Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel Developer, 2K Australia, Closes

It's a sad day for sequels as 2K Australia, the studio known for developing BioShock 2 and Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, closes its doors for good.

Kotaku Australia reports that the Canberra-based studio of 2K Australia is closing its doors. 2K Australia is mainly known for developing Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel and BioShock 2, which were each popular and successful in their own right, but unfortunately weren't as widely embraced as the other entries of both series. 2K has confirmed that the entire studio is closing, which means every staff member will be losing his or her job. The high costs of operating out of Australia were supposedly the reason behind this closure. "All hands are gone," claimed an inside source. There were supposed plans to relocate the studio to Melbourne to help bring in more members, but this may have inspired many of the top members of the studio to leave, factoring into another reason why it may have closed.

Here's what a 2K representative had to say in regards to this closure:

We can confirm we have taken steps to begin the studio closure process for 2K Australia in order to better manage ongoing development costs while improving the working proximity of our creative teams. We are very grateful for the team’s valuable contributions to numerous 2K projects, and are working with affected staff to explore reassignment opportunities where possible.

While Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel and BioShock 2 both had their flaws in comparison to their predecessors, I still enjoyed them both and am sad to see them go. Sure, they weren't nearly as perfect as Borderlands 2 or the other two BioShock games were, but they weren't like most other lackluster sequels on the market and offered suitable expansions of their respected franchises.

This marks the closing of the last major AAA-level studio running out of Australia, which is a darn shame. This could also mean that we might not be seeing any more DLC for The Pre-Sequel released unless Gearbox Software continues in 2K Australia's place.