Anno 117 Studio Among Three Ubisoft Germany Sites Facing Buyouts, Targeting ~100 Roles

Anno 117: Pax Romana maker Ubisoft Mainz is one of three Ubisoft Germany studios in talks over a new voluntary departure program that could shed around 100 staff. Game File first reported the talks on Wednesday, and GamesIndustry.biz confirmed them on Thursday morning. Ubisoft Düsseldorf, the largest of the three sites with roughly 400 workers, would absorb more than half the cuts.

The headline number: of the roughly 100 affected roles, more than 50 sit at Düsseldorf. Berlin and Mainz, the two smaller studios, account for the rest. The voluntary departure talks come just one day after Ubisoft proposed closing Trials developer RedLynx in Finland and cutting 70 roles in Singapore.

A Ubisoft spokesperson told Game File that the company “initiated discussions with the Works Council last week regarding a proposed voluntary departure plan across Ubisoft Düsseldorf, Ubisoft Berlin and Ubisoft Mainz.” A Works Council is the union-style employee representative body common in German workplaces; Ubisoft uses the term in the same sense throughout its European studios. “The voluntary plan is the primary measure being proposed to support the intended organisational changes,” the spokesperson added. Ubisoft declined to confirm a final headcount.

Of the three, Düsseldorf is the biggest, with roughly 400 staff. Berlin and Mainz have just over 100 each, per a source familiar with the talks. The cuts were announced at a town hall for the German studios last Tuesday. Benedikt Grindel, who oversees the German “zone,” followed up by email to explain that the goal was to “best position our German studios for the future, with a clearer focus on their role, capabilities, and organisational setup needed for the work ahead.”

This is the second pass in two years. In January 2025, Ubisoft cut 185 roles across its German studios, including about 65 at Düsseldorf. The company called those layoffs “essential to improve our operational efficiency and ensure the long-term sustainability of our studios.” The current round is being framed as voluntary rather than imposed. A Works Council proposal has the company paying a worker’s monthly salary multiplied by 1.5 times their tenure. The formula is still under negotiation, and Ubisoft said it “won’t comment on specific proposals while discussions are ongoing.”

The studio that may mean the most to readers is the one in the headline. Mainz is the lead studio on the Anno series and shipped Anno 117: Pax Romana in November 2025 to strong reviews. Berlin and Düsseldorf mostly operate as support studios within Ubisoft’s creative network, with credits on Rainbow Six Siege, the Rayman Legends Retold remake, The Settlers and Ubisoft-branded escape rooms.

Germany is part of a wider cost-cutting push. Ubisoft’s headcount is down from 20,729 in September 2022 to 16,590 by the end of March 2026, a 20% drop in three and a half years. The company says it has cut costs by nearly €325 million since 2022 and plans to lower them by another €180 million through 2028. Today’s announcement follows the proposed closure of Trials maker RedLynx and 70 cuts at Ubisoft Singapore earlier this week. Both moves are part of the same wave (see our Ubisoft Singapore and RedLynx coverage and the Morning Save Point roundup from Wednesday).

If you only play the games those three studios support, nothing changes for you today. But the announcement is another reminder that Ubisoft is shrinking faster than its catalogue is growing.

Our read: the German buyouts look less like a Germany problem and more like the next installment in Ubisoft’s company-wide pullback. Four overlapping cuts in roughly four months have now touched Winnipeg and Belgrade in June, Singapore and RedLynx in October, and Germany this week. Putting them side by side makes the pattern clearer:

Three signals worth watching: Mainz’s Anno 117: Pax Romana shipped in November 2025 to strong reviews, Düsseldorf’s work this year was largely co-development on Rainbow Six Siege and The Settlers, and Berlin’s payout package still has to clear the Works Council. Ubisoft’s own framing of a “clearer focus” on each studio’s role is the line to watch in the next investor call, since the company now needs to replace its lost workforce with the same shipping cadence it had in 2022.

Edited by Kerwin Stewart, Editor-in-Chief · How we report