NCsoft Clarifies Austin's Future News

Following a few days of rumours and speculation, NCsoft has today finally clarified the situation surrounding its studio in Austin, Texas. Despite rumours of closure, the outfit will be cutting 21 positions relation to, "products which we have not previously announced and were in prototype phases."

In addition, some of the redundancies are coming from the Dungeon Runners team, although NCsoft has clarified that this is mainly down to the decision not to take the title to other platforms for now (we assume the PlayStation 3 was scheduled to receive a port of the game following the multi-title deal between SCE and NCsoft).

Earlier this week, rumours had suggested that Dungeon Runners was shutting down entirely, along with a move for Tabula Rasa to NCsoft's Arena.net studio in Washington. Instead, the Richard Garriott sci-fi is today receiving what has been described as a 'substantial update' today, which will no doubt delight the MMO's hardened subscriber base.

The full statement issued by NCsoft is as follows:

"We are announcing that 21 positions are being eliminated in the Austin office of NCsoft in the area of product development. Primarily this is related to products which we have not previously announced and were in prototype phases. We are also cutting some positions on the Dungeon Runners team after deciding not to port the client to other platforms at this time."