“Unlike anything I’ve taken on before” — The heads of this canceled Xbox game join Take-Two to make a new 2K developer after Microsoft killed their studio

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Just a reminder that Microsoft cut around 9,000 jobs earlier this year in July, impacting teams across the company, including Xbox and its game development studios.

Several projects were cancelled as part of cost-cutting measures. These included Rare’s Everwild, a new online game from ZeniMax Online, and the reboot of Perfect Dark. The studio developing Perfect Dark, The Initiative, was also closed down, along with its collaboration with Crystal Dynamics.

Last September, reports surfaced that Take-Two Interactive, the company behind 2K, attempted to acquire Perfect Dark from Microsoft. Unfortunately, the deal didn’t happen because they couldn’t determine who actually owned the rights to the game. Shortly after, Crystal Dynamics experienced layoffs – the second time in 2025, with a third round coming in November.

Although Take-Two Interactive wasn’t able to acquire the rights to *Perfect Dark*, I’ve learned they *did* manage to hire two key people who worked on the game. They brought on Darrell Gallagher, who led The Initiative studio, and Brian Horton, the creative director.

Gallagher is now a senior vice president at 2K and leads a newly formed development team. Horton is vice president and creative head at this new studio.

Gallagher revealed on LinkedIn that he’s joining 2K as Senior Vice President and Studio Head. He’ll be leading a new studio and tackling a particularly challenging and exciting project, as initially reported by Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier.

Throughout my career, I’ve always been driven by the power of talented people uniting around an ambitious goal. That’s why I’m so excited to join the incredible team at 2K! And I understand David Horton was also pleased to share and confirm this news – it’s a great moment for everyone.

Prior to establishing The Initiative in 2018, Gallagher was a Senior Vice President and led development at Activision (when it was still an independent company). During his time there, he helped launch several popular games, including titles in the Call of Duty series, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice from FromSoftware, and Destiny 2.

Prior to this role, he worked at Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics, where he helped develop several Tomb Raider games, Just Cause 3, Life is Strange, and other popular titles.

I remember when Ted Horton was the creative director for both the *Marvel’s Spider-Man* game and the *Miles Morales* sequel. He’s also been working on the next big project, *Marvel’s Wolverine*, which I’m really excited about.

Prior to his current role, Horton worked as a studio and creative director on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Remastered at Infinity Ward. He also has experience at studios like Crystal Dynamics and the now-defunct Disney Interactive Studios, as well as several other teams.

We currently have no information about the studio Gallagher and Horton are creating with 2K Games, or what game(s) they will be developing. It’s possible they might create a stealth-based first-person shooter similar to Perfect Dark, but this is just a guess at this point.

I’m really hoping for this, particularly because it’s been a difficult 25 years since the first Joanna Dark game came out.

I’m just glad to see Gallagher and Horton have found new work after the studio closure. I also hope everyone else who was affected at The Initiative has been able to find new opportunities.

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2025-12-09 22:40