85 layoffs at Toys for Bob part of Microsoft’s 1,900 total

Alongside 76 at Sledgehammer Games.

Among Microsoft’s total 1,900 layoffs are 86 terminations at Crash Bandicoot 4 It’s About Time‘s Toys for Bob alongside 76 positions at Call of Duty Vanguard developer Sledgehammer Games.

The number of layoffs at both studios come from California law, which requires companies to notify the state about upcoming layoffs. The WARN alerts were first noticed by the San Franciso Chronicle.

The layoffs are part of a larger restructure at Microsoft, which has resulting in job losses across Xbox, Activision Blizzard and Bethesda’s ZeniMax.

“The Gaming Leadership Team and I are committed to navigating this process as thoughtfully as possible,” Xbox head Phil Spencer said, announcing the layoffs. “The people who are directly impacted by these reductions have all played an important part in the success of Activision Blizzard, ZeniMax and the Xbox teams, and they should be proud of everything they’ve accomplished here.”

The layoffs have drawn scrutiny from the USA’s Federal Trade Commission (FTC), which says that the Activision Blizzard-specific layoffs jeopardise the company’s autonomy.

“Specifically, Microsoft reportedly has stated that the layoffs were part of an ‘execution plan’ that would reduce ‘areas of overlap’ between Microsoft and Activision, which is inconsistent with Microsoft’s suggestion to this Court that the two companies will operate independently post-merger,” the FTC said in its complaint.

More than 6,000 layoffs have rocked the video games industry in this year alone. Impacted developers and publishers over 2023 and 2024 include Devolver, Eidos-Montreal, Riot Games, Thunderful, Embracer and Gearbox, Twitch (again), Unity, Codemasters, 505 Games’ Digital Bros, Amazon, Bungie, Media Molecule, Ubisoft, Aussie studio League of Geeks, Versus Evil and many more.