Lucasarts has confirmed that they have laid off somewhere between 80-100 staff members, stating, "they had to do with where we are in our product life cycles." This is likely in relation to the console cycle, which is likely at least half done.

"I can confirm we had layoffs yesterday they were in the studio," said LucasArts spokeswoman Margaret Grohne. VP of Product Development Peter Hirschmann, and the producer of LEGO Indiana Jones and LEGO Star Wars, Shawn Storc, were the two biggest named on the LucasArts chopping block, with the rest of the layoffs geared mostly towards Production Services and Quality Assurance.

LucasArts stresses the company’s strength, spokeswoman Margaret Grohne assuring the world that it is not a bad sign for their upcoming titles. "We are healthy," she said. "LEGO Indie was launched on seven platforms to positive reviews, The Force Unleashed and Fracture our on track for this fall. We have a good slate of games and we have some good stuff going on in production.”

Later this year LucasArts is to release Star Wars: the Force Unleashed on all platforms, which will sell millions of units regardless of quality, and always has several other franchises that they could re-release to tap into their endless supply of money. Hell, just throwing the LucasArts Adventure Bundle onto the Nintendo DS would make them enough to pay the bills, so I don’t think this is a bad thing for fans of the company. We will be sure to keep you updated on all of the Lucas news as it develops.

Related Articles:

Lucasarts Leaves the ESA

LucasArts May or May Not Bring Back Adventure Games

Wii Homebrew Adds ScummVM