Hyper Light Breaker development ends as developer Heart Machine announces layoffs

Heart Machine, the indie studio behind the roguelike Hyper Light Breaker, has announced that it is ending development on the early access title and undergoing a wave of layoffs, citing financial concerns.

The details:

• As confirmed in a statement to Game Developer, the LA-based studio is wrapping up development on Hyper Light Breaker, just nine months after it entered early access. Despite the critical success of its predecessor, Hyper Light Drifter, and 2021’s Solar Ash, the game was met with mixed reviews from fans, but Heart Machine has confirmed that it plans to polish the title before development stops entirely. "We still have something coming in January. We plan to deliver something meaningful and as polished and complete as we can given our current circumstances. We’re doing our best to refine what we can, complete key systems, and have the game culminate in a satisfying punctuation point," said a studio spokesperson.
• Unfortunately, the end of the game’s development has also led Heart Machine to announce job cuts, affecting an undisclosed number of employees. "As we wrap up our work on Hyper Light Breaker, we’ve had to make the difficult decision to part ways with a number of talented team members. This was not our ideal path, but rather the only one available given the circumstances," the studio wrote. "While this path will include a conclusion on the project, it reflects broader forces beyond our control, including shifts in funding, corporate consolidation, and the uncertain environment many small studios like us are navigating today."
• However, the layoffs will not affect the studio’s upcoming title, Possessor(s), which is set to release next month across PlayStation 5 and PC.