Shawn Layden, the former President of Sony Interactive Entertainment America (SIEA), has expressed his disappointment at the closure of Concrete Genie developer PixelOpus over the weekend.
PixelOpus was established back in 2014 during Layden’s newly-appointed role as Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA, before it was rebranded SIE) president, and was formed of students from Carnegie Mellon and San Jose State University.
Layden took to Twitter to express his thoughts on the studio’s closure, which we’ve included below.
Ngl, this is a deep cut. So loved working with this team and watching them level up to deliver the genre busting, Concrete Genie, all while maintaining a culture of support, inclusion, challenge. Now a new adventure awaits. Only the very best to every team member.
While Concrete Genie was released back in 2019, the studio did reveal back in Summer 2021 that it was hiring for an ‘exciting new PS5 game,’ although sadly whatever it had in mind will no longer materialise. Here’s what the job description for the new game said:
We are seeking a Principal Graphics Programmer to contribute to our development process as we tackle exciting innovation and rendering opportunities through a collaboration with Sony Pictures Animation. This position specializes in programming that centers around the graphics functionality of the PlayStation 5 and Unreal 5 game engine, but with our small team, responsibilities will be diverse.
Not only was PixelOpus actively working on a new project, but the studio expanded its staff with the hiring of Mark Vernon only earlier this year.
[Source – Shawn Layden on Twitter via PSLS]