When you think of 90’s classic PC games, you’re probably thinking of RPGs or possibly management games. One of them I’ve prattled on about for long enough, Theme Hospital, others would hammer in that Deus Ex, Fallout, or System Shock are the pinnacle. Given I’ve only played two out of the four games I’ve mentioned, while I own three of them, and haven’t touched one of them or their successors, it feels weird to still be talking about them in this past decade. Just last week we spoke about Fallout, Deus Ex is back in hibernation after Mankind Divided, and Two Point Hospital is a cough and a nudge at Theme Hospital.

Of course, since the release of System Shock in 1994, there has been one sequel with a very big following. One successful game launched a couple of ships called BioShock and the complete overhaul of Prey. It has been a while since the last System Shock game, as back in 1999 EA didn’t split up every game to make the most money possible, they published games. Since then the baby of Warren Spector of Wing Commander, System Shock, Thief: The Dark Project, and Deus Ex; and Ken Levine of Thief: The Dark Project, System Shock 2, and BioShock have been mostly dormant.

Then in November of 2015 Night Dive Studios bought the rights, and the following month OtherSide Entertainment was signed on to develop the game. Soon after Warren Spector would join the team. Just last year we got a teaser at the Unity Keynote at GDC (Game Developer Conference) featuring SHODAN. For the most part, the updates and information had petered out. That was until yesterday when a developer from the team working on the game spoke with VGC about the entire team being laid off.

Originally the game was set to be published by Starbreeze Studios, though as we’ve covered in the past, they have had some financial troubles and had relinquished the $12 million deal. Since that moment last year, OtherSide Entertainment has been looking for a new publisher. Meanwhile, the writers, director, lead programmer, design director, and more have all quit the project within the last few months. Just this past week design director Chase Jones, a frequent collaborator of Spector’s, confirmed his departure from the project on LinkedIn.

Found by VGC, an anonymous account on the forum RPGCodex stated just over a week ago that: “the team is no longer employed there.” The user also says, “The only reason I’m posting is because I saw so much confusion about the state of the company and the project I thought some first-person information would be welcome.” In another, it is said: “I can’t be any more specific without violating my NDA.”

At the time of publishing, we are reaching out the OtherSide Entertainment for a comment on the claims of possible layoffs. We will update the article if we receive an update.

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