UK Racing veterans Codemasters, whose credits include Dirt, Grid and F1, are set to lose as many as 50 people in a round of layoffs.
The news comes from an anonymous source speaking to Eurogamer, who reports that over 30 employees of the 500-strong company are guaranteed to be let go.
Most of the layoffs will stem from designers and artists, while technical staff such as programmers will remain untouched. A number of the affected jobs lie within the Grid and Dirt teams, while the F1 team based in Birmingham who are currently working on a new game for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One will be undisturbed.
This upcoming F1 game, which will presumably be titled F1 2015, will be one of the first current gen titles put out by Codemasters. The previous entry to the series, 2014 was released for the PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 last October, a sign that the developer had yet to adapt to current gen hardware.
As a result of the layoffs,production of the latest Dirt game is likely to be affected, although Codemasters still intend to release the game at some point. The source claims that the developer is looking to adopting an Early-Access style approach sometime in Feburary, but Eurogamer notes that this window is unlikely to work, as the team has yet to secure car licenses.
A statement to Eurogamer from Codemasters reads:
As Codemasters continues its programme of strategic realignment in line with market changes, the company has reviewed its current structures to focus on areas of increased importance and decrease resources in areas where work requirements have been reduced. As a result of this review, a small number of roles have been proposed as being at risk of redundancy. Those in potentially affected roles are now involved in a consultation period to discuss the proposal. The proposal does not affect the on-going production of titles in development and no projects have been cancelled as a result of the proposal.