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Sony has laid off an unknown number of individuals from its San Diego-based Visual Arts studio as well as PS Studios Malaysia, according to a Kotaku report and testimonies from former employees on LinkedIn.
Per Kotaku, staff were informed earlier this week that March 7 would be their last day, and included developers who had contributed to a number of different projects, such as a recent canceled live-service game at Bend Studio. Visual Arts is an art and technical support studio that has worked over the years with PlayStation’s other first-party studios, most notably the recent The Last of Us Part 1 and 2 remasters.
IGN has identified a number of developers on LinkedIn saying they had been laid off from Visual Arts, as well as at least one from PS Studios Malaysia. One former Visual Arts employee noted that the layoffs were “due to multiple project cancellations.”
This is the second round of layoffs at Visual Arts in the last two years, after another wave impacting an unknown number of individuals in 2023. It is unclear how many people remain at Visual Arts or what the studio is working on now. IGN has reached out to PlayStation for comment.
The layoffs contribute to an ongoing trend of games industry layoffs and project cancellations that’s been reported on since 2023, when it was estimated that over 10,000 game developers were laid off. That number rose to over 14,000 in 2024, and in 2025 the trend has continued, albeit with far hazier numbers due to more studios declining to report the exact number impacted.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can find her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.
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