CD Projekt has confirmed layoffs for its Project Sirius team, with five members at Warsaw headquarters being asked to leave, alongside four others in the Boston office. Nine others were invited to apply for other internal postings, showcasing a notable reduction in manpower working on the project, per IGN.

It’s rather disappointing to talk about layoffs on a team working on something as exciting as a multiplayer Witcher spin-off. What makes it worse is that this isn’t the first time that the team has faced layoffs (and that’s not even getting into the “new framework” for the title, which sounds like a development reboot).

What this means for Project Sirius remains to be seen, as The Witcher 4 and the sequel to Cyberpunk 2077 will remain priorities for the studio. There’s also The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt’s Songs of the Past expansion (which is set to premiere its first look at Gamescom Opening Night Live on August 25th) and The Witcher 1 Remake that are likely taking up time and resources.

All the studio had to say on the subject was that it had “adjusted the size of the Sirius team to reflect the project’s needs at this stage of development”, which we can only assume is that it isn’t too high on its list of priorities. Stay tuned for updates, as always, on what’s next with the troubled project.