Amid rumors of significant cuts within its video game sector, Amazon reportedly canceled its highly anticipated Lord of the Rings MMO. This decision comes in the wake of a massive workforce reduction that saw around 14,000 employees let go across the company.

Internal communications from Steven Boom, Amazon’s Vice President of Audio, Twitch, and Games, indicated that “substantial role reductions” were being implemented across Amazon Game Studios. Boom attributed these layoffs to a strategic shift that involved halting a considerable portion of its first-party AAA game development, particularly in the MMO genre. The exact number of employees affected in this division has not yet been disclosed.

Following this announcement, many affected employees took to social media to share their experiences, hinting that those working on the projects New World and the Lord of the Rings MMO, first revealed earlier this year, had been impacted. A concerning message from former senior gameplay engineer Ashleigh Amrine suggested that the Lord of the Rings MMO is effectively canceled. She noted in her LinkedIn post that she and her talented colleagues were part of the layoffs and expressed that everyone would have enjoyed the project.

If confirmed, this cancellation would represent the second Lord of the Rings MMO project that Amazon has abandoned. The company had previously announced a different MMO set in the same universe in 2019, which was ultimately scrapped following disputes with the Chinese conglomerate Tencent.

Regarding New World, Amazon has announced that the MMO will cease receiving updates but will remain accessible for the time being. The company assured players that servers would remain operational until at least 2026, promising to provide a minimum of six months’ notice before implementing any changes that could affect availability. Further information about the game’s future is expected to be released in the coming months.