November 19 Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman’s company Skybound says development has resumed on the final season of Telltale’s abandoned Walking Dead series.
The sudden closure of Telltale Games came alongside the company’s firing of most of its staff, and it left questions in its wake – among them, what was to become of the final season of The Walking Dead, the studio’s tentpole series? Series creator Robert Kirkman announced at New York Comic Con in October that he was hiring members of Telltale’s Walking Dead team on to finish the adventure series.
“We can’t lose Andrew Lincoln and Clementine in the same year,” Kirkman quipped, as Variety reports.
In a blog posted today, Skybound’s Johnny O’Dell said it’s taken time to sort out the logistics and legalities of taking the series over from Telltale, and that while those efforts have been underway, continued development on the game’s last two episodes wasn’t possible.
“But, we’re excited to let you know that many of the talented, passionate team members who originally worked on the game are resuming development efforts today,” O’Dell wrote.
Telltale laid off more than 250 employees when it shut down, leaving many of them struggling to make ends meet in California’s Bay Area, where the studio was headquartered.
One of them filed a class action lawsuit against Telltale in U.S. federal court, alleging that Telltale violated American and California labor laws when it fired the bulk of its staff without warning in late September.
Variety reports that the layoffs and studio closure came days after Telltale met with AMC and South Korean games publisher Smilegate for an investment deal. The deal was Telltale’s last hope to keep the studio afloat, but the companies walked away, and as we’ve seen, Telltale went belly up.
Kirkman did not specify how many former Telltale employees will be hired on to complete The Walking Dead’s final season.
Kirkman, who created The Walking Dead comics series, says his company Skybound will work with former Telltale developers who had been working on The Walking Dead in order to complete the final season. A company spokesperson told Variety that the hope is to keep the original Telltale team intact.
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