{"id":791738,"date":"2026-07-29T17:35:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T17:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/791738\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T17:35:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T17:35:08","slug":"the-ambitious-open-world-cyberpunk-action-game-troy-baker-was-working-on-gets-hit-with-mass-layoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/791738\/","title":{"rendered":"The Ambitious Open-World Cyberpunk Action Game Troy Baker Was Working On Gets Hit With Mass Layoff"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bad news for Lightspeed LA, the developers working on Last Sentinel,<\/a> a sci-fi game set in a futuristic Tokyo which first garnered attention with a reveal trailer<\/a> at the 2023 Game Awards. IGN reports<\/a> that the Irvine-based studio has decided on a shift in developmental direction for its cyberpunk-inspired open-world action game in order to \u201cdeliver the experience players expect.\u201d According to reporting in GamesBeat<\/a>, the studio will lay off 80 members of staff, but says\u00a0that it will remain open and that development on Last Sentinel will continue.<\/p>\n

Lightspeed LA is the US-based subsidiary of Lightspeed Games, one of Tencent games\u2019 numerous subsidiaries best known for its work developing mobile games including PUBG Mobile. Tencent opened Lightspeed LA in 2020, and in 2023 the studio debuted the trailer for Last Sentinel, billing the game as a AAA narrative experience for PC and console. In 2024, Lightspeed LA added a bit of video game star power to Last Sentinel, bringing on Troy Baker as the game\u2019s performance director<\/a>. However, according to a statement from Lightspeed shared with IGN, it seems that after internal review, Last Sentinel wasn\u2019t living up to expectations, forcing the team to pivot and requiring layoffs. \u201cWe are treating affected team members with compassion and respect, offering comprehensive support and where possible the opportunity to transfer internally,\u201d the studio wrote in its statement to IGN.<\/p>\n

Other Tencent subsidiaries are having a tough time as their parent company seems to be slowly pulling back on some of its gaming investments worldwide.<\/a>\u00a0Earlier this year, TiMi Montreal shut down<\/a> five years after it opened its doors and without releasing a single game. Back in 2023, Tencent also closed the LA-based Team Kaiju<\/a>, shuttering its unannounced project as well. But while Tencent seems to be closing some doors, it\u2019s opening other, much bigger doors by investing 1.25 billion dollars in Ubisoft,<\/a> potentially paving the way for a possible acquisition of the embattled publisher in the future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bad news for Lightspeed LA, the developers working on Last Sentinel, a sci-fi game set in a futuristic…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":791739,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[336521,2539,74,35401,336522],"class_list":["post-791738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-last-sentinel","tag-layoffs","tag-technology","tag-tencent","tag-troy-baker"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=791738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/791738\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/791739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=791738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=791738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=791738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}