Per Eurogamer, Rocksteady has quietly laid off a number of employees at the end of 2024. Those affected are programmers, artists and more QA staff. Eurogamer contacted publisher Warner Bros. for confirmation; however, no acknowledgment was given, aand similar non-response was given after the studio’s September layoffs. The publication did independently confirm that the redundancies took place by talking to half a dozen employees affected by the loss.
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League’s Commercial Failure Continues to Affect Rocksteady.
This follows a previous round of layoffs the studio suffered in September of last year. Rocksteady cut its QA team down to 15 members from 33, with the senior management acknowledging that product quality may suffer in the future. One former employee revealed they had been made redundant during their paternity leave. While many of those made redundant were in junior roles, a significant portion of those let go were at the studio for over five years. Staff members conveyed that they would take their specialized skills and knowledge with them, leaving their co-workers with a treacherous workload.
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League launched in the first quarter of 2024 to almost universal disdain. The game’s critical and fan reception was poor, leading to derision and eventually becoming a meme. The game became emblematic of overspending, unrealistic expectations and enormous financial losses that plagued the AAA gaming industry in 2024.
Publisher Warner Bros.’s insistence that Rocksteady, a studio famous for its tight single-player experiences, make a live service game was a miscalculation of the audience and how to utilize a studio’s skillset properly. In an earnings call, Warner Bros. reported they had lost $200m on the game and suffered a 41 percent decline in year-on-year gaming revenue.
The failure of the game cannot be solely leveled at Warner Bros. In June of last year, an exposé revealed the studio’s management could not plug the holes in the sinking ship. Former staff members reported a “toxic positivity” culture that often “discouraged criticism”. The game was initially intended to be released in 2019 or 2020, but staffers say that Sefton Hill, the perfectionist director of the game, often left team members waiting months for direction, severely delaying production.
Many new hires were surprised that they would be working on a live service game because they did not possess that particular skillset. The future for Rocksteady currently looks bleak as Warner Bros. has announced they will be discontinuing support for Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.
