Departing Gamekult team dismissed 'hurriedly' by new owner Reworld
Editorial staff no longer able to produce content, despite not being due to leave until December
The editorial team of French games publication Gamekult has been asked to vacate their office on Monday by new owner Reworld, a few days after the staff announced they would be leaving in December.
Gamekult, which is about to celebrate its 22nd anniversary in December, was bought by Reworld Media in June, with the acquisition finalised in October.
Last week, the editorial team announced that they would all be leaving in December, using a specificity in French law called "clause de cession," which allows journalists to resign without conditions when their publication is sold, and still be entitled to some benefits.
But, as reported by Libération, the team was asked to leave the office "hurriedly" on Monday, with members of staff who used the clause de cession asked to not come back despite a notice period going up to December 7.
As a result, the team was not allowed to record its last show that was due to be a farewell to its audience, nor can it continue publishing on its website.
In a long post shared on November 17 on Gamekult's website, the editorial team described the issues encountered since the Reworld acquisition, including poor work-life balance due to the offices being moved.
But the post also mentioned an overall fatigue from the entire team facing a constantly evolving games media landscape which gives more space to infotainment, with "journalism ethics often crashing into Google's demands."
The team also talked about the growing pressure over the years to be more and more profitable, which came from the various big media groups that have acquired the publication over the past decade.
"This accumulation has led the editorial team to the only solution they could envision: to leave," the post read. "It's a very hard decision that we are taking with a lot of emotion and sadness. It's also a financial risk, many of us having no future endeavours to turn to. Considering the current health of the video games media landscape, for many it's also probably the end of an entire career, a job they cherished, that represented so much to them."
Gamekult as a website is not closing, with new staff to be hired "in due course," the team said last week, though it's uncertain at this stage how this has evolved since Monday's events.
GamesIndustry.biz has reached out to Reworld for comment.