'We've already seen that our ongoing cultural transformation is creating a better workplace for the team, which leads to better games for our community. We have seen a lot of change in the last few years: we have an entirely new leadership team, including new HR Director and department in 2021 hired about 75 employees since the beginning of the pandemic and have transformed the demographic make-up of our team. 'Our past culture does not exemplify who we are now, nor who we want to become. 'I recognise that some of our employees, current and former, have shared that their experiences at the Lab weren't always positive,' Holt said in a statement issued in response. Holt's plans for internal demos of the game also caused problems, with staff departures and a lack of focus seeing plans eventually shifted at employee behest.Įmployee opinion on the game now seems mixed - some say it has finally turned a corner, while others are more sceptical of how the project will continue with further departures and under the studio's current leadership. However, the damage has been done, and a wave of departures followed. It was here, last summer, after several public testimonials of working conditions, that Microsoft apparently did step in. The subsequent switchover from previous studio boss Jeff Strain to former ArenaNet exec Philip Holt as head of the company also caused friction, it was reported, as well as frustration over the company's allegedly ineffective new HR boss Anne Schlosser. 'We were afraid they would come in and change our culture,' one staff member said, 'but our collapse came from within and we could have used help.' Now, staff say Microsoft should have done more. In 2018, when Undead Labs was bought by Microsoft, staff said the concern had been an enforced change of culture. Rules on meeting etiquette reportedly had to be enforced, though did not solve these issues.

The report also alleges sexism - that female employees were ignored or blamed during meetings, and subject to sexist remarks - as well as failures by HR. Watch on YouTube Microsoft announced State of Decay 3 in 2020, though the project still lacks a release date.

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