Doom: The Dark Ages launches to franchise-best numbers as Xbox layoffs gut id Software

Doom: The Dark Ages launched to the biggest debut in id Software's history, but the celebration is overshadowed by brutal cuts at Microsoft. On Monday, the company kicked off its fiscal year by laying off 1,600 Xbox employees, with another 1,600 expected to follow within the next twelve months.

The fallout across Bethesda's umbrella has been significant. Obsidian Entertainment scrapped a sequel to Avowed to redirect resources toward a new Fallout game, and id Software was hit particularly hard — it's now believed fewer than half of the studio's 186 employees remain after the cuts.

The layoffs weren't triggered by poor performance. The Dark Ages was critically well-received and posted the strongest launch numbers in the franchise's history, making the scale of the cuts at id all the more striking. Microsoft's restructuring appears to be a top-down cost decision rather than a response to any creative or commercial failure at the studio.

How the remaining team at id Software moves forward — and what the cuts mean for future Doom projects — remains to be seen. For now, The Dark Ages stands as both a franchise high point and a grim marker of where Xbox's internal studios find themselves heading into 2025.