Last week, Bloomberg reported that 25 people comprising the entire staff of Annapurna Interactive walked out the door in a group resignation. But while some of the circumstances around their departure emerged in the reporting, one pressing question was left unanswered: why?

Having spoken to multiple individuals close to the situation who requested anonymity due to fear of reprisal, as well as an Annapurna spokesperson, IGN has pieced together a somewhat complex answer. Disagreements over the direction of the Interactive division, chaotic departures, communication breakdowns, and a perceived lack of leadership transparency at Annapurna Interactive led to a staff walk-out that has left 25 individuals jobless, Annapurna leaders scrambling, and numerous developers concerned about their contracts with the publisher.

A Company Divided

Though the collapse of Annapurna Interactive as we once knew it started earlier this year, its roots lie in the company’s historical leadership structure. Annapurna Interactive was initially conceived as the gaming division of Annapurna Pictures, which was founded by film producer and billionaire Megan Ellison in 2011. Annapurna Interactive itself was spun up in 2016, tapping a staff of industry veterans including including former Sony creative director Nathan Gary, former Capybara Games president Nathan Vella, former Sony executive producer Deborah Mars, and former Sony producer Hector Sanchez for leadership roles. Sanchez left the company in 2019.

The film side of Annapurna’s business has undergone well-publicized struggles. In 2018, it was bleeding enough money to prompt Ellison’s father, multi-billionaire Larry Ellison, to step in. By 2019, Annapurna Pictures was reportedly teetering on bankruptcy, and in the ensuing years its film and TV output slowed significantly. Variety reports that Ellison disappeared from public life in 2019 almost entirely, leaving her business to largely run itself during the height of the pandemic. She reemerged in 2021, only to name Gary president over all of Annapurna, with Mars and Vella stepping into co-head roles at the Interactive division.

In the ensuing years, Annapurna Interactive continued to grow, releasing financial and critical successes such as Stray, Outer Wilds, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Cocoon. While the company claims the Annapurna Pictures side of the business hasn’t struggled in recent years, saying that film and TV were more profitable than Annapurna Interactive in 2023, a spokesperson alleged to IGN that Gary was a less-than-ideal steward of Annapurna Pictures. Under his guidance, they claim, resources were pulled away from film and TV, key executives were pushed out, and the company was largely refocused on gaming. Annapurna tells IGN that Gary also elevated co-founder James Masi to chief administrative officer, a role the spokesperson suggested was unnnecessary at a company of Annapurna’s size. Notably, Annapurna did launch an animation division under Gary’s tenure that released the critically-acclaimed film Nimona just last year. IGN has reached out to Gary, but he declined to comment.

IGN understands that opinions of Ellison within Annapurna Interactive prior to 2024 varied from indifference to latent mistrust given previous reports on her behavior toward employees. Anonymous sources I spoke to all cited a strong fear of reprisal from Ellison in particular, given her resources, history, and reach. A few people referenced creative or compensation disagreements during their time at Annapurna that contributed to a general feeling Ellison would not keep promises. Multiple sources we spoke to described Ellison as a largely hands-off leader and rarely present in the gaming division, an attitude that for years suited many of Annapurna Interactive’s employees just fine.

Ad-Verset effects

This was the state of things at the start of 2024 according to our sources. Prior to March of this year, work at Annapurna Interactive was business-as-usual, they say, until employees were suddenly informed mid-month that James Masi had been unexpectedly let go. An Annapurna spokesperson confirmed Masi was made redundant, saying that Ellison had chosen to step back in at the company and oversee the Annapurna Pictures side again in an effort to re-invest in the film and TV side of the business. As a part of this, Annapurna claims that Ellison reinstalled Gary as head of Interactive, and deemed Masi’s role unnnecessary.

However, at this time, Gary also left the company. Annapurna claims he left of his own accord in response to Masi’s firing and his change in role. But sources say employees were told in the following days by leadership within Annapurna Interactive that Gary had been fired along with Masi. The belief that two of their leaders had been fired seemingly out of the blue sparked confusion and fury, and a handful of individuals quit in protest, including at least one other Interactive leader.

The sudden resignation of multiple key individuals came as a shock to the company, and IGN understands that Ellison held a video call with Annapurna employees to discuss what had happened and find a way to move forward. On the call, Ellison allegedly expressed a desire to keep the entire group, including those who had been fired or resigned, together. In the following days, all the departed staff returned, including Gary and Masi, and discussions began for a potential spin-off of the company that would allow Gary and Ellison to achieve their respective visions with minimal disruptions to partner developers.

Roughly, the plan was for Gary and the Annapurna Interactive staff to become a new company called Verset, with ownership split between Annapurna and Verset’s leaders. Verset would oversee all currently existing signed Annapurna Interactive projects, with revenue split between itself and Annapurna proper in Annapurna’s favor. It would also be free to sign its own, independent deals. Developers IGN spoke to report being made aware the spin-off was happening in the following months, and were reassured their contracts would be fulfilled.

While employees understood such a venture would take time to get off the ground, in the ensuing months a number of events occurred that made some skeptical of Ellison’s commitment to parting with Annapurna Interactive. In early summer, sources tell us that employees discovered Hector Sanchez had been quietly rehired back at Annapurna by Ellison and was working on gaming projects without the knowledge of the rest of the Interactive staff. The news wasn’t made official until August that Sanchez had been appointed president of interactive and new media at Annapurna — a title that seemed to some as potentially at odds with Vella and Mars’ roles at Interactive.

Annapurna, for its part, claims that talks between Ellison and Sanchez began as far back as February for Ellison to fund a new venture Sanchez was planning after departing Epic Games. As talks continued, Annapurna says Sanchez began negotiating with Remedy Entertainment for a deal related to film and TV spin-offs of its properties. However, when spin-off negotiations began to crystalize at Annapurna Interactive, Ellison offered Sanchez a position at Annapurna. The intent, per the spokesperson, was for Verset to become the company’s indie arm, and for Sanchez to lead efforts in the AAA and AA-gaming space, including transmedia properties.

Which is how, months later, Annapurna announced it was partnering with Remedy Entertainment on film, TV, and other projects including funding support for Control 2. The press release, which IGN received, referenced both Sanchez and Ellison. But it doesn’t reference Annapurna Interactive at all, and IGN understands Annapurna Interactive employees were only informed the deal was happening that morning. Employees, unaware of Ellison’s plans or the status of the spin-off, were confused, concerned, and frustrated about the direction of the company and the future of its Interactive division, Verset or no Verset.

While all this was going on, sources say that discussions with Ellison regarding the spin-off appeared to have stalled out, and in August Annapurna officially terminated discussion. Annapurna claims this was due to Gary’s lack of response to requests for feedback on legal drafts. Meanwhile, multiple people told IGN that in those final months, they began to see signs of Ellison exercising greater involvement over Annapurna Interactive’s deals, projects, and budgets in a way that began to make them further uncomfortable with the direction the company was taking overall.

All of this came to a head at the end of August when all 25 Annapurna Interactive employees including Gary, Vella, Masi, and Mars signed a joint resignation letter. The group gave two weeks notice and departed the company together on September 6 leaving Ellison, Sanchez, and newly-hired chief strategy officer Paul Doyle working on a semblance of Annapurna’s gaming efforts. Sources tell IGN that up to the letter being sent and after, the group asked Ellison to work with them on other possible solutions such as the aforementioned spin-off, but did not receive any interest.

IGN also understands that despite the two-week notice, partner developers did not learn about the sudden exodus of all their Annapurna contacts until a day or two before it occurred. Annapurna claims they didn’t have enough time to collect developer contact information to alert them sooner, while Annapurna Interactive sources say they received no guidance from the company during that period as to who should tell developers, when, and how.

Annapurna Aftermath

While IGN couldn’t glean any details on the future of the 25 departed employees, there are some indications that the group is collectively working on some new venture together. A website for Verset appears to be online at the time of publication with a PR alias, which IGN reached out to for comment. IGN was also unable to find any posts or other discussions from the departed members indicating they were looking for employment elsewhere. Whatever their future plans, IGN understands that the group did not have a ready-made venture waiting when they left, as some have speculated. Whatever they build, if anything, it will be largely from scratch.

Meanwhile, at Annapurna itself, efforts are underway to right the ship. Multiple developers I spoke to expressed a mixture of frustration and confusion at the sudden departure, but several told me they felt confident in Sanchez’s ability to honor existing obligations. Several individuals with projects at different stages of development told me about meetings they’d had with Sanchez in the wake of the event that they reported had reassured them. Sanchez has previously stated his intention both to backfill roles as well as work with outside agencies to fulfill Annapurna’s contractual obligations, and IGN has confirmed this process is ongoing. Earlier this week, Annapurna also posted an open role for a QA Manager overseeing “multiple external QA teams.”

The unusual situation appears to have impacted a few specific projects in unique ways. On August 30, iam8bit shared an announcement that an upcoming PlayStation 5 physical edition of Outer Wilds: Archaeologist Edition had suffered from a manufacturing error, and did not include the Echoes of the Eye expansion as expected. Annapurna Interactive at the time said it would “continue to investigate”, while iam8bit offered either a digital DLC voucher to impacted customers, or a replacement corrected physical copy. Both Annapurna and Interactive sources have told IGN that this issue is unrelated to the resignations, and Annapurna reassured that it will not be impacted by the upheaval at the company.

Then there’s Blade Runner. Last summer, Annapurna Interactive announced it would be developing its first in-house game, based on the Blade Runner franchise, titled Blade Runner 2033: Labyrinth. However, game director Chelsea Hash appears to be one of the 25 individuals who resigned, per LinkedIn, and IGN understands that all other full-time members of the development team joined her. Annapurna has told IGN that development on Blade Runner 2033 will continue despite the departure of its entire team.

An Annapurna spokesperson also shared the following statement when asked for further comment:

“The whole situation is a baffler, but now we’re focused on moving forward. We’ve had really great conversations with an overwhelming majority of our existing development teams and are grateful for their partnership. If our inbox is any indication, a ton of developers continue to want to be a part of what we’re building, and we look forward to seeing their pitches. We’ve also had an influx of quality job applicants and are excited to build a team passionate about our mission to tell original stories that aren’t being told elsewhere. P.S. We’re hiring.”

Annapurna has splintered into two groups, both of which are now working to pick up the pieces. The remains of Annapurna Interactive, (or perhaps a future Verset), consist of 25 individuals who felt strongly enough about perceived mismanagement, poor communication, apparent spontaneous layoffs of leaders, and one another that they were willing to give up paychecks and stability at a time of overwhelming industry job and funding uncertainty. When IGN approached its sources close to this group about Annapurna’s version of events (specifically, the conflicting information around Masi and Gary’s alleged resignation/firing and the collapse of spin-off discussions), they reacted with skepticism, but did not feel they could safely provide more specific details.

Meanwhile, at Annapurna, a tiny leadership team is struggling to ensure that around 40 projects have the support we need, while the company’s partners have been left at various stages of development and uncertainty as to what comes next.

Annapurna Interactive as we once knew it — a beloved publisher of critically-acclaimed, unique, beloved indie games — is no more. What, if anything, will rise to take its place?

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Got a story tip? Send it to rvalentine@ign.com.

Note: These impressions are based on my early experiences with EA Sports FC 25. So far, the focus has been on core gameplay in Career and Rush modes, but I’ll explore how the changes impact Ultimate Team and other online modes after spending more time with them.

Every year, I start with the same overly optimistic questions: What has actually changed in FIFA—sorry, EA Sports FC—this time around? Is it really new, or just the same old experience with a fresh coat of paint? There’s always a laundry list of flashy new marketing terms designed to grab attention: Hypermotion V, FC IQ, BallTouch, Rush, etc (okay one of those is made up). Yet, even with all the buzzwords, there’s often a lingering feeling that these changes are merely surface-level, just enough to warrant a new bullet point on the box without truly changing up the gameplay in an innovative way.

Well, so far the changes made to FC 25 make it feel like the latter scenario: a series of incremental improvements and adjustments that do add to the fun through their novelty if nothing else, but they’re hardly enough to usher in a sweeping revolution of any kind.

Career Mode: Finally a Welcome Refresh

As someone who prefers the depth of Career Mode (I’ve spent hundreds of hours playing out multiple season-long campaigns over the years) over the microtransaction-driven Ultimate Team, I was pleased to see that FC 25 finally gives it the attention it deserves and brings some meaningful updates. One of the biggest improvements this year is simply in the ways you can customize the experience. There’s more flexibility in how you set up your career—board expectations, for instance, can now be set to lenient, sparing you the frustration of being sacked for not spending every penny of your transfer budget. The ability to customize training plans and match tactics to a greater degree, deciding how hard your players train and which roles suit them best, is a welcome step towards giving us more control over our players’ development, particularly when it comes to managing youth talent and squad rotation.

Then there’s also the addition of weather effects like wind and rain, which surprisingly aren’t just cosmetic—they’re modifiers that genuinely affect how matches play out. In smaller stadiums, for example, a strong gust can make the ball swerve unpredictably. It’s a satisfying touch and adds a new level of realism for offline modes like Career that feels long overdue. That said, it’s a shame this isn’t available in online modes due to balancing reasons. I understand how it could frustrate those who don’t enjoy forces outside of their control becoming a deciding factor, but I’d love to see it as an optional setting for casual Ultimate Team matchups to spice things up just that bit more for those of us who like to live dangerously.

Beyond the weather, another interesting feature is the integration of a social media feed featuring none other than the seemingly omnipresent transfer guru Fabrizio Romano. His trademark “Here We Go” catchphrase now pops up during in-game transfer announcements. It’s a fun, slightly gimmicky, if borderline cringeworthy addition—but I’m still waiting for a “There We Land” before I’m truly impressed.

FC 25’s welcoming of several major women’s leagues is long overdue and much appreciated, and the ability to seamlessly drift between the men’s and women’s leagues and teams within one career mode save is particularly neat. Plus, you can now start a save as one of FC’s many icons, allowing me to finally live out my dream of Andrea Pirlo running the show at the base of Gillingham’s midfield.

There are new ways to play within Career Mode as well. Rush is a new 5v5 mode found throughout FC 25 (essentially replacing Volta) and it’s used through the introduction of youth tournaments, giving you a chance to test your wunderkinds in high-pressure scenarios throughout the season. It’s a cool, fast-paced break from the standard matches and some much-needed variety to the often-repetitive nature of Career Mode seasons.

This new, futsal-inspired mode brings a fresh twist with a set of unique rules that introduce a fun dose of chaos to the gameplay. Kick-offs are revamped, in that players race toward the center of the pitch as the ball is launched into play, much like Rocket League. The offside rule only kicks in within the final third, a departure from the usual halfway-line restriction. Red cards are swapped out for blue cards, sending players to a one-minute sin bin for serious fouls, though their time is cut by 15 seconds for every goal the opposition scores during that period. Penalties also get a shakeup, taken from the “final third line” in a one-on-one duel with the goalkeeper, similar to hockey shootouts.

Rush mode is also available in Kick Off, Ultimate Team, and Clubs, making it perfect for players who don’t always have a full squad but still want to jump into the action with a few friends. Outside of Career, matches take place in the custom-designed Rush Stadium, developed in partnership with Nike, featuring a futuristic flair, vibrant drone shows that enhance the atmosphere, and unique commentators specific to the mode. With online modes kicking off in early access, Rush already shows plenty of potential to evolve into something truly unique. Whether that potential will be fully realized, or discarded like The Journey and Volta, remains to be seen.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Graphically, EA Sports FC is once again a hot pot of good and bad, shining on the pitch while appearing neglected off it. During matches, the presentation is particularly sharp—especially in Premier League games, where the new scoreboards, broadcast-style overlays, and team-specific on-screen graphics packages really stand out. A nice surprise is the option to re-enable team walkouts in the pre-match build-up, after the feature was suddenly removed in FC 24.

Unfortunately, the user interface is a different story. What’s most infuriating is how the menus feel like they were designed for a touchscreen—soft edges, clunky, and far from intuitive with a controller. Worse, they seem to provide less information than ever before. Despite the ever-increasing bloat of the menu items directly in front of you, key information is buried behind layers of tabs that disappear if you scroll too far, leaving you hunting for crucial menus.

For a game that actively encourages you to slow down, tweak tactics, and customise player roles, the new menu system that plagues every game mode feels like it’s chugging two steps behind every input, making what should be an enjoyable experience feel like a chore. This was especially notable in menu-heavy modes like Career which, while it has had several cool additions, is now aggravating to try and navigate through.

There’s also the new ‘Cranium’ system, which aims to make players without facial scans appear more natural alongside top-tier talent from leagues like the Premier League, La Liga, and beyond. It’s great to see a greater range of “generic” faces now, and even unscanned players look a little like their real-life counterparts. Likewise, it’s neat that there’s a greater level of customization in the personal player or manager models as well. However, the results are inconsistent: Under ideal conditions and lighting, some players look significantly better than in previous entries, but these conditions are rare, and more often than not everyone in FC 25 looks like they’ve been pulled from a waxy, uncanny valley hell.

Speaking of jank, expect some of the typical weirdness in FC 25. Commentary is still often disconnected from the action on the pitch, cutscenes glitch out in bizarre ways, and there are moments where the world briefly collapses into a pinky-purgatory void. For those of us who’ve been around the FIFA/FC block, these graphical quirks are nothing new, but that doesn’t make them any less annoying.

Unfortunately, it’s a similar story across many annual sports titles. In Madden, bizarre animation bugs still see players warping or phasing through each other, while NBA 2K has its own share of uncanny character models and awkward animations. It feels like these issues are simply glossed over with each new installment. In fact, they’re becoming increasingly indefensible as the same problems resurface year after year.

Gameplay: Tweaks That Matter (And Many That Don’t)

When it comes to gameplay, FC 25 delivers some fun, if incremental, improvements – just like clockwork. One of the standout new features is FC IQ, which effectively replaces the old system of work rates, where players’ movement was dictated by set verbal descriptions of their effort in attack and defense. Instead, player movement is now determined by their “role” and the “focus” assigned to them within that role. Each position offers a choice of three to five roles. For example, a central attacking midfielder (CAM) can be assigned roles like shadow striker, playmaker, and others, altering how forward-thinking you want them to be throughout a game.

There’s a new level of automation that comes hand-in-hand with this change and actually feels significant. For example, attackers feel a bit more useful while on the break, and no longer having to constantly manually trigger players’ runs in behind or down the wing with button presses is great. Players will make smarter runs based on their roles, too. However, the level of control still pales in comparison to the more tactical-heavy sims found in Football Manager, and the initial impressiveness of the change wears off fast. It’s certainly an improvement, but the desired depth isn’t quite there yet.

In terms of how the on-pitch action feels with the controller in your hand, passing is a touch snappier than last year, especially when pinging long balls across the pitch. Shooting also has a nice weight to it—smooth, responsive, and satisfying. When the weather effects are in play in offline modes, even the physics in wet conditions adds a layer of unpredictability, with the ball sometimes skidding to a halt as the rain pours down. It’s these moments when you’re battling the elements that are a great example of the enjoyment found in the imperfections of the beautiful game.

But then there’s the defense, which still feels frustratingly loose. A tale as old as time, pacy players can turn and breeze past a defense with ease, and defenders are often a step behind, even slower than they should be. Even near-track-athlete-level speedsters like Mickey Van de Ven sometimes find themselves unable to catch up with the less-than-zippy attackers. If the opponent gets in behind your defense, you might as well start planning your next kickoff because there’s little you can do to stop them.

Defensive issues are compounded by the new FC IQ tactical options, which are supposed to give you more control over how your team plays, not quite extending to defenders how I’d like. For example, there are no longer instructions to tell players to press heavily after losing the ball. Defending is half of football, yet it currently feels like an afterthought that needed a lot more time in the oven. No matter if you’re playing a low, medium, or high-aggression style, it just feels the same: slow, boring, and lacking tight control. At times, it felt like someone was holding onto my players’ heels, keeping them back; When they finally did accelerate, it was rigid and unnatural, like they were moving along a predetermined path.

More of the Same… Again?

After my first day with EA Sports FC 25, it feels like the game is in a tough spot. For Career Mode fans like myself, there are some positives—the expanded customization options, enhanced tactics, dynamic weather effects, and added depth create a much richer experience than in previous years. However, despite the improvements to offline modes like Career and the clear potential of Rush, there’s still an underlying sense of frustration. As a long-time fan, I can’t help but feel disappointed by how long issues like defensive slipperiness, choppy menus, and graphical inconsistencies have remained unaddressed.

After more than 20 years of EA Sports football games (yes, it’s been that long), the cracks aren’t just beginning to show, they are upsetting the very foundations. The ever-growing focus on increasingly expensive microtransactions in Ultimate Team has left the other modes still feeling left behind, no matter the smattering of custom gameplay tweaks, new menus, or weather effects added in.

The improvements, while welcome, are largely incremental, and the gameplay remains frustratingly familiar in all the wrong ways. For the leading football simulator, EA Sports FC continues to lack the fluidity, polish, and excitement it seems like it could and should deliver. While it’s still early days, first impression-wise, FC 25 currently feels like a small but reasonable step forward for Career Mode enthusiasts, but it’s still hard to see the appeal of all of this as a whole. There’s fun to be had, but it’s tempered by lingering disheartenment and a sense that EA is, as always, playing it safe.

I’ll be back soon with some more developed thoughts on EA Sports FC 25 next week, once I’ve spent time more time with Rush, Ultimate Team and how the online experience is shaping up over its early days.