PopCap shuts down two studios, lays off 50 in Seattle
PopCap, the social gaming studio behind hints like Bejeweled and Plants vs Zombies, has laid off dozens of employees from its Seattle headquarters. In addition, two international studios in Dublin and Shanghai have been shuttered.
Update: PopCap co-founder John Vechey confirms the layoffs, offers comment.
PopCap, the social gaming studio behind hints like Bejeweled and Plants vs Zombies, has laid off dozens of employees from its Seattle headquarters. In addition, two international studios in Dublin and Shanghai have been shuttered.
PopCap's head of social media Jeff Green confirmed the layoffs in a tweet, asking the gaming community to "hire my PopCap friends!" Other employees have already begun using social media to search for new jobs.
3D Realms founder George Broussard has been providing regular updates about the situation at PopCap, confirming the extent of the worldwide layoffs. An earlier report from VG247 suggested that the developer has been "very quietly" laying off staff for "several months," culminating in today's unfortunate turn of events.
Recently, the studio had announced a sequel to its popular tower-defense game, Plants vs Zombies. Broussard suggests that it's an example of "good news before bad news." The company was acquired by gaming giant Electronic Arts last year for over $700 million.
PopCap co-founder John Vechey says that the EA acquisition has nothing to do with today's layoffs. "The founders, CEO, and executives who were in charge of PopCap still are. The decision to reorganize was 100 percent made by us, with no pressure from EA," he said on the PopCap blog. Adding, "if we didn't have EA behind us, the cuts would have been worse."
"We've hired aggressively this past year and PopCap is still growing. Even with the cuts we expect to end the year with roughly the same number of people we started with."
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replyAndrew Yoon posted a new article, PopCap shuts down two studios, lays off 50 in Seattle.
PopCap, the social gaming studio behind hints like Bejeweled and Plants vs Zombies, has laid off dozens of employees from its Seattle headquarters. In addition, two international studios in Dublin and Shanghai have been shuttered.-
Another EA success!
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Can't wait for them to screw up the ending to Plants vs Zombies 3 in 2014!
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Pre-order now from Amazon to get Double Flower Points Booster
Pre-order now from Wal-Mart to get an extra campaign!
For $30 EA-BUX you can unlock an extra ability slot in all modes!-
i actually thought this was a real post for a second
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I am sure.
EA - We own you now. Lay off a whole bunch of your staff.
PopCap - Ya know, we were growing until you acquired us.
EA - Yeah, we do that to companies. -
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Shame on EA and PopCap execs and investors. PopCap was profitable before EA. Steady growth and sales. The EA waived a billion dollars in front of them and they bit. EA way over paid for the casual game company. Not sure in what universe they thought they were going to make $1 Billion back on the deal over games that sell for $1 or $2. At least not so soon.
Now it looks like the social & casual games market was overvalued all around given this turn of events and the problems at Zynga. Big freaking shock!
But the PopCap investors and execs probably made out like bandits in this deal. I'm sure they all deep down knew PopCap wasn't worth 1 Billion. That EA wouldn't be able to sustain the head count at PopCap with that buyout price hanging over their heads. And now we know the end result. EA announces a new PvZ game and then layoffs. Now the hard working people who built PopCap up over the last decade are the ones paying the ultimate price.
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Does this affect you?
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It gave him herpes.
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lol
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Hahaha...i don't get it
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Don't you mean this amazing movie.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballistic:_Ecks_vs._Sever-
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That implies that there's someone out there that actually likes that movie.
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Best thing to come out of that link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_considered_the_worst
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Is Jeff Green still afloat?
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He's had a hell of a ride:
- After CGW / Games for Windows magazine closed down, Jeff Green went to EA in September 2008, and then became the EIC of the EA.com blog...
- Then, in August 2010, he left EA, with a blog post ( http://jeff-greenspeak.blogspot.com/2010/08/where-im-at.html ), and an awesome guest appearance on the 8-17-2010 Bombcast...
- Then, in December 2010, he became head of social media at PopCap...
- ...which got acquired by EA in July 2011.
I hope he's doing okay sanity-wise through all these crazy transitions.
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Another notch on EA's belt. It's relentless quest to buy all talented studios and then scuttle them continues unhindered.
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That said, EA Canada seems to be shrinking. I remember in late 2010 when EA decided to can NBA Elite 11, and move future NBA game development to EA Tiburon. I don't remember exactly, but I think there was a winding-down after the release of the new SSX.
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EA strikes again.
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EA: Close everything.
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Well, that sucks.
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Have they even made anything recently? How many ports of Bejeweled, PvZ, and Peggle can they do without something new?
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