"A Traumatizing Experience." Indie Devs Speak Out on Humble Games Layoffs.

On July 23, publisher Humble Games laid off its entire staff, in a move it referred to as “restructuring.” Inverse has reported out the effects of what former employees say amounted to a closure as operations were handed off to The Powell Group, a consultancy. Over the last week, several developers with titles published by Humble Games reported being unable to update their own games on consoles. Confusion over the fate of Humble Games’ catalog remains, though some developers tell Inverse that they’re confident that future releases under the label won’t be impacted.

“When you make a deal with a publisher, you do it because of the people that work there. You trust their ability to sell and market your game,” Tiani Pixel, co-founder of Unsighted developer Studio Pixel Punk, tells Inverse. “If they're all gone, your contract was for nothing. You risk losing years of your life as an indie dev, because you trusted this publisher.”

Humble Games did not respond to Inverse’s request for comment.

Studio Pixel Punk’s most recent game, Unsighted, was published by Humble Games in 2021. Because the game has been out for several years and no longer receives regular updates, Pixel says, “We're in a somewhat comfortable position, and all that Humble was doing was managing the store pages.”

Other developers weren’t so lucky. Stairway Games was the first developer to publicly share its fears over the future of its games. In a social media post two days after the layoffs, the studio wrote, “The impact of Humble Games’ restructuring on Coral Island remains uncertain for all things related to consoles, whether porting or hotfixes, as they are responsible for these platforms.”

During Coral Island’s Kickstarter campaign, it accepted pledges for the Nintendo Switch version of the game, which it now says it’s unsure it will be able to release, and is offering a switch to the Steam version for anyone who backed the campaign for the Switch. Stairway also said that it was preparing to release a hotfix for the game’s 1.1 update, but that Steam is the only platform where it can update its game without the help of Humble Games. Since then, Coral Island has received the hotfix on Steam, but not elsewhere.

Stairway Games did not respond to Inverse’s request for comment.

Aside from studios being unable to update recently released games, there’s concern from some that future releases will also be affected. As Pixel tells Inverse, “the most concerning part is what is going to happen to recently released games, or games that are still in the release pipeline.”

Not every developer working with Humble Games on an upcoming games shares that concern, though.

“I’m not privy to the decision making within Humble, but I'm comfortable stating that Monaco 2 won't be affected by the layoffs,” Andy Schatz, studio director for Monaco 2 developer Pocketwatch Games, tells Inverse.

“I did have some close relationships with folks that were laid off and I'd go to bat for them any day,” Schatz adds. “I also believe the teams that Humble brought in to bring Monaco 2 to market are professional and care about launching a successful game.”

Dead Mage, developer of Wizard of Legend, has also been unaffected so far, but is less clear on the release of its upcoming sequel, calling the layoffs “unprecedented and strange.”

“It is a bit too soon for us to understand the effects on Wizard of Legend 2,” studio director Amir Fassihi tells Inverse. “We'll know more in the coming weeks. Not being able to collaborate with the people at Humble who really cared about this game is a huge loss for our team.”

It’s also unclear what the future holds for the new iteration of Humble Games beyond titles already in the pipeline. Studio Pixel Punk’s followup to Unsighted, Abyss X Zero, doesn’t have a publisher yet, and Pixel says it’s pursuing new publishers, “but we are also considering self-publishing. This situation will surely change how we approach deals moving forward.”

As mass layoffs have become an increasingly common occurrence in the games industry, Humble Games shows how one company’s failures can impact far more than its own employees. But a growing push toward unionization is putting power back in workers’ hands at the same time, and there’s some hope that developers can likewise claim some protection from another situation like what’s unfolding at Humble Games.

“This has been a traumatizing experience for many devs, and hopefully in the future we'll be able to create more protections against this kind of situation when making deals with publishers,” Pixel says. “It's truly an unprecedented situation, and I hope this isn't the start of a new trend.”