Inside Microsoft’s Xbox turmoil
Microsoft launched a fiery Xbox controller on the same day it announced gaming layoffs. | Image: Microsoft
Just hours after learning that Microsoft was shutting down a number of game studios this week, Dinga Bakaba, head of Microsoft-owned Arkane Lyon, decided to let the company know how he felt about the decision — right in public. “Don’t throw us into gold fever gambits, don’t use us as strawmen for miscalculations / blind spots, don’t make our work environments Darwinist jungles,” Bakaba wrote on X.
Bakaba, whose studio wasn’t impacted by the layoffs this week, said his message was aimed at “any executive reading this,” including the Xbox leaders behind the latest wave of layoffs. It was a rare public display of criticism, but sources at Microsoft tell me it reflects a growing discontent and fear among Xbox employees about what comes...