Metal: Hellsinger studio The Outsiders is closing as part of Funcom's post-Dune: Awakening layoffs

Ten years after it was founded, Metal: Hellsinger studio The Outsiders is closing. The news was delivered by studio founder and creative director David Goldfarb, who said in a message posted to Bluesky that the studio has fallen victim to the Funcom layoffs announced last week.

"I have not had much time to process the news but all of us at The Outsiders and Funcom Stockholm have been affected by the layoffs at Funcom and our 10-year-old studio will be closing," Goldfarb wrote. "Many of us had survived a near-death studio experience years back when Darkborn was cancelled, and because of this team's loyalty and refusal to quit, Metal: Hellsinger was born. It will always be a high point for me personally and I will be forever grateful we got to make it and for the wonderful team and partnerships that made it happen."

Darkborn was originally announced in 2016 as Project Wight, but after a grisly gameplay reveal in 2019, the project was effectively cancelled in 2020. The studio got a new lease on life with the rhythm shooter Metal: Hellsinger, which arrived in 2022 and carries an "overwhelmingly positive" rating on Steam.

Goldfarb alluded to something new in the works in the closure announcement, writing that "we had hoped to do something even better this time." And while "things don't always go the way you hope," it's not necessarily the end of the line: "We are not giving up and will do our damnedest to continue on in some new form."

Goldfarb didn't say how many people are losing their jobs as a result of the closure, but the Funcom website says its Stockholm team consisted of about 60 people. Funcom announced the layoffs last week, just a few months after the launch of Dune: Awakening, which it described as "the biggest release we’ve had in our 32-year long history of making great games," a statement it made while simultaneously telling a lot of the people who worked on it that they don't have jobs anymore.