You just can't win—despite Ghost of Yōtei selling millions of copies, 24 people are reportedly being let go from Sucker Punch

As we've noted before on this very site, there really is just no winning in the videogame industry, particularly under current conditions. Make an unsuccessful game? Make the kind of game you didn't want to make, but were pressured into? Layoffs. Make a successful game? Layoffs. Currently making a game? Believe it or not, layoffs.

As is the case with Ghost of Yōtei developer sucker punch, which has reportedly—per an internal email sent to Aftermath and confirmations from an ex-employee to the site—been hit with 24 layoffs, around a 10% reduction in staff.

This is despite the fact that Ghost of Yōtei, the studio's most recent game, was a commercial success: It sold 3.3 million copies in its opening month, making it the 11th-best selling game in the US in 2025. It continued to rake in the cash, hopping over 5 million copies in just a handful of months.

The email itself reads: "After carefully observing the challenges in the market and reviewing the team needs for our next project, we've decided to make some staffing reductions. Several positions across Sucker Punch will be eliminated as a result.

"We know this is a lot to take in, and we want to assure you that we did not make this decision lightly. We have given this a lot of attention and worked to support our affected colleagues during this transition as well as we can. … There's no getting around that this is a hard day. Next week we will go into more details about the future."

In—and I want to wrap this word up in air quotes here—fairness to Sony here, challenges in the market have been absolutely miserable. An AI bubble has sent everything tits-up for the foreseeable future, games are getting far more expensive to make, outpacing the prices at which they're sold, and Covid-19 overhiring didn't help.

And yet, part of me thinks you should be able to make a nearly top-10 selling videogame and probably be secure in your job for, like, a year at the very least. This doesn't smack as a sign of a healthy industry. Besides, it's not like you're seeing Sony's executive staff taking a pay cut.