{"id":87039,"date":"2026-08-04T09:21:03","date_gmt":"2026-08-04T13:21:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/?p=87039"},"modified":"2026-08-04T09:37:20","modified_gmt":"2026-08-04T13:37:20","slug":"this-game-was-labeled-a-success-its-developer-laid-off-85-of-staff-2-months-after-release","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/?p=87039","title":{"rendered":"This Game Was Labeled A Success. Its Developer Laid Off 85% Of Staff 2 Months After Release."},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In June, Netflix released an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gamespot.com\/articles\/fifa-world-cup-game-coming-to-netflix-with-updates-based-on-how-the-tournament-goes\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.gamespot.com\/articles\/fifa-world-cup-game-coming-to-netflix-with-updates-based-on-how-the-tournament-goes\/\">officially licensed FIFA World Cup game<\/a>, and while it was not a critical success, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gamespot.com\/articles\/netflix-says-part-of-its-games-business-is-up-600-but-its-still-early-days\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.gamespot.com\/articles\/netflix-says-part-of-its-games-business-is-up-600-but-its-still-early-days\/\">Netflix management later singled it out as a successful release<\/a>. Now, however, the studio behind the game, Refactor Games, has enacted a round of mass layoffs affecting the majority of the studio.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cofounder Nathan Burba told <a href=\"https:\/\/gamesbeat.com\/refactor-games-worked-with-delphi-on-fifa-game-for-netflix-now-the-studio-laid-off-85-of-staff\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/gamesbeat.com\/refactor-games-worked-with-delphi-on-fifa-game-for-netflix-now-the-studio-laid-off-85-of-staff\/\">GamesBeat<\/a> that the studio has laid off 85% off its staff. This amounted to about 80 people, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/insider-gaming.com\/developers-fifa-world-cup-let-go-refactor-games\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/insider-gaming.com\/developers-fifa-world-cup-let-go-refactor-games\/\">Insider Gaming<\/a>. The studio&#8217;s co-owner, Delphi Interactive, was said to have pulled funding after the launch of the game in June.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Affected developers were reportedly notified on Friday, July 31. The laid-off developers reportedly received no severance pay, though the last day was a payday.<\/p>\n<figure data-wp-interactive=\"core\/image\" class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-ref-id=\"1839668\" data-wp-on--click=\"actions.core.image.showLightbox\" style=\"cursor: zoom-in\" src=\"https:\/\/www.gamespot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/Screenshot-2026-08-04-at-8.54.47-AM-1.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-1839668\" \/>Netflix continues to grow its games business. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Netflix FIFA game, which is called <a href=\"https:\/\/www.netflix.com\/games\/82050895\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.netflix.com\/games\/82050895\">FIFA World Cup Launch Edition<\/a>, allows people to play on their TV or computer with up to four people. The game features all 48 teams, 1,238 players, and 16 stadiums from the tournament. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The game received poor review scores, with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.videogameschronicle.com\/review\/fifa-world-cup-review\/\" data-type=\"link\" data-id=\"https:\/\/www.videogameschronicle.com\/review\/fifa-world-cup-review\/\">VGC saying<\/a> it&#8217;s a &#8220;woefully undercooked companion&#8221; to the World Cup.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During Netflix&#8217;s latest earnings<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In June, Netflix released an officially licensed FIFA World Cup game, and while it was not a critical success, Netflix management later singled it out as a successful release. Now, however, the studio behind the game, Refactor Games, has enacted a round of mass layoffs affecting the majority of the studio. Cofounder Nathan Burba told&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":87041,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-87039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-external"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87039"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=87039"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87039\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":87042,"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87039\/revisions\/87042"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/87041"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=87039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=87039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vgvote.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=87039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}