Developer behind Kickstarter’s most successful MMO reportedly loses management and staff following troubled launch

A significant number of management and development staff working on Kickstarted MMO Ashes of Creation have resigned or were laid off from developer Intrepid Studios, according to social media posts over the weekend.

Ashes of Creation brought in $3.2 million in Kickstarter funding in the platform’s heyday in 2017, a record for an MMO and the eighth most successful game Kickstarter ever, only just behind Double Fine Adventure and Mighty No. 9. The game launched into Early Access in December to mixed user reviews, and complaints over bugs, performance issues, bots and game systems. A post on the game’s website on January 29th said that work was underway and scheduled a Twitch stream to share the development timeline, but then on January 31st community lead Margaret Krohn revealed that she and “all the dev team” had been laid off via a post on LinkedIn.

Studio founder Steven Sharif, who served as the game’s creative director, subsequently posted on the game’s Discord, giving what he described as “a limited statement in my personal capacity and not on behalf of the company, regarding the situation.” The post was recorded by PC Gamer.

“Control of the company shifted away from me, and the Board began directing actions that I could not ethically agree with or carry out,” wrote Sharif. “As a result, I chose to resign in protest rather than lend my name or authority to decisions I could not ethically support. Following my resignation, much of the senior leadership team resigned. Following those departures, the Board made the decision to issue WARN Act notices and proceed with a mass layoff.”

“I cannot responsibly speak to further details at this time due to ongoing legal and governance matters. What I can say is that the developers and staff acted in good faith and deserved better than the uncertainty they are now facing. I am incredibly dismayed by the situation.”

The game had a development team of about 240, following the laying off of nine staff two weeks ago, which Sherif described at the time as “not a large-scale layoff and not a reflection of the health or future of Ashes of Creation.”

The game has steadily lost players since its Early Access launch, with a current 24-hour peak of 6,599 players according to SteamDB. GameDiscoverCo estimated its sales at 239,000. Intrepid, which was founded in 2015, launched the first of several playable alphas in 2019.