Elder Scrolls Online lead says Xbox's layoffs aren't the reason the MMO is switching over to smaller updates: "Seasons is not in any way a response to that"

Last week, The Elder Scrolls Online studio Zenimax Online revealed in the game’s 2026 roadmap that it’s ditching the huge, annual expansions it’s been doing for years in favor of smaller, seasonal updates every three months. It’s not an unprecedented move by any means, with fellow Xbox Game Studios developer Rare taking Sea of Thieves in a similar direction a few years back. That said, with Microsoft’s brutal layoffs last year still fresh on the memory, it’s hard not to question… why now? After 11 years, why now?

Well, we don’t really have a hard answer to that question (Zenimax Online has said it’s to allow for “greater choice and variety”), but according to ESO executive producer Susan Kath, it has nothing to do with Microsoft’s downsizing, which heavily impacted Zenimax Online and resulted in the cancelation of what would’ve been its first new project in 12 years, Blackbird.