Earlier this month, Microsoft gutted The Elder Scrolls Online, with 379 staff across ZeniMax gone. And this is the second time it's happened in two years. As Harvey and I put it a few weeks ago, ESO's developers deserved better. The developer, now claiming to be the same size it was 10 years ago (similar to id Software), has just debuted ESO's new seasonal structure but will have to continue carving that path with reduced capabilities.
Mere weeks after these layoffs, and we're already seeing their effects. Community manager Kevin Gbolie posted an update on the ESO forums outlining updates to the Crown Store, the game's premium cash shop.
"To help manage workload, we have decided to remove the Web Crown Store from the official elderscrollsonline.com website on Wednesday, July 22," Gbolie explains. "The ability to acquire crowns via the website will remain and, of course, this does not affect the items that will be offered on the Crown Store in The Elder Scrolls Online, you will just need to login into the game to view and purchase the latest offerings."
"Furthermore, for the same reason, the monthly Crown Store Showcase blog will also change."
It's ironic that, to combat the increased workload with fewer staff, ZeniMax has been forced to close the web version of the cash shop (forcing you to log into the game instead) and downsize the monthly promotional blog. It's unclear how the blog specifically will change going forward, but Gbolie notes that "due to team bandwidth … [the blog will] be more list-like than anything else."
In the comments, Gbolie discussed how these blogs were key to building the community Unofficial Elder Scrolls Pages wiki for the game, since they included high-resolution screenshots of items.
"The goal is to provide what we can. Especially because we know folks like UESP do use those shots," Gbolie says. "But to be blunt, the team responsible for the blog and those screenshots doesn't have the capacity to provide those at the scale we could before. But we will provide what we can for now and adjust from there."
It's sad to see Xbox's heavy-handed layoffs not just see ZeniMax's promising Project Blackbird MMO cancelled, but its current game—my most played game of all time—struggling under the pressure too.
