Star Wars Zero Company: Bit Reactor brings furloughed developers back – but not all

TVS News AI, editorially supervised, presents Star Wars Zero Company: Bit Reactor brings furloughed developers back – but not all.

When Bit Reactor released Star Wars: Zero Company, the response was massive: on Steam the game shot straight to number 1 in the global sales charts after launch, racked up 84 percent positive reviews, and scored 85 points on Metacritic. But the triumph came too late for the workforce: shortly beforehand, around 80 percent of employees had been placed on unpaid furlough.

Now the tide is turning – if only for part of the team. As GameStar and several other trade outlets report in agreement, Bit Reactor is bringing most of the laid-off developers back to the workplace and putting them back on the payroll. According to XboxDynasty, more than half of the former workforce is being paid again. GameStar makes one thing unmistakably clear in its headline: not everyone is coming back.

How the layoffs came about in the first place is described by Eurogamer: due to massive financial shortfalls and a bitter legal dispute between the founders, Bit Reactor had sent the bulk of its developers on unpaid furlough. According to IGN, only a small remaining group stayed on during this phase to fix any post-launch bugs – the vast majority had to make do without a paycheck despite the imminent release.

What is known so far about the return

Several independent reports paint a consistent picture. GameStar writes that most of the furloughed employees are being brought back to the workplace. PlayStationInfo reports that parts of the team have returned and are being paid again. XboxDynasty writes that Bit Reactor is bringing numerous furloughed developers back. What specifically moved the studio to reactivate part of its workforce right now, and which employees remain left out, is not clear from the available reports.

What this means for you

For you as a player, this primarily means: with more staff working on the game full-time again, the chances of faster patches and possible additional content go up. For the employees who are not being called back, the situation remains open – none of the reports provide details or a statement from Bit Reactor.