Dreams Dev Media Molecule Says Layoffs Impact Planned Community and Curation Support

Media Molecule has said the layoffs at the Sony-owned studio have affected plans for ongoing community and curation support in PlayStation 4 game Dreams. The Guildford, UK-based developer, also known for creating the LittleBigPlanet series, entered into a consultancy with staff last year. That process ends spring 2024, when Media Molecule will lose its Curation Team. In a new blog post, Media Molecule said that the impact to its teams means “we will be unable to deliver on all the promises” outlined in a 2023 blog post discussing plans for ongoing community and curation support in Dreams following the end of live support. This included The Impsider editorial, which will now not happen. However, Media Molecule said it will continue its streams and support of the Dreams community via social channels. As announced, live support for DreamSurfing and DreamShaping will end in mid-April. Media Molecule said this will coincide with the launch of new playlists alongside spotlighting the Dreams Recommender playlist providing “tip-top” recommendations based on what players recently played in Dreams. “Overall, the plan here is ensuring that Dreams transitions into a self-sustaining platform, with these changes helping to filter new creations through to regular Dreams players whilst creators reach their deserved audience for their games, animations, music and everything in between,” Media Molecule said. Fans have expressed concern about the future of Dreams ever since Media Molecule announced the redundancies in October. Media Molecule insisted there are no plans to take Dreams offline, while admitting the last 12 months have been “tough” for the studio. "We see a lot of talk and a lot of worry about the future of Dreams in our streams and on social media, and while it’s impossible for anyone to predict what the future might hold, we want to reassure you today that there are currently no plans to take Dreams offline, restricting access to the thousands upon thousands of amazing creations brought to life by all of our fabulous creators," Media Molecule said. "This was an incredibly tough time for the studio as a whole and it meant the world to see support from folks on our social channels. While we're still working through the process, the studio as a whole continues to work on our exciting new project which we'll talk about when we're ready." The redundancies at Media Molecule were announced months before Sony confirmed plans to lay off around 900 staff, or about 8% of its global PlayStation workforce. The devastating wave of cuts affected a number of PlayStation studios, including Insomniac, Naughty Dog, Guerrilla, Firesprite, and, most significantly, PlayStation's London studio, which is to close. Alongside the layoffs, a number of in-development games were canceled, Sony said.