Until Dawn studio Supermassive is laying off up to 75 people, its third round in two years
Supermassive Games, the horror studio behind Until Dawn and The Dark Pictures Anthology, is cutting up to 75 jobs “to ensure the sustainability of the company.” It’s the third round of layoffs since early 2024, roughly 200 jobs gone, after a string of games underperformed.
Supermassive Games, the British studio that made Until Dawn one of horror gaming’s signature hits, is cutting staff again, and this time up to 75 people are losing their jobs.
The studio announced on August 11 that it’s beginning a “redundancy consultation process” it expects will end with the loss of up to 75 employees. Supermassive called it “a necessary step to help ensure the sustainability of the company,” and said supporting the affected staff would be its priority. What it didn’t say, but the timeline makes clear, is that this is becoming a pattern.
This is the third round in about two and a half years.
A studio shrinking in stages
Add it up, and the numbers are grim.
Supermassive cut around 90 jobs in February 2024, another 36 in July 2025, a round that also delayed its game Directive 8020, and now up to 75 more. That’s roughly 200 jobs gone from one studio in under three years, a slow bleed rather than a single collapse, which in some ways is harder to watch. Each round is framed as securing the future; each is followed, eventually, by another.
The studio, based in Guildford and owned by Nordisk Film since 2022, employed around 350 people as of 2023. These cuts take a serious bite out of that.
Why it’s happening
The uncomfortable throughline is that the games haven’t landed.
Supermassive built its name on Until Dawn in 2015 and followed it with The Quarry and The Dark Pictures Anthology, but its recent releases have been middling. The Casting of Frank Stone, Little Nightmares 3, and this year’s Directive 8020 landed at 68, 71, and 72 on Metacritic respectively, none a flop exactly, but none the hit the studio needed. Even the recent Until Dawn remake drew criticism from fans who felt it lost the atmosphere of the original. A studio that runs on narrative horror needs those games to connect, and lately they haven’t.
There’s a telling detail, too: Until Dawn 2, the sequel to the studio’s biggest success, is being made by a different studio. Supermassive’s own former CEO stepped down in June. The pieces of a studio under real strain are all here.
Part of a much bigger story
Supermassive isn’t an isolated case, and that’s the bleakest part.
Its layoffs land in the middle of the worst stretch for games-industry jobs in memory. Just this year: Battlefield Studios cut staff even though Battlefield 6 was 2025’s best-seller, Bungie’s Destiny 2 team was gutted, and Microsoft parted with several studios while laying off thousands across Xbox. The pattern holds across the industry, studios shedding people whether their last game succeeded or failed, as publishers chase sustainability by getting smaller.
For Supermassive, the hope now rests on what’s next, including that outsourced Until Dawn 2 and whatever the surviving team builds. But for up to 75 people in Guildford, the future of the company is a small comfort against the loss of their own jobs, and they join a very long line of developers who spent 2026 finding out that making good games, or even best-selling ones, doesn’t keep the layoffs away anymore.
Article compiled and edited by Derek Gibbs (entertainment editor) and the Clownfish TV newsroom.
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Hat Tips:
Game Informer (August 11, 2026), verified for the up-to-75 layoffs, the redundancy-consultation statement, the “sustainability of the company” quote, the February 2024 (90 jobs) and July 2025 (36 jobs) prior rounds, the ~200-jobs-in-three-years total, and the Metacritic scores for Directive 8020, Little Nightmares 3, and Frank Stone
Video Games Chronicle (August 11, 2026), verified for the Dark Pictures Anthology and Until Dawn credits, the “ensure sustainability” framing, the former CEO stepping down in June, and the Directive 8020 context
Push Square and Dot Esports (August 11, 2026), verified for the third-round-in-two-years framing, the Until Dawn 2 being developed by a different studio (with Dacre Montgomery and Neil Newbon), and the Until Dawn remake fan criticism
Game Informer and industry reporting (2026), verified for the wider layoff wave including Battlefield Studios, Bungie’s Destiny 2 team, and Microsoft’s Xbox studio cuts