Red 5 lays off 10% of staff

About ten percent of Red 5 Studios workers have been laid off as the team approaches the launch of online FPS Firefall.

The majority of the redundancies affected staff at the studio’s internet video channel, a fact that suggests the reorganization is related to the news that the developers have backed off their pursuit of e-sports.

A blog post says that less than three percent of players have taken advantage of the studio’s latest attempt at a pure PvP esports option, a fact that has lead the studio to believe it needs to pull the PvP content until it’s more polished.

Red 5 promises that development of the persistent free-to-play game has not been affected by the layoffs.

"As Firefall matures, we must transition our priorities and our development strategy to focus on streamlined operations and live product support," said Red 5 founder and CEO Mark Kern.

Last year the company brought its numbers up from 60 to over 100 employees, which probably puts best estimates of the number of layoffs at about ten.