It seems like every few days there’s more news about layoffs hitting video game developers, and today it’s Behaviour Interactive’s turn. The company announced via press release its plan to cut up to 95 jobs. The company’s Montreal studio will be hit particularly hard – 70 of the cut employees will be coming from there.
Up until this year, Behaviour was experiencing some incredible growth. The company’s own press release acknowledges that it’s more than doubled in size over the past years, going from 575 to 1,300 employees. “Over the same period, the greater gaming industry has also witnessed remarkable growth,” the company writes, adding, “However, the industry’s unprecedented popularity has also led to unprecedented competition.”
According to the press release, these changes are aimed at helping the company focus on its primary goals to “lead in horror, lead in service, and explore the possibilities of location-based entertainment.” To that end, Behaviour says that the restructuring won’t affect its work on Dead by Daylight, which will continue to see regular updates and franchise crossovers.
At this point it seems almost unnecessary to point out that this is just the latest in a string of layoffs that’s been snaking through the industry since before the start of the year. Companies like Microsoft, Sony, and Unity – to name just a few – have all been hit, and the total number of jobs lost in 2024 alone is already reaching 2023’s depressing 9,000. This restructuring from Behaviour may seem like small change in comparison, but every job lost is a life disrupted, and seeing all these losses piled together is staggering.
