Crytek has faced some financial trouble in the past, having had to sell off their UK studio to Deep Silver in 2014. However, as far as we knew they were doing alright right now. Only over the weekend a few posts emerged that suggested that maybe things were once again going wrong behind the scenes.
The posts, duplicated on both Reddit and Imgur, are supposedly written by an author who claims to be an employee at the main Crytek studio in Germany. In it they write that Crytek hasn't paid them or their co-workers for almost six months, and that as far as they can tell the problem is not just limited to the German studio. "This isn’t just here in Germany, this is in all of our offices as far as I can tell."
There has also been a report by Let's Play Video Games into this. Sources have apparently come forward to them and have been "privately verified" by LPVG as legitimate. Crytek's Black Sea studio in Bulgaria has not been paid wages in three months, and may even be up for sale with a "big name" in talks to purchase it.
It's been suggested that the reason is due to mismanagement and other things leading to Crytek not making a great profit for a while. A lot of projects have been cancelled it seems and Crytek have failed to capitalise on the popular IPs they do have, like TimeSplitters and Crysis according to sources. They also blame pushes into VR (Robinson: The Journey, The Climb) that were never likely to turn a profit in the first place, and an overcommitment to free-to-play (Warface).
Management seems to be keeping quiet, although it is possible that they themselves aren't being given the full picture by their higher-ups either.
"Management never gives anyone a heads up, and it isn’t clear to me if they are getting paid or even informed from the owners." writes the author of the Reddit/Imgur post about the managers at the studio. He also wrote that some of his co-workers had moved to Germany from other countries to work there and were now unable to get back home due to having their wages withheld for so long.
Whatever is going on, it sounds like there's once again trouble afoot for Crytek. We'll just have to see how this situation develops.
