Justin Roiland is leaving Squanch Games just a month after the comedic shooter high in life would The most popular launch of Xbox Game Pass in 2022. The studio co-founder who voices many of them high in life‘s characters is currently faced two charges of domestic violence from 2020.
Squanch Games announced the news late Tuesday, shortly after Adult Swim announced that this was the case Airdrop Roiland from Rick and Morty even. But the CEO’s resignation does appear to have happened over a week ago on January 16, four days after news of the domestic violence charges first broke (to which Roiland pleaded not guilty) and three days later my city first reported on a Lawsuit 2018 The studio’s allegations of workplace harassment and discrimination (and which it settled in 2019).
“The passionate team at Squanch will continue to create games that we know our fans will love while continuing to support and improve them high in life,” the studio tweeted yesterday. Squanch Games did not immediately respond to a request for comment about why Roiland resigned, whether he was aware of any other allegations regarding him or the studio, and whether he still owns shares in Squanch.
Squanch Games was co-founded in 2016 by Roiland and former Epic Games Executive Producer Tanya Watson. Squanch Games’ early projects included virtual reality games accounting and dr Splorchy Presents: Space Heroes. This was followed in 2019 by the action platformer Trover saves the universe. Each of them drew heavily on Roiland’s vocal performances, which were strongly reminiscent of his work on Rick and Morty.
Last years high in lifeHowever, , which started as a Google Stadia exclusive, was by far the studio’s biggest game. In my city‘s own review, author Alyssa Mercante found the humor grating and felt the running gags outlasted her welcome, but was pleasantly surprised by the visual style and gunplay. The game similarly divided other critics, but audiences flocked to Xbox and PC, where it was available on Game Pass on day one.
Whether due to the game’s inherent merits or the fact that it popped up at the end of an otherwise anemic year for Xbox exclusives and blockbusters, it immediately shot to the top of the Game Pass charts. Shortly after the release, Microsoft crowned it “The largest Xbox Game Pass launch of 2022, the largest third-party Game Pass launch ever, and the largest single-player game release in the history of the service.”
This award came after a large promotional campaign for the game on the platform, including a podcast interview between human Xbox mascot Larry “Major Nelson” Hryb and Roiland, where the latter spoke about the game and its influences. That’s gone quiet now with the Xbox Game Pass Twitter account don’t tweet about it high in life since news of the domestic violence charges first broke.
