Rockstar Games North workers formally announced Thursday the formation of the Rockstar Games Workers Union, a part of the wider Independent Workers of Great Britain union. The union includes workers from Rockstar Games offices in Leeds, London, Edinburgh, Dundee, and Lincoln, the Rockstar Games Workers Union said in a YouTube video published on Thursday. 

Workers at Rockstar Games North had been organizing for months ahead of Thursday's announcement. If a company refuses to recognize a union, the group must have "at least 10% union membership within the proposed bargaining unit" to be officially and legally recognized, per government rules. The union reached that threshold by October, an IWGB spokesperson told Aftermath in November. It's unclear if Rockstar Games Workers Union has filed for recognition with the government labor body. (Unions in the UK, like the IWGB Game Workers Union, include members from different companies. A worker can still get union support if a union isn't officially recognized at their specific workplace. Recognition often relates to bargaining with a company.)

Aftermath has reached out to IWGB for more information.

"Together, we are organizing around the things we want to change, starting with pay transparency, flexible working hours, and an end to crunch," a representative of the union said in the video. Last year, Rockstar Games employees told Aftermath that the company's insistence on return-to-office policies was a problem for many workers. Rockstar Games, for its part, claimed the policies were related to productivity and security concerns. 

Rockstar Games is set to publish its highly-anticipated Grand Theft Auto 6 this year. The union cheekily referenced the anticipation of its release and rumors of a new trailer in the YouTube description of its video: "GTA fans have been on the edge of their seats at the rumours a new video is about to drop…," it wrote.

It was Rockstar Games' so-called security concerns that first brought the workers' organizing efforts public last year. The video posted Thursday outlines what happened over the past several months, starting with the firing of more than 30 Rockstar Games employees in October 2025 for what the company said was "discussing confidential information in a public forum," a Rockstar Games spokesperson said in a statement to Bloomberg in November. The union disagreed: It said at the time that the workers were gathered in a private Discord server with employees and union organizers—the beginnings of the union announced Thursday. The IWGB is working to fight the firings in court. Workers and outside union supporters gathered globally after the employees were fired, in front of Rockstar Games' offices, to protest what the union called union busting by Rockstar Games.. A date for a hearing has been set, a Rockstar Games Workers Union representative said in the YouTube video. 

The fallout of the workers' firings have been devastating for those impacted. The representative said in the video that workers with sponsored visas were laid off, and that Rockstar Games reported workers on sponsored visas to the UK Visas and Immigration office, forcing some people to leave their homes, families, and pets. Employers are required to report changes to employment for sponsored workers, according to UK immigration law group Cromwell Wilkes.

"We believe the [firings] were unlawful and retaliatory—connected to the workers' collective activity of organizing at Rockstar," IWGB Game Workers Union co-founder Austin Kelmore told Aftermath at the time. "This action by Rockstar came shortly after reaching 10 percent of eligible workers at Rockstar in the union."

The Rockstar Games Workers Union representative said in the video that the union is bigger and stronger than ever. The union is asking the community for financial support to fight Rockstar Games in court. At a hearing in January, the UK labor tribunal denied the fired workers interim pay during the process.

But the workers have received support from government officials; in December, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer called the firings of the unionizing workers "a deeply concerning case." He vowed to look into the matter during a parliamentary meeting, when Parliament member Chris Murray approached the group about the action.

Aftermath has reached out to Rockstar Games for comment.

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Ubisoft announced Wednesday it will close its Ubisoft Halifax studio and lay off 71 people. Ubisoft's closure of the Assassin's Creed: Rebellion and Rainbow Six Mobile studio comes just weeks after a group of 60 employees voted to unionize with Communications Workers of America's Canadian affiliate, CWA Canada. Seventy-four percent of the staff voted yes to unionize and create a wall-to-wall union including producers, designers, artists, testers, and researchers.

CWA Canada Local 30111, the chapter the Ubisoft Halifax workers joined, also includes more than a hundred workers at Bethesda Game Studios.

"Over the past 24 months, Ubisoft has undertaken company-wide actions to streamline operations, improve efficiency, and reduce costs," a Ubisoft spokesperson said in a statement to Aftermath. "As part of this, Ubisoft has made the difficult decision to close its Halifax studio. 71 positions will be affected. We are committed to supporting all impacted team members during this transition with resources, including comprehensive severance packages and additional career assistance."

The Ubisoft spokesperson did not specifically address the closure's relation—or not—to the recent union vote.

CWA Canada president Carmel Smyth said in a statement to Aftermath the union will "pursue every legal recourse to ensure that the rights of these workers are respected and not infringed in any way." The union said in a news release that it's illegal in Canada for companies to close businesses because of unionization. That’s not necessarily what happened here, according to the news release, but the union is "demanding information from Ubisoft about the reason for the sudden decision to close."

"We will be looking for Ubisoft to show us that this had nothing to do with the employees joining a union," former Ubisoft Halifax programmer and bargaining committee member Jon Huffman said in a statement. "The workers, their families, the people of Nova Scotia, and all of us who love video games made in Canada, deserve nothing less."

Ubisoft Halifax started as Longtail Studios, which was founded in the early 2000s by Ubisoft cofounder Gérard Guillemot. In 2010, several studio members were absorbed into Ubisoft, and by 2015, Ubisoft had acquired Longtail Studios entirely. That's when it became Ubisoft Halifax. Before joining Ubisoft, the studio was best known for its work on the Rocksmith franchise; under Ubisoft, it focused squarely on mobile games. Ubisoft Halifax was quickly removed from the Ubisoft website on Wednesday. IGN reported in 2023 that Longtail Studios tried to unionize in 2008, but ultimately failed. 

Ubisoft has been cutting costs over the past several years: laying off staff, canceling games, and shutting down studios. In November, Ubisoft shared in its earnings report that it intends to continue to reduce its fixed costs—to reduce costs by an additional €100 million by the 2027 fiscal year—on top of the €200 million reduction it had already enacted. Part of that reduction was a decrease of roughly 1,500 employees in the 12 months prior to the November earnings report. Not all of those departures were layoffs, however.

Ubisoft required a $1.25 billion investment from Tencent last year, too, to spin off the company's most successful franchises: Rainbow Six Siege, Far Cry, and Assassin's Creed. That initiative is called Vantage Studios, led by Charlie Guillemot and Christophe Derennes. "Vantage Studios represents a first step in Ubisoft's ongoing transformation," Ubisoft said in a news release from October.

If you were among those hoping for the tidal shift of the games industry to move in favor of workers, this news is not exactly something that will fill you with confidence in that hope. Ubisoft Halifax, the studio that developed titles like Assassin’s Creed Rebellion and Rainbow Six Mobile, officially formed a union in […]