Deliver Us Mars dev lays off entire team due to lack of publishing options, but vows to rebuild the studio
"Heavily beat, but far from beaten."
Deliver Us Mars developer KeokeN Interactive has laid off its team due to a lack of publishing options for its forthcoming projects, but vows to rebuild in future to continue the legacy of its games.
The news was revealed in a lengthy statement on social media site X from CEO Koen Deetman and managing director Paul Deetman.
"Heartbroken, we've had to lay off our team at KeokeN because of nothing substantial materialising directly after our visit to GDC," the statement reads. "We've unfortunately exhausted all our possible options for publishing, work for hire, and co-development."
According to a previous post from March, the studio was working on five projects and was searching for investment partners. It would appear no such investment has been found.
"Paul and I are heavily beat, but far from beaten," continues the statement. "It's our personal mission to rebuild KeokeN brick by brick like we've done before, in the name of our people and to continue the legacy of our games."
The pair also stated their desire for the team to find new positions elsewhere in the industry, and noted the importance of the community around its games.
"It has become abundantly clear that what is most important to us and our team is you, our community," reads the statement. "You play our games, you make our games shine, you make us feel special as you believe in us. You have showed up consistently in both the good and the bad times, from our debut Kickstarter in the past to our recent video asking for help. Because of you, we've reached millions of people. We have always needed you and continue to do so."
The studio's next game will be Deliver Us Home, which will soon receive a Kickstarter for financial aid.
Deliver Us Mars was released in February last year, published by Frontier's now-defunct publishing label Frontier Foundry.
In a recent report on layoffs at Frontier, the label was described as a financial misadventure that was dropped in June 2023 due to "disappointing financial performance and increased competition amongst third-party publishers".