More Funcom cuts
Additional staff put on "forced temporary leave"
Norwegian developers Funcom have cut more staff this week, according to a company statement quoted on American news site Blue's News. An undisclosed number of workers at their US offices have been laid off, while more staff in Scandinavia have been put on "forced temporary leave", an oddity of the Norwegian welfare system whereby the staff remain employees of the company but most of their salary is paid by the government. Similar steps were taken back in December, when about 30 staff were put on leave as Funcom tried to turn around their business after the relatively disappointing launch of their bug-afflicted massively multiplayer game Anarchy Online. Once again Funcom are saying that it's business as usual for Anarchy Online itself, with future patches and a planned add-on pack for the game still on schedule despite the latest round of job cuts. "Subscription numbers for Anarchy Online have been steadily climbing" this year, according to Funcom's statement, and the company is optimistic that they will be able to re-hire most of the staff they've put on leave. The news wasn't so good for the company's Java games division though, with the website (which offered a range of free games) shut down earlier this month after talks aimed at selling the site as a going concern fell through. Meanwhile the company's other massively multiplayer project, the highly promising Midgard, still appears to be on hold as all hands focus on turning around Anarchy Online. Related Feature - Midgard put on hold