Netflix’s ambitious game studio shut down after two years

Netflix has shut down its ambitious in-house game studio Team Blue just two years after it was launched.

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In 2021, Netflix announced it would be looking to add games to its current library of films, TV shows and documentaries. To begin with, the streamer wanted to focus on mobile games but in 2022, it founded internal studio Team Blue.

With Netflix focused on making a cloud gaming service to rival Xbox Game Pass, Team Blue was working on a “brand-new AAA multiplatform game” based on an original IP. The studio featured former Overwatch executive producer Chacko Sonny as studio head alongside former Halo Infinite developer Joseph Staten and God Of War art director Rafael Grassetti.

At the time vice president of Netflix gaming Mike Verdu said: “You don’t get people like [Sonny] coming to your organisation to build the next big thing in gaming unless there’s a sense that we’re really in it for the long haul.”

However, according to a new report by Gamefile, all three developers have left Netflix and Team Blue has been shut down without ever releasing a game. Just two months ago, the studio was hiring, according to PC Gamer.

No reason for the closure has been given, but it comes after a shake up at Netflix. Verdu is now working on “transformative innovation in game creation and development” at the streamer while Alain Tascas, former vice president of game development at Fortnite studio Epic, is the current president of gaming at Netflix.

At a recent earnings call, Netflix’s CEO Gregory Peters confirmed games based on Squid Game, Virgin River Christmas and The Ultimatum are still in the works and the company is “very excited” about their launch.

In 2022 it was reported that less than 1 per cent of Netflix’s 221million subscribers play games on the streamer. However, in recent months, three Grand Theft Auto games have been added to the service which now features over 80 games.

In other news, Super Smash Bros. and Kirby creator Masahiro Sakurai has teased a new project that’s been in the works since 2021.

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