One hundred people lost their jobs today because Midway would rather punish failure than nurture mistakes, and reward stockholders instead of develop their resources.

Okay, we get it. You don't like Midway's games. But it's their business strategy that cost jobs this morning. Hopefully whatever CEO they put in place to replace the iterim prez has the sense to see what a mistake this round of layoffs was - and how much it will cost them in the long run.

Tonx

@zanzibarlegend:
Nice analogy. LOL

DigitalHero

@DigitalHero: exactly.

i dunno midway is like that poor old boxer having a mid-life crisis, trying to punch his way outta mediocrity, only to find himself punching bags of meat, wishing he were the italion stallion.

sad sight.

zanzibarlegend

It's always a sad thing to see a game get canceled..regardless of it's quality

PaPa Bear

If a tree falls on Midway and nobody cares, does it matter?

Any IPs that have any chance of making money will be grabbed by EA.

It is nice that Midway is being put out of their suffering finally, though.

BoringJob

Saw this coming. Just look at their past projects. Stranglehold anyone?

DigitalHero

Companies cancel projects all the time without needing to shit-can all the employees that had their name attached to it. Midway wasn't disappointed with the "Criminal" game, they were disappointed with the team.

It's sad that they sacked so much talent because the dev team directors had no direction. Luckilly, I'm sure other developer teams will snatch up the newly-available talent on the market. Good luck to all those who received their pink slips this morning.

Except for the heads of the Austin team, that is. Looks like it's their fault a hundred people are losing their jobs.

Tonx

TNA: Impact, Blitz: The League II, and MK vs. DC is their Holiday lineup. That's considered strong?

Midway even acknowledges themselves in that press release that MK vs. DC will only sell well because of the DC license, not anything special they do to it. And the other 2 games will probably have a hard time getting a combined rating of 9, let alone individually.

If that's Midway's "strong" lineup, I'd be prepared for more lay-offs next year.

mva5580

@ranchhand: Hmm, so long possible yet unlikely innovation?

chuffhoncho

They have a standard for quality games?

[www.metacritic.com]

Give me a fucking break.

DaPress

@chuffhoncho: so long innovation? um. what innovation?

ranchhand

Too bad for the people who worked there. But Midway is just shit these days I'm sorry. The more memorable titles they merely published in the past are Unreal Tournament 3 and...Unreal Tournament 3.

@SG79: Burn :D

Candlejack

@SG79: There's another few parallels that I could draw between Air Canada and Midway, too - such as undelivered promises of quality of services rendered...

beantastic!

I never did care for Midway. Hydro Thunder was the only good thing to come out of them.

Adrock4

Midway says that the decision will "allow Midway to maximize its development resources and apply manpower and capital to projects with the highest chances of success."

In other words, so long innovation. Hello sequels!

chuffhoncho

wow, that is really sucky, i wonder what made them ax the game?

Gfunksnow

Midway reminds me of Air Canada. Regardless of how the economy is, they always manage to make extremely poor management decisions that ultimately lead to layoffs.

SG79

@Sustenance: Well put, sir. I'd rather see a piece of shit die on the vine than be plucked and offered to gamers as the next coming of Christ.

DaPress

@zanzibarlegend:
Dammit, its time to put it back then. Everyone keeps asking about it. :D

DigitalHero

@Sustenance: Agree completely. It's FAR better to cut a bad game early than crap something out and ruin any credibility as a studio hoping enough people will buy a game to recoup a little of the loss. Plus, you put 5 million more into a game that's already cost you 15M to make it fun, it's that much harder to recoup. Midway made a very hard but ultimately good decision for the future of the company IMO. This is par for the course among many large publishers right now. Everyone is tightening their belt.

benderbendingrodriguez

@Gfunksnow: From what Midway employees have told me, Criminal was absolutely awful. Terrible gameplay and they couldn't get it to run well at all. They basically butchered it to an unrecognizable abomination of what it's original concept was. I heard nothing good of it other than it looked good graphically.

ps360blows

@DigitalHero: Thanks!
by the way, i'm already missing your old avatar.

*plays "Chrono's Theme" in Itunes in respect.*

zanzibarlegend

See, this is exactly what I'm talking about. How much time and people-power was wasted on this thing before someone had the guts to pull the plug?

Most of the time, NO ONE pulls the plug, and then you, the gamer, are forced to consume the carcass.

Sustenance

Another developer saying "fuck the original IPs."

William "Killer" Shatner

I wonder if Harvey Smith got the axe? I remember watching that Warren Spector lecture/interview with him, and I got the impression that when they brought him on well into the process of Blacksite: Area 51 (Austin's last project), that he felt that there was only so much he could do to try and save the project. Considering it still bombed, that doesn't say much about Midway Austin...

Putter5

@DigitalHero: yay for democracy! it was no broken, so why fix it? :D

zanzibarlegend

Midway has been at death's door for years now. I feel for the people that lost their jobs today, but at the same time what can you expect from a company that's STILL losing money.

weasl

I hope some of you lose your jobs.

Dalren

@Dalren: "I hope some of you lose your jobs."

were not blaming employees, but the guys in the suits callin the shots. take it easy there, nobody on here needs to lose their job, especially how horrible the economy is in the US.

zanzibarlegend

You know what's really eeiry? I had a dream last night about getting shitcanned from my software development position. Luckily I don't work for Midway...

PissedPS3Fan

No doubt that this is simply another way for the majority stake shareholders to gain greater profit at the expense of the company, as what happened when they closed Australia and San Diego.

Should be laws against that kind of thing...

FunkyJ

Dudes, this is just the beginning of layoffs for midway. Lets see, 90 employees, average salary $50k/year, equals roughly $4.5 million. Once they look at a few of the other studios, especially the Chicago one and see all the dead weight, mismanagement and absolutely terrible games, they'll be flying some heads there too! This company has been on the downward path for quite sometime, and if this company is seriously going to try and survive this generation, they will need a major house cleaning. I'm not glad at all that people had to lose their jobs, but honestly I wouldn't care if midway was gone for good, they suck.

jackassjackson

Midway in today reminds me of Acclaim back in my childhood. Occaisional flashes of merit that stuck out like pieces of corn among a seemingly constant stream of shit.

jackassjackson hit the nail on the head. This company is collapsing under the weight of its own overhead. Always sad to see jobs lost in the process, but if Midway hopes to last another ten years, they need to re-evaluate their entire business model from the ground up, and probably trim more fat.

Jonaconda

Typical fucking suits. 'we feel it was the right thing to do for the future of Midway'. What about what's right for the people who put in all the hours and work and have now got to look for something else? As a coder who's been given the shaft by a company in the past, I hate people like this. Shareholders and directors don't make you fucking money, the people who live behind the keyboards do and you've just bent over 90 of them. The company doesn't deserve to survive.

shufflemoomin

That sucks, I feel for the people who got axed. I was laid off just a week ago, as were a couple of my friends.

Madriker

A crime game called Criminal? GENIUS!

Pablos102030

Sounds like somebody borrowed the Activision playbook.

null_unit

@ps360blows: You, my friend.... are completely correct. According to my NDA Kotaku's public announcement of "Criminal" has effectively released us from our NDAs.... I think..... But yes, the game was (in my opinion) shit and some of us who had the recent chance of working on the project can firmly state that the game was marred with poor design, bad plot, weak at best game play and the graphics where honestly great when it was thought up 4 years ago. But by today's standards lacked seriously. I will obviously miss my very brief tenure, though short, with Midway, but I cannot fault them for canceling a game that became a waste of money months ago and would have been a commercial failure upon release.

CochiseFugue

Gee... one less "free-roaming crime game" on the market. Darn, I was really looking forward to it, too.

Nate128

@ps360blows: you, my friend.... are completely correct. According to my NDA Kotaku's public announcement of "Criminal" has effectively released us from our NDAs.... I think..... But yes, the game was (in my opinion) shit and some of us who had the recent chance of working on the project can firmly state that the game was marred with poor design, bad plot, weak at best game play and the graphics where honestly great when it was thought up 4 years ago. But by today's standards lacked seriously. I will obviously miss my tenure, though short, with Midway, but I cannot fault them for canceling a game that became a waste of money months ago and would have been a commercial failure upon release.

EXMIDWAY

@ps360blows: You, my friend.... are completely correct. According to my NDA Kotaku's public announcement of "Criminal" has effectively released us from our NDAs.... I think..... But yes, the game was (in my opinion) shit and some of us who had the recent chance of working on the project can firmly state that the game was marred with poor design, bad plot, weak at best game play and the graphics where honestly great when it was thought up 4 years ago. But by today's standards lacked seriously. I will obviously miss my tenure, though short, with Midway, but I cannot fault them for canceling a game that became a waste of money months ago and would have been a commercial failure upon release.

EXMIDWAY

@Adrock4: dont forget NBA Jam!

mixem

"our strong holiday line-up which includes TNA iMPACT!, Blitz: The League II, and Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe"

Three gritty action titles with two carrying an M rating and two being fighters. Way to diversify your lineup, Midway! I guess someone did not give Mr. Booty the memo that success of a media company rests on having a products that are, you know, dissimilar.

It's astonishing that Redstone has not bought the rest of Midway and created a games division for Paramount. It is not as if the Midway name carries much value these days.

advertised as poetry

Glad to see he was able to pimp Midway's holiday lineup and not make light of the situation.

SuperMoof