In a move that would make even Agent 47 wince, Xbox has quietly assassinated its funding deal for Project Fantasy - the online fantasy RPG in development at IO Interactive, the studio famous for Hitman and the upcoming 007 First Light. According to Eurogamer, Microsoft has fully pulled out of its publishing agreement, leaving IOI holding the bag on what was shaping up to be a very ambitious side quest.
The fallout is already real and it's not pretty. Layoffs are now on the table at IO Interactive, meaning the people who spent years perfecting the art of disguising yourself as a chef to poison a crime lord are now facing some very un-fun real-world consequences. Nothing like a Microsoft budget review to ruin your whole save file.
Another one bites the dungeon floor
Project Fantasy had been flying under the radar for a while, positioned as IOI's big swing into the online RPG space - a pretty bold move for a studio whose entire identity is basically "you are a bald man, go murder someone elegantly." It sounded genuinely interesting, and now it's in serious jeopardy.
This is unfortunately becoming a familiar pattern in the industry. Xbox has been on a cancellation and studio-closing spree lately that would make even the most hardcore roguelike player rage-quit. IOI joins a growing list of developers who found out the hard way that a Microsoft publishing deal can vanish faster than a disguise in a crowd of NPCs.
So what now for IOI?
The silver lining - if you can call it that - is that IO Interactive still has 007 First Light in active development, which is presumably keeping some lights on at the Copenhagen studio. The James Bond game is one of the more exciting things on the horizon for action-game fans, so here's hoping the layoffs don't gut the team working on it.
As Eurogamer reports, the exact scale of the layoffs hasn't been confirmed yet, which means IOI employees are currently stuck in a horrible waiting room of uncertainty - arguably worse than any Hitman level. Fingers crossed the studio finds a new publisher for Project Fantasy, because losing an original online RPG from the Hitman devs before it even launches would be a critical hit nobody asked for.
