Ballistic Moon, the developer that worked with Sony on its PS5, PC remake of Until Dawn, has "effectively closed" down, according to a new report from Insider Gaming. The outlet suggests, after speaking to sources "with knowledge of the situation", that the studio is down to its bare bones following a quiet round of layoffs in December for staff working on post-launch support for the game. Now, it's said only the founders remain and "possibly" a handful of workers "at most".
While the team did work with Sony on the Until Dawn remake, Ballistic Moon remains an independent developer. It's reported leads at the studio have been searching for funding and new projects, but couldn't secure either. As for more work with Sony, one source speaking to Insider Gaming said the idea was discussed but never materialised. "Sony said after the game they might greenlight more funding for updates, but [it] looks like they didn’t."
One source speaks to the working conditions at Ballistic Moon, where it's described as "a generally good place to work" (in Insider Gaming's writing) but there were "weeks" of unpaid overtime leading up to the internal announcement of redundancies.
Released in October 2024, the PS5, PC remake of Until Dawn proved a slightly controversial release as many fans questioned the point of it. With the PS4 version freely available and some downgrades present in the new version, it failed to properly take off. "With vastly enhanced graphics and minor gameplay tweaks, this is still a highly recommended game," we concluded at the time. "The problem is it costs three times as much as its nine-year-old predecessor, and doesn’t have an upgrade path."
There are still rumours of an Until Dawn 2 being in the works, but from Horizon Call of the Mountain team Firesprite, not Ballistic Moon. A movie that loosely adapts the original game is releasing next month. How do you react to this news? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
[source insider-gaming.com]
Comments 27
I wonder how many more studios will even be left by the end of the year? Way too many are closing.
@LavenderShroud gonna be alot more closings, especially in the western market. Alot of chasing on live service still showing its affects, and generally significantly less appealing games to the market from them with bloated budgets.
I imagine Ubisoft will have much more shakeups and downsizing to come
Wonder how many copies of the remake were sold? I can’t imagine many in this current climate.
@LavenderShroud the first problem is way too many existed, the market just isn’t big enough to support as many studios as existed. It’s not like the video game market has massively shrunk, it’s still bigger than pre-pandemic.
Hopefully they all find good jobs elsewhere. This sort of thing is never good. It’s crazy how much money is at the top of gaming but down the bottom it’s so tough.
Remaking until Dawn always seemed pretty stupid to me, considering the PS4 version is still available and is in very good shape.
Didn’t the remake run worse than the PS4 version?
Not surprised no additional funding wasn’t given, but sad to see another round of layoffs in the industry.
This was unfortunately inevitable, especially after hearing about lay-offs before the game even released.
To be fair an Until Dawn remake should make no money in a sane world.
@Boxmonkey well it's their own fault they said remake, but it really wasn't , definitely more of a remaster with new camera angles " sometimes" amd some collectibles which is fine but not at the ridiculous high price they were asking. Also no upgrade for previous owners
Did we ever find out whether the reporting that BM had been acquired by Sony was accurate?
I’ll say it again and again. Consolidation is going to continue and worsen, whether we like it or not. The amount of games releasing is way too much.
Too many studios relying on their games to sell, while the market is oversaturated. Bigger publishers can just handle loss of sales much better than smaller studios.
With consolidation, i mean either bigger publishers acquiring smaller ones.
Or studios just closing down, leaving the bigger companies behind who can financially fund these projects, and better withstand the potential risks of their games not selling
A sad story for the industry once again. ☹️
@Boxmonkey
Well, they sold one, at least.
I bought a new copy of Until Dawn, but only because I lost the PS4 version when I moved house last year. I have not got around to replaying it yet.
Always the way. Bigwigs make teams do remakes and live service games and when they fail, they close them down. Typical poor judgement by the higher ups, affecting people's jobs. One of many more due to come id imagine.
The game industry reminds me of the craft beer industry. Hate to see a decent group go south though. Hopefully those affected land in their feet.
In this instance, I'm not surprised. They were really flogging a dead horse with that remake.
Personally liked The Quarry over UD.
the irony is if sony didn't bring them in for the remake, they would have shut down sooner. at least sony gave them some work but they couldn't find anything after that.
@EquiinoxGII sony doesn't own them , they never did. so how did they make them do it? they gave them work. with out the remake they wouldn't have had any games and would have shut down earlier.
A game that didn't need to exist. If they were unable to secure funding, it's logical to assume they didn't have any ideas worth backing. No company has a right to exist.
There are too many game companies popping up with a run of the mill idea, having an unfeasibly large budget for it that's entirely reliant on it being a major, unprecedented success to survive long enough to get a second game out. Too easy for chancers to create a company in an attempt hit big and sell up knowing that it's far likelier to fail.
Independent studios should always work within safe margins and make smaller games until they have enough money to safely take bigger risks. I've seen how some indie studios have grown like that over the years and how others have failed by risking it all on one big project. Just play it safe. And listen to the dude from Larian.
Honestly I'm not surprised in the slightest.
Honestly understandable as the remake was mostly inferior to the original, surely that money could have gone elsewhere.
I honestly don't understand why this game even exists. Why did Sony waste money on remastering Until Dawn when Resistance, Infamous, Killzone, MGS4, and GTA IV are all still stuck on PS3?
@theSpectre 👆👆👆THIS!!!!!
@twitchtvpat where in my sentence did I state Sony owned them? Someone made a decision and the rest are affected. That was my point..
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