Realtime Worlds “fully committed” to APB, confirms redundancies

Friday, 13th August 2010 16:48 GMT By Patrick Garratt


Following rumours this morning that Realtime Worlds had laid of the MyWorld team and had warned of cuts to APB, the Scottish developer has issued a statement confirming lay-offs but saying the MMO will remain fully operational.

“Further to the press release issued on the 7th July announcing the post-launch restructure for APB and expected redundancies, the 30-day consultation period with the affected staff has ended. The supporting infrastructure for a game inevitably changes once released, and those staff that couldn’t be redeployed to new projects in the Art, Audio, Coding, Design, Production, and QA departments have regrettably been made redundant,” said RTW in a just-issued statement.

“APB continues to be our primary development focus, and we remain fully committed to the game and its players.”

The exact number of redundancies was not confirmed.

Drastic cuts

The lay-off story broke this morning when a source told VG247: “The MyWorld team has been completely laid off.

“As many as 60 may have gone, but there’s a rumour they may be trying to sell the team as a smaller entity. I don’t know the exact figure.”

An email was apparently sent to staff yesterday saying there could be drastic cuts made to newly-launched crime MMO APB.

Rumours are circulating that the Scottish developer is seeking to sell on APB entirely. VG247 has been told today that the company has spent more than $100 million in total.

MyWorld, a project that looked like a cross between social networks and LittleBigPlanet, was only announced on July 28, while APB launched in late June in the US and early July in Europe.

“Skeleton staff”

VG247 poster Massiveslag appeared to confirm the news this morning, warning that APB’s staff count was to shrink.

“As of 11:30 GMT Realtime Worlds have put a large proportion on their workforce on gardening leave ranging from 4-8 weeks,” he said.

“APB’s staff will be reduced to admin and a skeleton staff of devs and artists to keep it running and do general updates, but this looks like the end of RTW.”

Rumours have circled all week that RTW had gone bust, following hints from sources that the studio had reached a critical point in terms of funding.

Breaking news


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  1. DJ Deathstar

    WTF wasn’t MyWorld only announced a couple of weeks ago?

    #1 4 years ago
  2. Retroid

    APB really not going well, then?

    #2 4 years ago
  3. Crysis

    wow, was the game THAT bad? i know they spent a quite the fuckload on it..

    #3 4 years ago
  4. Abstract Poster

    What a shame. What a waste :(

    #4 4 years ago
  5. Erthazus

    I figured out that it was that bad when i played the beta.

    Played for 30 minutes and after that: Game is total shit.

    #5 4 years ago
  6. Massiveslag

    I must say I think it was a far too ambitious project for a fledgling studio. The MMO space is far too competitive for new kids on the block and RTW have paid the price for over reaching.

    #6 4 years ago
  7. Dannybuoy

    All Persons Booted

    #7 4 years ago
  8. Droid

    The only good part was the character/vehicle customisation. Think I spent most the time on that in the beta as the other gameplay was very boring. They constantly said they were adding more to it but it never materialised. Yes I think their ideas were too big for their small team. Lets hope other mmo’s add similar massive customisation options into newer games.

    #8 4 years ago
  9. Kerplunk

    Good luck to those now looking for employment elsewhere.

    I expect Ruffian’s phone will be ringing quite a lot today.

    #9 4 years ago
  10. Suikoden Fan

    i think microsoft should buy the company if this is happening to safe guard the crackdown games. Or sony to start a crackdown type game for themselves. i mean this in the sense that the company seems to need the money either side could give

    #10 4 years ago
  11. Zonejeu

    Any official answer from RTW ?

    #11 4 years ago
  12. Massiveslag

    #12 4 years ago
  13. Hunam

    RTW are a bit more than just crackdown. It’s a shame to see this happen though.

    #13 4 years ago
  14. LOLshock94

    why is everyone saying that ruffian and realtime are friends?? is it because ruffian made crackdown2????? if so then that means nothing

    #14 4 years ago
  15. Yoshi

    APB isnt that bad. It’s like a chair without legs, sure its fun but it needs the legs to keep lasting.

    #15 4 years ago
  16. DrDamn

    Ruffian was formed partly by ex-RTW employees wasn’t it?

    #16 4 years ago
  17. Suikoden Fan

    @DrDamn, yes they are. As for my earlier comment, i mean thst rtw made the better of the 2 crackdown games and they should be bought to safeguard the franchise

    #17 4 years ago
  18. Grimrita

    Jesus. I’ve a couple of friends working there. Why on earth does this kind of stuff happen? Are publishers squeezing developers too much, or are developers just writing blank cheques?!

    #18 4 years ago
  19. Psychotext

    Another brit developer bites the dust. =/

    #19 4 years ago
  20. Phoenixblight

    ” developers just writing blank cheques”

    Maybe you are confused but developers don’t write the checks the publishers do.

    This always happens especially when a game doesn’t do as well as expected. Its not like they’re Blizzard or Bioware and do so well they keep every one.

    #20 4 years ago
  21. Grimrita

    @ 20
    No I dont mean to spend on PR/marketing etc – thats publishers. I mean do developer spend beyond their own means – ie hiring too many folk, wasting money on stuff they might not need.

    MMOs are a huge investment and trying to create a new brand in such a risky environment can only end in tears(in most cases)

    #21 4 years ago
  22. DrDamn

    Seems this MyWorld stuff was developed without having a proper backer for it – the recent reveal was likely a last gasp attempt to try and get more funding. That seems to be the crux of it. That and APB not being as well received as they would like.

    #22 4 years ago
  23. KrazyKraut

    lol..AAA is Gold, everything else not anymore…..

    #23 4 years ago
  24. Phoenixblight


    From what I understand they put a budget on them and say you can’t go past this limit and if the developer wants to focus on hiring people more than the game, they can, especially if you want to piss them off.

    #24 4 years ago
  25. Grimrita

    well – either way, I hope that they all can find jobs quickly.

    #25 4 years ago
  26. rainer

    Wow terrible news for everyone at Realtime Worlds.

    It was very silly though to bet the entire farm on an MMO, the games industry is littered with failed companies that did exactly this time and time again.

    #26 4 years ago
  27. Abstract Poster


    You’re confused. RTW is not a developer, it’s a publisher with developers in house.

    There is no publisher.

    The money they’ve burnt through they raised from investors.

    This is the story of a publisher running out of cash, not a developer mispending the money they got from their publisher.

    #27 4 years ago
  28. Robo_1

    From the RTW forums:

    “As we”ve announced we had to restructure the company to make it so that we can focus totally on APB.

    APB is still going strong and we fully intend to support 100%. In fact we have a cool announcement coming this afternoon, so keep your eyes peeled”

    Does anyone know how APB has actually done?

    Sad times either way, best wishes to those effected.

    #28 4 years ago
  29. Patrick Garratt

    @28 – Do you have a link to that post?

    #29 4 years ago
  30. Robo_1

    I got it from the GAF:

    Edit: Ah, found you the original:

    #30 4 years ago
  31. mington

    You should change the picture to this:×768/fond-ecran-nelson-des-simpsons.jpg

    …and we can both go to hell together :P

    #31 4 years ago
  32. Callum

    A real shame. APB didn’t live up to my expectations, it wasn’t a bad game, but lets me honest it wasn’t a great game either. Prehaps they should have focused on something smaller and produced a more polished and fine tuned experience? We will never know.

    #32 4 years ago
  33. Old MacDonald

    Another failed MMO. That genre is a deathtrap, I wish devs would have the sense to just stay the hell away.

    #33 4 years ago
  34. frostquake

    Fully Committed…My Ass….Don’t waste your money on this is truly a lost cause. Servers will begin to slowly disappear. I told them all along they should have focused on Crack Down 2. Instead they did APB and we get a Crappy Pay for Play Cops and Robbers and a HORRIBLE CRACK DOWN 2!!!!

    #34 4 years ago
  35. DSB

    When you make a game as inexcusably bad as APB, your company is gonna be in a really bad place.

    With no one wanting to fund MyWorld, it sounds to me like their only chance of survival is someone coming along and buying up the company.

    Judging from the (presumably) insider posts on Develop, people are definitely in panic mode.

    #35 4 years ago