Netflix shuts down AAA “Team Blue” SoCal gaming studio

One of Netflix’s most intriguing video game studios is no more.

The company’s Southern California game studio, one of a handful of internal studios assembled by Netflix in recent years as part of its expansion into video games, has been shut down, Game File has learned.

The studio, also known as team “Blue,” seemed poised to break the mold of what Netflix is doing in gaming. Early hints about the team’s work suggested it was pursuing a big-budget multi-device strategy, signifying the ambitious edge of Netflix’s initial mobile-focused expansion.

As proof of that, Team Blue had made some splashy hires in the past two years:

In late 2022, Netflix wooed Overwatch executive producer Chacko Sonny from Blizzard to build its SoCal studio. (Sonny had stints on Call of Duty and Sony Santa Monica before that).

In spring 2023, Netflix’s SoCal studio added Joseph Staten, a longtime creative lead on Microsoft’s Halo franchise at Bungie and 343 Industries. Staten was exiting the Xbox camp for Netflix to work “as creative director for a brand-new AAA multiplatform game and original IP,” he said at the time. That move was widely covered in the gaming press, a sign that Netflix was very serious about this gaming thing.

That same spring, Team Blue also recruited art director Rafael Grassetti, who had nearly a decade of experience at Sony Santa Monica where he’d most recently been the God of War studio’s overall art director. 

As of October 2024, however, Netflix has shut down Team Blue and all three of those big hires are no longer at the company, a company rep confirmed to Game File.