Inside Microsoft’s Xbox turmoil

By Tom Warren , a senior editor covering all things Microsoft, PC, and tech. He founded WinRumors, a site dedicated to Microsoft news, before joining The Verge in 2012.

Just hours after learning that Microsoft was shutting down a number of game studios this week, Dinga Bakaba, head of Microsoft-owned Arkane Lyon, decided to let the company know how he felt about the decision — right in public. “Don’t throw us into gold fever gambits, don’t use us as strawmen for miscalculations / blind spots, don’t make our work environments Darwinist jungles,” Bakaba wrote on X.

Bakaba, whose studio wasn’t impacted by the layoffs this week, said his message was aimed at “any executive reading this,” including the Xbox leaders behind the latest wave of layoffs. It was a rare public display of criticism, but sources at Microsoft tell me it reflects a growing discontent and fear among Xbox employees about what comes next.

Microsoft’s latest round of layoffs shocked both employees and fans. Arkane Austin’s big Redfall update was on the way with a new offline mode, and the DLC was being worked on just hours before the studio was closed.

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