Andrea May 2nd, 2024 - 8:27 PM
BAFTA winner, UK based studio Roll7’s shutdown was announced on May 1st, 2024. The studio is dissolving alongside Intercept Games.
NEW: Take-Two Interactive plans to shutter two studios as part of a mass layoff announced last month: Roll7 (Rollerdrome, OlliOlli World) and Intercept Games (Kerbal Space Program 2) https://t.co/KxUOsWzJdb
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) May 1, 2024
Roll7 is most well known for Rollerdrome (2022), a skater-shooter video game published by Private Division. Rollerdrome was nominated and won a BAFTA. Before Rollerdrome, Roll7 worked on other projects such as OlliOlli (2014) – a skateboarding game – and Laser League (2017), a futuristic sports game.
Take-Two publishing label Private Division has reportedly laid off the “vast majority” of its teams in Seattle, New York, Las Vegas and Munich.
This follows reports that the company has shut down Roll7 and Intercept Games.https://t.co/IK7PFw2MBf pic.twitter.com/VNKcXCvwtU
— VGC (@VGC_News) May 3, 2024
Roll7 was under Private Division, whose parent company is Take-Two Interactive. Roll7 being acquired by Private Division ensured that Roll7 did not have to go to different publishers every time they created and pitched a game. The studio’s operations were mostly hybrid, with a few days in person at the London offices. Roll7 during active operation had 55 employees as of 2023. Many employees were remote workers. The studio was founded in 2008 by Simon Bennett, Tom Hegarty, and John Ribbins. The trio started off by creating contract based educational games.
Take Two Interactive also owns 2K and Rockstar Games. Private Division was developed to support indie games. Other companies and developers Take Two have acquired include, but are not limited to Zynga (a mobile games developer), GameClub (a mobile games subscription service), Firaxis Games (game design company by Sid Meier, Jeff Brigs, and Brian Reynolds), and earlier in March, Gearbox Entertainment Company. Despite acquiring a lot of studios and projects, Take Two also was not immune to the layoffs and dissolved many projects in the process.
