And all of this is after more layoffs and shutdown 18 months ago which closed Arkan Austin, Alpha Dog Games and the developer of Xbox’s best game in a while, Hi-Fi Rush’s Tango Gameworks, which had to be saved by another company.

The Initiative, the Xbox studio developing a modern reimagining of Perfect Dark, is being shut down, and development of the game is ending. As first reported by Windows Central, the studio's closure is part of major cuts Microsoft is making across its business,

Microsoft's recent round of layoffs has seen the closure of The Initiative and the cancellation of the upcoming Perfect Dark.

The news was initially confirmed in a statement signed by Brenda Romero and posted on X. “Last night, we learned that our publisher has canceled funding for our game along with several other unannounced projects at other studios,

John Romero's Romero Games just released a statement saying that the project the studio has been working on has been defunded. Microsoft's funding of the project was unknown till now, but the timing suggests that Romero Games was part of the massive cuts that the company made yesterday.

Amid this week's layoff bloodbath, Microsoft has insisted every game shown at its Xbox showcase in June is safe. But what were the no-shows, and should we be worried about them? IGN runs through the list.

Microsoft has reportedly cancelled Everwild, an in-development game from UK-based Sea of Thieves developer Rare, and potentially other projects amid a round of layoffs that will see the company lose upwards of 9000 employees.

These changes come at a time when we have more players, games, and gaming hours than ever before,” said Xbox head Phil Spencer in an email to staff.