44 people have been laid off from the studio, and the sword of Damocles may be hanging over the new project for the Dungeons & Dragons IP, often abbreviated to D&D (and also used in Baldur’s Gate 3).
Michael Austin, founder and creative director of Hidden Path Entertainment, wrote on LinkedIn that they have been looking for funding for more than half a year without success and had to lay off 44 employees as a result. This year we will hear the word “fired” a lot (Activision Blizzard laid off 1900 people, and many more lost their jobs in ONE month).
“For over six months, our team at Hidden Path Entertainment has been in active discussions to find alternative funding for an exciting RPG project. In the face of a challenging environment, we now have no choice but to pause development on this project and downsize the company until we have an opportunity to return to it. As a result, we have had to make the painful decision to lay off 44 amazing game developers from our studio. Those affected have played key roles in the development of a number of great projects. Their creativity, passion, and dedication have left an indelible mark on Hidden Path. We are committed to doing everything we can to help these talented professionals continue their careers elsewhere, while hoping to work with them again soon,” Austin wrote.
Hey everyone, just wanted to set the record straight:
Our epic D&D project with Wizards is still happening! In fact, we're currently hiring and looking for talented people to join our team. Check out our jobs page at https://t.co/mXo7I9BPY1— Hidden Path Ent (@HiddenPathEnt) January 5, 2023
It doesn’t make sense to us that there are two projects the Hidden Path people are working on, so they probably just have the anonymous D&D project. But there may have been trouble as early as January 2023, when Bloomberg reported that licensor Wizards of the Coast had canceled several projects. At the time, Hidden Path wrote on Twitter that there was nothing to worry about because it was still in development and they were even looking for people! Whitney Beltrán, the game’s narrative director, left the company in April (she’s now studio head and co-founder of mobile publisher Dawon Entertainment).
It looks like Hidden Path wants to return to the project.
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