Sad news, sim racing fans: SimBin Studios, the renowned Sweedish developer of fabled sim tittles such as GTR, RACE and the free-to-play RaceRoom Racing Experience is shutting down. The studio is reportedly facing bankruptcy according to a Facebook post by former SimBin employee AnneSofie W. Madsen, resulting in staff layoffs. The FaceBook post has since been deleted.
Development on R3E is set to “continue in another setting”, however.
While this will unfortunately result in some restructuring, the situation may not be as bleak as it sounds. SimBin's Jay contacted VirtualR to clarify the situation, indicating that the majority of the SimBin team will be housed in a new studio to continue work on current and future projects:
"The actual story in short is this:
“New studio, new location, new name, (almost) the same team. Be ensured that all development on the project will continue.
More interesting news to follow soon!”
It's a shame to lose such an esteemed name in sim racing, but it will be interesting to see what the next chapter will bring – afterall, Blimey's transition to Slightly Mad Studios spawned the highly-anticipated Project CARS.