Schell Games has finally joined the long line of studios forced to cut staff, ending a two-decade run of avoiding layoffs that CEO Jesse Schell once framed as a deliberate business choice rather than an inevitability.

LinkedIn posts from affected employees and managers confirm the cuts hit marketing, art, design, and visual effects roles last Friday, with names and roles shared publicly by marketing director Dwayne Waite Jr. and the senior public relations manager; the principal engineering manager who kept their job noted the industry "is hemorrhaging" and stressed the moves weren't performance-based.

The Pittsburgh Business Times pegs the impact at roughly 10% of the studio's 51-200 employees—around 14 people based on the posts—marking the first time the I Expect You to Die maker has resorted to this after handing off Among Us 3D development back to Innersloth earlier this year and pivoting toward smaller projects amid broader sector turmoil.

Schell's old quotes about putting cash at risk instead of jobs now read like relics from a different era, and the LinkedIn trail leaves little room for spin.