Eidos Montreal’s founder and general manager Stephane D’Astous has resigned from the company, according to a Polygon report. In a statement, D’Astous wrote:
“Since last year’s financial short-coming performance of Square Enix Europe, we (HQ London and GM Eidos Montreal) have had growing and divergent opinions on what needed to be done to correct the situation. The lack of leadership, lack of courage and the lack of communication were so evident, that I wasn’t able to conduct my job correctly. I realized that our differences were irreconcilable, and that the best decision was unfortunately to part ways.”
Final Fantasy developer Square Enix is Eidos Montreal’s parent company, and this isn’t the first of their troubles. Last month, the company’s Hitman studio, IO Interactive, suffered lay-offs amidst a company-wide restructuring.
Prior to that, Square Enix reported that three of the company’s major big-budget games—Tomb Raider, Sleeping Dogs and Hitman Absolution—had all sold under expectations, despite each game having moved very respectable numbers. At the same time, Square also announced that they had scrapped a number of projects in Japan.
Meanwhile, new franchises in Japan, such as Gyrozetter, a series featuring cars that transform into battle-ready robots, have failed to make much of a mark. And then, there’s Final Fantasy XIV, which not only needed to be rebooted as an entirely new game after the original version failed to take off, but also affected other projects.
Following D’Astous’ retirement from Eidos Montreal, David Anfossi, who is Eidos Montreal’s studio head, will be serving as his replacement.
