Flaming Fowl just announced a new deck-building strategy game known as Ironmarked and confirmed the layoffs of the majority of its employees.
The video game developer was founded in 2016 by former members of original Fable developer Lionhead Studios. The company went on a rollercoaster ride in a post on Steam that started off with a reveal of the new game which is a co-op RPG with turn-based combat for one to three players.
Flaming Fowl's Layoffs and Production Hold
(Photo : Flaming Fowl / Screenshot taken from Steam)
Flaming Fowl then followed up by saying that they were forced to lay off the majority of its workers due to the current lack of funding in the games industry.
The company said that it also put production of the newly announced game on hold and was forced to downsize, letting go of some amazing people in the process.
The studio said that despite the layoffs, they were proud of what they were making and wanted to share it with players.
Flaming Fowl noted that it was hoping that the release of the demo could help employees who were let go to secure new roles elsewhere as it demonstrates their outstanding work on the project, according to Eurogamer.
The CEO of the company, Craig Oman, also added more context regarding Ironmarked's shelving and subsequent staff layoffs. He noted that they have been working on the game for more than a year and that their publisher pulled out last year around June.
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Since then, Flaming Fowl has been self-funding since August and has been pitching to other publishers. However, they all said that while the game looks great, they were not looking to sign anything at the moment.
Oman said that when they finished Gloomhaven, all of the offers that they had a year ago meant nothing as the publishers said that they were no longer looking for projects such as that.
The company's inability to secure sufficient funding resulted in layoffs, which caused the previously 30-man team to be whittled to only about nine people.
Funding in the Gaming Industry
Flaming Fowl also asked players to wishlist Ironmarked if they are interested in it as it could help the company re-pitch the game once the gaming industry has somewhat recovered. Oman believes that part of the reason for the issue is that they were a mid-tier size game, said Video Games Chronicles.
They had initially pitched a budget of around $6.2 million but Oman noted that there seemed to be very little opportunity in that ballpark. He added that publishers were either looking to sign stuff for a few hundred thousand or up to the $25 million to $50 million range.
Oman argued that wishlists are a massively important thing for anyone who is trying to launch a game on Steam. He said that it is a metric that can be shown to publishers that provides a clear indication of the market that they can potentially tap into.
Flaming Fowl's Ironmarked is a co-op RPG with turn-based combat that is set in a fantasy world that was inspired by medieval Italy. In it, players hire mercenaries to take on various quests and each has unique gameplay abilities and personalities, according to PCGamer.
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