CI Games downsizes internal studio, despite selling 1 million units of Sniper Ghost Warrior 3.
Warsaw-based CI Games has announced staff lay-offs in addition to a strategic restructuring of its business. The restructure sees development on an as-yet-unannounced tactical shooter continue with a team of 30 staff, plus the support of subcontractors.
The studio’s last game, Sniper Ghost Warrior 3, was released in April 2017 and has now sold over one million units globally. As a result, the company earned €24 million in fiscal year 2017.
In a press statement issued today, Marek Tyminski, chief executive officer at CI Games, said:
“With our own cash and the new financing from the bank of over 8 million Euro, we are well positioned for further growth. Sniper Ghost Warrior 3 was the biggest title we’ve ever developed and published, and despite a middling media reception upon release, we have continued to work hard to improve the game, and have managed to come out relatively successful with this title.”
On the need to downsize the studio, Tyminski explained:
The decision to downsize the studio was the toughest decision I have taken over the past years—it is never easy to let go of friends and colleagues with whom we’ve worked for years-however I truly believe that it was the best way to move forward. Quality is not only extremely important to our upcoming tactical shooter, but it is important to every game we will bring to the market. The difficulties we faced during the development and launch of Sniper Ghost Warrior 3 were major lessons for us. We now believe in smaller and leaner development teams when it comes to succeeding in this very competitive industry. At the same time we are proud of our team’s efforts and we sincerely want to thank everyone who was part of the journey of developing SGW3, as without them we could not have even attempted to deliver a AAA-caliber game to players around the world across three platforms.”
CI Games has also confirmed that talks are progressing with potential partners regarding the development of a Lords of the Fallen sequel.
