management were “committed to open and constructive social dialogue”. Subsequent negotiations between Spiders and the French union representing the staff, the Syndicat des Travailleurs/ses du Jeu Vidéo (STJV), did look to have yielded some promises that the workers would recive an “audit” of their working conditions, as well as bonuses based on Greedfall 2’s performance in early access.

This year’s been a particularly brutal one in terms of layoffs across the games industry, with Oblivion Remastered co-developers Virtuos being among the companies which have recently thrown workers into the void. Here’s hoping that if Spiders devs are being let go, they can land on their feet.