One of the biggest workhorses for XBOX was Obsidian Entertainment. The studio somehow managed to release three titles in 2025 alone: Avowed, Grounded 2 (in Early Access), and The Outer Worlds 2. Yet even Obsidian was not spared from the recent layoffs across all of XBOX.
According to sources speaking with Kotaku, somewhere between 60 and 70 employees were laid off. The layoffs include producers, artists, designers, programmers, QA testers, writers, and more. Many of those that were laid off were "senior talent," with at least one employee having been with Obsidian for over a decade. Kotaku notes that the art director for The Outer Worlds was among those laid off, as well as the studio's only recruiter.
One individual told me that employees who will remain at the studio have not yet received formal guidance on how their existing projects can continue with so many staff members missing, particularly given what they characterized as a “huge list of projects” in the works at the studio in the coming months.
