Zynga to shut Japanese studio in further consolidation

Zynga has confirmed that it will be shutting down its Japanese studio, in an effort to curb the less profitable parts of its business. Despite quickly becoming a billion dollar company, in the past year it has seen layoffs, lawsuits and player reductions that have really hit home that all is not well at Zynga.

The announcement was made by CEO Kenj Matsubara in a Facebook post that was spotted by Serkantoto. It said that Zynga Japan will be officially closed by the end of January and that Matsubara thanks all the users for playing the company's games. While certain games won't continue operation, he did note that card battle game Ayakashi would.

There was some word on this closure back in October, where CEO of Zynga Mark Pincus, hinted that the Japan office could be shut down. It wasn't certain however, until today.

This is just the latest part of the Zynga 2012 down turn. It's had stock prices crashing down, staff layoffs, attacks by hackers and even a legal scuffle with EA Games over the similarities between a couple of their games.

KitGuru Says: Of course Zynga has a reputation for doing that, but copying from Maxis, an EA subsidiary was the first time it had sized up against a worthy opponent. Other devs claiming to have been stolen from were far too small to kick up much of a fuss.

Become a Patron!