Update (9/27/2024): After deleting the original post, Merge Games made a new one saying it was now fully integrated within Maximum Entertainment.
However, former community manager Tom Griffith offered a “minor correction,” saying the integration was more of a mass layoff that saw most of the staff let go. “[You] kept two people to manage sales,” he wrote.
Griffith also claimed Maximum the studio’s original “heartfelt goodbye,” which he re-published and remarked “how odd” it was to have been deleted at all.
Original story: After 15 years, publisher Merge Games is closing down, and its 22-person staff has been laid off.
In a now-deleted post on social media, the studio reminisced on how it “brought hundreds of indie gems to storefronts around the world and loved every moment of it!”
“We couldn’t have done it without the people passionate about indie games,” Merge continued, “from all of our developers all the way to you folks, the players!”
The history of Merge Games
During its lifetime, Merge published several indie games (like Sunnyside, Spirittea) and physical versions of already released titles (Dead Cells, The Thaumaturge).
Last year, its original parent company Zordix Game Group acquired Maximum Games. Merge became a subsidiary of the relaunched Maximum Entertainment, which also included Maximum and Modus Studios (Them’s Fightin’ Herds).
Earlier this month, Maximum laid off staff at the indie publisher and shuttered its Chelford office. At the time, Maximum CEO Christina Seelye explained the reductions were part of the company’s consolidation plans.
As a result of those layoffs, games under Merge’s umbrella that had not yet released, such as Spirit of the North 2, were transferred to Maximum.
Merge ended its statement by thanking players “for the many years of gaming! If you see someone from Merge, just know they’re an incredible person that worked their hardest.”