Staff have taken to social media to report that Free Radical Design, the British studio behind TimeSplitters and more, has closed. Its website has also been taken offline.
Little more than a month on from November’s report that Nottingham-based studio Free Radical Design was to close, staff have begun to announce on Twitter that the axe has indeed fallen on the company.
As reported by Eurogamer, several artists and designers have now confirmed that the studio behind the TimeSplitters series of shooters has shut down.
Senior tech artist Adam Kiraly wrote on X/Twitter, “The last day at [Free Radical] was very different from what I imagined. I don’t think it sunk in properly just yet, but handed my keys in and left the building the last time.”
Not long after, it was then noted by several outlets that Free Radical’s website has been taken down, with its main page currently reading, simply, “404 Company Not Found :-(“.
Free Radical’s closure is the latest aftershock from Embracer Group’s financially calamitous year, which saw the Swedish holding company’s stock prices tumble after the collapse of a $2bn deal with an unnamed company. In the months since, Embracer has gone on a lengthy cost-cutting campaign, with victims including Volition, the developer behind the Saints Row series, as well as several staff at Crystal Dynamics, makers of the Tomb Raider games.
Free Radical Design was originally founded in 1999 by former developers at Rare, who brought the expertise that gave the world GoldenEye 007 to bear on a new franchise, TimeSplitters. After a rocky period in the 2000s which saw the studio renamed as Crytek UK, Embracer’s purchase – and its subsequent shift back to the old Free Radical name – signalled what looked like a happier new era for the team.
For the past couple of years, Free Radical had been working on a new, rebooted take on TimeSplitters. It’s now unlikely that the project will ever appear – yet another casualty of what has been a truly brutal year for the games industry.
Here’s hoping those affected will find new jobs elsewhere soon.
