Popcap, the EA-owned game studio behind Plants vs. Zombies, has just laid off a number of employees, Kotaku has learned.
One source pegs the cuts at 30-40 people, and we hear the company has been gradually laying people off for the past year. EA won't confirm the number, but they did send over a statement attributed to PopCap general manager John Vechey:
The changes we made today at PopCap were painful and we're sorry to lose some of our friends and colleagues. But it was also necessary in order to stay on course with our future plans for mobile games, live services, and new IP. PopCap is a studio that made its name building great games that the world can fall in love with, and that's what we'll continue to do.
Last month, Popcap released Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare for Xbox 360 and Xbox One to solid reviews. Last year, they released Plants vs. Zombies 2, the free-to-play sequel to their 2009 tower defense hit.
The author of this post can be reached at jason@kotaku.com or on Twitter at @jasonschreier.
DISCUSSION
Just once, I want to see a "we laid off a bunch of people at our studio... and helped them set up a brand new studio, while we hired a huge batch of new talent to train in the ways of great game making! While we're sad to see our friends go, they've got a great foundation to build more games. Our mission, as always, is to get more voices in the industry, and what better way to do that than by letting some of our up and coming stars take over their own company?"
That would be cool.