A new report from Bloomberg sheds more light on what is going on at Obsidian Entertainment in the wake of the mass layoffs that impacted all XBOX studios in some capacity this week. We know already that roughly 25% of Obsidian employees were laid off this week. Due to these extensive layoffs, several projects have been canceled.
According to Bloomberg, one of the known cancelations at Obsidian was a sequel to 2025's Avowed. The report says that there were "other unannounced projects" that were also canceled.
In a real "monkey's paw wish" turn of events, Obsidian will now lead development on a new title set in the Fallout universe. Obsidian's design director Josh Sawyer will lead development on this new Fallout title at Obsidian. Sawyer was the project director on 2010's Fallout: New Vegas and held leadership roles, including narrative designer, on all of the New Vegas expansions.
Obsidian's Fallout project could be the first new Fallout title since the release of Fallout 76 in 2018. Fallout 4, the last mainline entry in the series, released in 2015. All Fallout titles, except for Fallout: New Vegas, were developed by Bethesda. Bloomberg says that Bethesda "will work with Obsidian on the new project."
In 2025, Obsidian released three titles: Avowed, Grounded 2 (in Early Access), and The Outer Worlds 2. According to a WARN notice (obtained by Gamefile) filed in California, where Obsidian is headquartered, 52 employees were laid off. This is said to be roughly 25% of its entire workforce. Of the 52 employees: 43 were based in their California offices and an additional 9 employees were remote workers.
