Zelnick on Roll7 and Intercept Games: “We didn’t shutter those studios”

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Update: Take-Two says “entire organisation contributed to cost reduction efforts” after CEO claims firm hasn’t “shuttered anything”

Original story: Take-Two hasn’t shut down Roll7 and Intercept Games, CEO Strauss Zelnick said in an interview.

Talking to IGN off the back of the company’s Q4 financials, Zelnick was asked about why the closures happened.

He replied: “We didn’t shutter those studios, to be clear. And we are always looking at our release schedule across all of our studios to make sure that it makes sense. So we are being very judicious because we are in the middle of a cost reduction program that we’ve already concluded and are now fully rolling out.

“We’ve announced that we’re saving $165 million in existing and future costs, but we haven’t shuttered anything.”

IGN senior reporter Rebekah Valentine further asked Zelnick about whether he was denying the reports, at which point a PR representative interjected and said:

“What we’ve said is, in the 8-K filing that we put out, we talked about the cost reduction plan is approximately 5% reduction in headcount worldwide, but we did not give a label-by-label breakdown of what that looks like.”

When asked again whether the studios still existed, Take-Two did not provide more details, with the PR adding: “We have not provided any additional colour beyond what I just said.”

Later in the interview, discussing Private Division’s health specifically, Zelnick said he didn’t think the label was in trouble, adding: “I think, as I said, we’re reviewing all of the projects company-wide, and sometimes we do have to make hard choices. We just tend to leave those announcements to the label, we don’t tend to talk about them, so we’re not trying to be cute or difficult today. It’s just that we don’t tend to bring those discussions into these meetings.”

Reports of Roll7 and Intercept Games being shut down emerged earlier this month through Bloomberg, which had access to internal documentation about the closures. A WARN notice was also filed in Washington indicating a studio closure impacting 70 people in Seattle (Intercept Games has about 70 staff and is based in Seattle). Take-Two never formally confirmed the closures.

Take-Two’s financial report yesterday saw the company post a $3.74 billion net loss, confirming that GTA 6 won’t release this current fiscal year.

Update: Replying to GamesIndustry.biz’s request for comment, a Take-Two representative provided the following statement:

“Our entire organisation contributed to our cost reduction efforts, including Private Division. We refocused our pipeline within Private Division and are still planning to support an array of titles,” they said, listing Moon Studio’s No Rest for the Wicked, Wētā Workshop Game Studio’s Tales of the Shire, and atitle in partnership with Gamefreak.

“Additionally, the label continues to make updates to Kerbal Space Program 2. We will continue to opportunistically evaluate future projects that have the potential to meet our financial benchmarks.”