14 DAY TRIAL // Sources close to the Raven development studio, which was behind recent video games Singularity and Wolfenstein, have announced that about 40 people working there have been let go, with publisher Activision saying that the move is a normal one considering the projects that the team now has under
development.
It's not clear what projects Raven is now working on, following Singularity, but reports suggest that the studio is moving to creating some download only titles, although no titles or launch dates have been announced.
It seems that Activision was not content with the sales of Singularity, a first person shooter which mixed traditional gunplay with supernatural looking powers, in a manner which has been described as being similar to that of Bioshock.
A full review of Singularity can be found elsewhere on Softpedia.
The game had good foundations for a first person shooter but it failed to offer a hook to most players and probably also confused some with the time traveling story.
The publisher says, “With the recent completion of Singularity, Raven Software is realigning its workforce to better reflect the studio's upcoming slate.”
This is the second time in about a year when Raven Software reported layoffs, with the latest news of people leaving coming last year when the team finished work on the movie tie in X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
At that time reports said that there are 130 people working at the company.
Raven has a long history, going back to 1990 when brothers Brian and Steve Raffel created the company.
Raven has a close association to id Software, collaborating on the first Wolfenstein and on Quake 4.
They also put together original games like Hexen and Heretic, which were notable because of the huge complex levels and the variety of weird weapons that players could use.
The company has also created Marvel: Ultimate Alliance and X-Men II: Rise of the Apocalypse.