The story director of Gears of War: E-Day has reportedly been laid off by The Coalition. It happened just four days after they publicly celebrated the game going gold.
Juan Vaca joined the Vancouver studio in 2022. According to their professional background, they led “narrative teams and cross-discipline groups” and helped build E-Day‘s story “from concept to execution.”
In short, this wasn’t just someone writing dialogue. The job meant making the story work with level design, cinematics, animation, and the rest of the team.
Going gold means the studio has a finished build that is ready for release. It doesn’t mean all work stops.
Teams still handle day-one patches, certification fixes, performance work, server testing, and post-launch content. Senior story leads often stay on to plan DLC, protect franchise lore, help with marketing, or pitch the next game.
This cut is part of a bigger wave, with 268 Xbox employees affected by recent layoffs.
