Now Naughty Dog is reportedly cutting contract workers

The Last of Us developer Naughty Dog is reportedly cutting contracts short for dozens of workers.

That’s according to a new report from Kotaku, which claims the PlayStation studio communicated layoffs internally last week, according to two sources familiar with the situation.

According to the sources, at least 25 developers were part of the downsizing and the cuts ranged from art to production, but “the majority” of those laid off worked in QA.

Kotaku’s sources claim that no severance is being offered for those currently laid off, and that impacted developers as well as remaining employees “are being pressured to keep the news quiet”.

Full-time staff do not appear to have been part of the cuts, the report says. Sony did not immediately respond to Kotaku’s request for comment.

Naughty Dog is currently working on a multiplayer spin-off of The Last of Us, which according to a recent Bloomberg report has been scaled back due to a negative internal review.

According to one Kotaku source, the multiplayer game, while not completely cancelled, “is basically on ice at this point”.

The Naughty Dog cuts would be the latest in widespread redundancies which have taken place across the games industry this year, as many companies make corrections on their post-pandemic expansion.

Epic Games recently announced it’s laying off around 16% of its workforce, and earlier this year Microsoft confirmed plans to lay off approximately 10,000 employees, including some at Xbox and Bethesda.

CD Projekt Red announced plans in July to lay off around 10% of its staff, with CD Projekt CEO Adam Kiciński stating that the company wants to have “teams that are more agile and more effective”.

Layoffs have also recently been occurring at a number of other companies, including Unity, Riot Games, Blizzard, Crystal Dynamics, Bioware and The Callisto Protocol studio Striking Distance.