Bandai Namco Cuts Off Over 100 Jobs Over the Last Year

Near the end of 2024, Bandai Namco had cancelled some of its projects. Often, when you hear about cancellations in the gaming industry, it will be followed up by the announcement of layoffs, yet it wasn't the case for Bandai Namco.

However, it seems like the reason behind this was the old-school Japanese practice of oidashibeya. Unlike in many other countries, Japan has rather strict legal boundaries when it comes to firing employees, on top of existing societal expectations, which made lifetime employment at one company into a common practice.

This is where oidashibeya comes in. Since they can't simply fire employees without facing legal issues, they make them quit instead. To achieve this, they are placed inside rooms away from others, and given either menial tasks or nothing to do at all. According to a Bloomberg report from last year, 200 of the employees faced this unusual punishment.

Bandai Namco later denied these allegations, but the recent findings from Automaton have given more weight to the existing suspicions. The latest update on the Japan's Pension Service database makes it clear that the staff has shrunk from 1,294 employees at the start of April 2024, to 1177 as of February 2025.

Outside the unusual practices to achieve this result, such news is nothing new for the industry at this point. 2024 set a record in the history of the game industry, with nearly 15,000 people losing their jobs. Even 2025 continues this grim trend, with nearly 1,000 layoffs, which only accounts for reports with more specific numbers or estimates.