Everybody's Gone to the Rapture-studion kickar (nästan) alla

The Chinese Room, den pyttelilla studion bakom uppskattade titlar som Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs och Dear Esther bekräftade under gårdagen att de tar en paus från spelidustrin efter att ha tvingats avskeda talanger på grund av finansiella problem. Hur länge denna paus kommer att bli står inte klart och hur den kommande planerade titeln So Let Us Melt kommer att påverkas är heller inte avslöjat. Läs hela uttalandet här eller läs en bit av det nedan.

"OK, two things. Firstly, it's not the end, just a pause. The games are still on sale, merch, soundtracks, the Dear Esther tour, all of that. We'll keep things gently ticking over: talking to fans, being on twitter, the usual stuff, just... less. We're still making The 13th Interior (formerly Total Dark) - me and Andrew and Jess, pushing that forwards until it's ready to throw a whole team at - and we've got plans (and funding) to go into a prototype period on Little Orpheus at the end of the year. So we'll still be about, just not a fully active development team for the time being.

Secondly, we're essentially artists, Jess and I, who made a hit game without realising it, and became a studio faster than we planned for. And it's been an amazing few years where we've made and released games we're very proud of, and we've worked with great people and made great friends. But we're makers, fundamentally, and our roles were increasingly making it very difficult to be practically involved in doing the things we love and we started the company to be able to do. We're taking time to figure that out; how we get to be creatives, not managing directors. That's a whole other job and skill set and lots of people do it really well and love doing it. But it's not for us - it just led to stress and burn-out and a desperate need to actually make stuff again- whether that's art, music, games, writing. So this break is a chance to reconnect with all of that, and we figure we've earned that time.

We've always been proud of being open and honest about everything, so take this, and the interview tomorrow as just that. An honest reflection of where we're at and what we want and need to do next.

Is it the end of The Chinese Room? No, I don't think so. But it's the end of a chapter, and we hope you can all be patient with us whilst we figure out what happens next."