Around “a dozen” employees at Glowmade are reportedly facing layoffs.
That’s according to Insider Gaming, which has seen documentation suggesting that the launch of the studio’s title King of Meat “failed to meet internal expectations by a significant margin.”
Sources claim leadership at the Guildford-based developer expected “a concurrent player count of at least 100,000” for the game on Steam, but it “failed to hit 1,000 consistently across all platforms” with a concurrent player peak of 320 on SteamDB.
As a result, the studio reportedly “began discussions with staff about voluntary redundancies earlier this month, affecting around a dozen people.”
GamesIndustry.biz has reached out to Glowmade and Amazon Game Studios for comment.
Glowmade was founded in 2015 by three developers from Lionhead Studios. In 2021, the independent studio partnered with Amazon Game Studios as part of its expansion into third-party publishing.
Amazon Games would go on to publish King of Meat, which launched in October 2025.
Last August GamesIndustry.biz spoke to Amazon’s EMEA publishing director Jon Rosenblatt about its games strategy, and how King of Meat fit within its plans.
“It’s really important for us to continue to build amazing games, but also make sure that the games are diverse in their look and their feel,” said Rosenblatt.
“King of Meat was just an ideal opportunity for us to work with a very talented team in Guildford, and really grow that game out into something much bigger than maybe they have planned.”
