Xbox CEO Asha Sharma visited Bethesda Game Studios this week while protesters demonstrated against the company’s layoffs.
Sharma visited the studio’s office on Tuesday, where she says she was shown a “live playthrough” of The Elder Scrolls 6 and had good things to say about it.
“Live playthrough of The Elder Scrolls VI: ******** this morning,” she wrote on X, perhaps hinting at the length of the game’s subtitle.
“The scale and grandeur are incredible. The story is even greater.”
Sharma’s visit to Bethesda Game Studios was met with protests from OneBGS, the Bethesda Game Studios Union, and other members of the Communicaiton Workers of America (CWS) union.
As reported by Game Developer senior editor Chris Kerr, CWA union members inflated a giant rat and set it up outside the Bethesda Game Studios office as part of demonstration against Xbox‘s recent layoffs.
The rat, which is known as Scabby, is occasionally used during CWA protests to shame unfair labour practices.
OneBGS demonstrators also planted hundreds of red flags in the ground outside Bethesda’s office, with each flag representing a game worker who’s been laid off by Microsoft this year so far.
“We’re mobilising to fight back,” union member says
OneBGS member Nathan Hahn told Kerr that union staff were also making their presence known inside Bethesda Game Studios offices during Sharma’s visit.
“We heard that Microsoft leadership was coming to our office this week, and decided to make our presence visible at the office to show how our developers have been impacted by these devastating layoffs,” he explained.
“To show our presence, we put up posters around the office, but we were immediately told by management we couldn’t have posters facing the outside of our cubes. Then, we brought in balloons so that they could see we were here, but inside our cubes this time.
“A separate team of laid off developers planted flags outside, one flag for each laid off dev. Each flag was a public reminder of how many people management cut from our teams – not just our colleagues and coworkers, but our friends at the end of the day.
“We’re mobilising to fight back against these layoffs not just to ensure impacted Xbox devs and testers get treated fairly, but to remind our company and game studios everywhere that layoffs like this cannot continue.
“If Microsoft leadership does not have the courage to do what’s right for our studios to make the best possible games, it’s up to us to stand up for each other and protect the future of our careers and the game industry.”
