Crytek Shares More Info About Its Current Situation

News
By Kevin Parrish
published

Just days ago, Crytek announced that it was going through a transitional phase after reports surfaced that the studio was in financial trouble and had problems paying the staff. Now the studio has released a "detailed breakdown" that reveals how the company will transfer from a developer to a publisher. The studio emphasizes that its long-term financial status is quite secure, and now it plans to optimize its business.

For starters, Crytek is talking with Koch Media about acquiring the Homefront IP. The deal would see the Homefront team from Crytek's Nottingham studio transferred over to Koch Media in compliance with English law. Once transferred, the Homefront team would continue to work on Homefront: The Revolution. The acquisition deal is expected to be finalized soon.

"The internal restructuring will also see the development of Crytek IP, HUNT: Horrors of the Gilded Age, transferred from their studio in Austin, USA to Frankfurt," the press release stated. "Crytek will retain a presence in Austin, with several staff members maintaining the CRYENGINE support team to assist North American licensees. Employees who are not set to be part of that support team will be invited to apply for new positions at Crytek in Germany."

The company confirmed that it will be business as usual for its Budapest, Istanbul, Kiev and Sofia studios, and Crytek is also currently considering a closer collaboration between its studios in Shanghai and Seoul.

Unnamed sources close to the matter told Kotaku that Crytek USA's senior staff quit over a week ago because they weren't getting paid. Most of the 30 to 35 people from that studio also walked out due to the departure of the senior staff. That meant Crytek was forced to move development of HUNT to the Frankfurt office.

Crytek founder and CEO Cevat Yerli supposedly visited the Austin, Texas-based studio back in May to inform the staff that a bank deal would be in place by June 20th so that they would be paid soon. But when the date had come and gone and the staff still hadn't been paid, many staff members stopped going to work. Most of these former Crytek workers have reportedly landed jobs elsewhere, and most of what Crytek owes its personnel has now been paid.

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Kevin Parrish
7 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Ninjawithagun
    Only one reason Crytek is in financial trouble - corporate greed. Business owners and board members decided to line their pockets with all the profit and let their company go broke. Sad days indeed.
    Reply
  • thechief73
    Only one reason Crytek is in financial trouble - corporate greed. Business owners and board members decided to line their pockets with all the profit and let their company go broke. Sad days indeed.
    And thus you have summarized the fall of the human race. Epitaph - "Here lie's a species that were too greedy to ensure their own survival"
    Reply
  • daekar
    This really boggles my mind. They have one of the best engines out there, a few killer franchises, and some games that redefined what we expect from their genres, and they're broke? WTF? That's some serious mismanagement.
    Reply
  • coolitic
    The only problem with Crytek is that they try to take on too many projects at a time and dont give enough time to each project resulting in many of their games having some flaws and being unfinished.

    However, for the little time they give to each project the efficiency of it is pretty high and many other devs would do a worse job with such little time.
    Reply
  • Draven35
    Crytek finishing all of their projects was likely rooted in the operation of their Kiev studio. I hear there might be problems in the area...
    Reply
  • 10tacle
    Only one reason Crytek is in financial trouble - corporate greed. Business owners and board members decided to line their pockets with all the profit and let their company go broke. Sad days indeed.

    Where is your evidence of the "owners" hoarding all the profits? Or prophets in this case? Also, I'm not sure how it works in Germany, but in the US the salaries of the Board Of Director members in corporations are determined and voted on by the share holders and approved by the CEO. Board members in the US do not determine how much they make and there are laws prohibiting board members from taking any money "under the table." They can sure do it, but if caught, they go to trial and jail. Just ask all those involved with Enron.
    Reply
  • dark_knight33
    Where is your evidence of the "owners" hoarding all the profits? Or prophets in this case? Also, I'm not sure how it works in Germany, but in the US the salaries of the Board Of Director members in corporations are determined and voted on by the share holders and approved by the CEO. Board members in the US do not determine how much they make and there are laws prohibiting board members from taking any money "under the table." They can sure do it, but if caught, they go to trial and jail. Just ask all those involved with Enron.

    A handful of employees from one, just ONE, corrupt corporation went to jail. Of that, the surviving employee had 10 years of his sentence cut off (leaving Skilling with the minimum sentence) by a judge without the insight to see that the point of the long sentence was to punish him for the length of time it would take for most of the employees to recover their retirements. He still leaves jail (now in 2017) a ridiculously wealthy man who will never need to work another day in his life.

    I've been a shareholder in several corporations, and it doesn't work like that. Shareholder votes on executive pay are non-binding, meaning they are considered only a recommendation, with no recourse if they aren't followed. Board & CEO set and approve their own compensation (like congress), that is corruption. Only the majority shareholders, mutual funds most often who are also run by profiteering dirt bags, usually have more sway, but still do nothing because the few in control are profiting enormously at the expense of everyone else.
    Reply