Spellcasters Chronicles Took 8 Years to Make, Quantic Dream to Lay Off Up to 95 Employees – Rumor

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After Quantic Dream announced it was cancelling its multiplayer game, Spellcasters Chronicles, and restructuring the company, the Paris-based game workers union, Syndicat des Travailleureuses du Jeu Video (STJV), reported that up to 95 employees will be laid off. The union criticized the company’s planning, stating that the project, initially intended to be manageable, took eight years to reach the early access stage.

STJV has pointed out several warning signs regarding the project over time. They stated that management seemed overly optimistic about the success of Spellcasters Chronicles, relying on the leadership team’s “30 years of experience.”

As a big fan, I was really surprised to read the details about this game’s development. Apparently, it started eight years ago with Guillaume de Fondaumière, David Cage, and Grégorie Diaconu leading the charge, and it was originally meant to be a smaller project with an earlier release date. What’s frustrating is that nobody ever really looked at how the game would actually make money. It sounds like really poor management led to endless revisions, completely burning out the team and ultimately leading to a really messy production.

Predictably, the project’s failure comes as no surprise. Worker representatives repeatedly warned about the significant risks involved. Management confidently told employees that Spellcasters Chronicles was guaranteed to succeed, citing their own thirty years of experience. However, they dismissed any alternative possibilities and refused to create contingency plans when speaking with the workers’ council. They simply didn’t consider the possibility of failure – a clear lack of foresight that has now led to this outcome, and workers are ultimately bearing the consequences of poor management decisions.

The union, along with management, believes NetEase, a shareholder in Quantic Dream, is also responsible. This is largely because NetEase rushed the cancellation of Spellcasters Chronicles and didn’t provide enough marketing support when the game launched.

STJV has concluded its discussions with Quantic Dream by outlining a series of demands. The most pressing is a halt to all planned layoffs. The union also requests that the team currently working on Spellcasters Chronicles be moved to the Star Wars Eclipse project, as no new projects are currently planned for them. Additionally, STJV is asking for employees to be promoted to higher positions with improved rights and protections, and for those in management and leadership to take accountability for the project’s failure and step down from their roles immediately.

Spellcasters Chronicles, released in October 2025, is a game where players become powerful spellcasters and compete in 3-versus-3 player-versus-player battles. Players can cast spells and command armies filled with fantastical creatures like dragons and skeletons. The game features over 50 different spells and creatures to summon.

Players who already own Spellcasters Chronicles can still play it until the game’s servers are turned off on June 19th. However, new players won’t be able to purchase or play the game, as it has been removed from the Steam store.

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2026-05-21 17:12