Cyan Worlds Inc. is arguably most famous for creating Myst. The adventure puzzler allowed gamers to play in 2D and VR. Over the weekend, the studio confirmed it is laying off twelve people, or around half of the entire team.
Myst
“Today we would like to share with you some very unfortunate news,” read the message shared by the studio’s creative director Eric Anderson. “Despite our best efforts to avoid it, Cyan has made the difficult decision to reduce our overall staff size—resulting in the layoff of twelve talented staff members…effective at the end of March.”
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“Industry conditions have forced us into tricky spot where we are having to weigh the future health of our studio against the month-to-month realities of game development in 2025. Throughout the past year, we have been ultra-transparent with the entire Cyan team about the choppy waters we find ourselves in, as well as the dangers ahead.”
According to the message shared by Cyan leadership, the team already expected the layoffs—although it doesn’t make it less sad for everyone. Perhaps, that explains why we couldn’t find a post containing outbursts from those impacted by the layoffs.
“Although we have done our best to pad the landing for those affected with severance packages, we would implore any fellow developers looking for world-class talent to reach out,” the message continued.
Cyan’s primary goal at the moment is attracting new investment for its next project and restabilizing the studio. The cryptic end to the message suggests that the studio may ultimately shut down if it fails to secure financing for its next project.
Message from ex-Cyan employees
GameBaba Universe found only one post from a former employee talking about the layoff. Animation lead, Autumn Palfenier, confirmed she was laid off, saying, “I’m so proud of the work we did, and shipping 3 games in 4 years is an accomplishment in and of itself”.
Firmament
Several other employees including QA Test lead Marc Ferrell, producer/project manager Ryan Warzecha, senior software engineer Brando Collins, and former studio art director Derrick Robinson have all updated their LinkedIn profile with the #OpenToWork badge.
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Cyan was founded in 1987 and released three kid games namely The Manhole, Cosmic Osmo, and Spelunx. Its most successful release to date is Myst. The game and its sequel—Riven—have collectively shipped over 15 million copies and hold the honor of being the best-selling video game of the 20th century.
Their last release was Firmament, a puzzle adventure featuring deep storytelling and world-building. The game was released on May 18, 2023, and has Mostly Positive reviews on Steam.
