Developers of anti-capitalist-themed games closed by publisher mere weeks ahead of new release.

The developers of workplace comedy Say No! More and anti-establishment roguelike Reignbreaker are closing down, and the news comes just two weeks before their final punky action game is due to come out. Studio Fizbin has been struck by ongoing cuts at their parent company Thunderful, they say, and despite pitching follow-up projects to work on after Reignbreaker’s release, none of those will go ahead. Which means they’ll be winding down at the exact moment you’d hope they’d be celebrating a payoff from years of work.

“Our parent company Thunderful made the decision to drastically reduce internal development in November 2024, which, as Thunderful’s CEO Martin communicated in the latest quarterly report, also affected Studio Fizbin,” said founder Alexander Pieper in a statement on the studio’s website, as noticed by Gamedeveloper. “Since then, we’ve been exploring various opportunities to work on after finishing Reignbreaker. Unfortunately, none of these projects will move forward, leading us to make this difficult decision.

“This means that Reignbreaker will be Studio Fizbin’s final game.”

Publishers Thunderful recently slashed 80-100 jobs across their studios, and said they’ll now focus on publishing games by outside studios, rather than developing their own. It looks like the full effects of that decision are now being felt.

If you haven’t seen it yet, Reignbreaker is a very purple and black action roguelike about bringing down a tyrannical queen with plenty of spear chuckin’ and upgrade choosin’. When James played its monarch-toppling chaingunnery he noted “flashy isometric fights” and “pausing for a chat with some charismatic, lovingly hand-drawn, likely flirty side character.” Sound familiar? James thought so too. “It’s so very, very Hades,” he said.

As for the theme, it’s a response to the “rise in right-wing authoritarianism all around the world, the growing class divide and exploitation”, according to community manager Ian Stewart. If any of that sounds intriguing, you can play the demo on Steam yourself. The game is due to release on March 18th.

Before this Studio Fizbin made a bunch of games that have been well-liked by RPS staff, such as point and click adventure The Inner World, hand-drawn puzzle platformer Minute Of Islands, and the comedy anti-capitalist refuse ’em up Say No! More which Alice B (RPS in peace) called “short but immensely satisfying”. Here’s a snippet of her thoughts:

It casts universal capitulation as a global, systemic problem, and, at the same time, being realistic and setting boundaries as a path to everyone being healthy and happy. But not in a preachy way. In an absurd way.

Fizbin will spend their remaining time as a studio working to ship the game, says Pieper, as well as providing some post-launch support to Reignbreaker, and supporting workers in finding new work.