Bethesda got an unusual visitor this week. Not Todd Howard. A giant inflatable rat.
Communications Workers of America members staged a labor demonstration outside a Bethesda office, complete with “Scabby the Rat,” the inflatable rodent that has been a fixture at US union protests for decades. Red eyes, bared teeth, claws, the full package.
Next to it, organizers planted around 800 red flags. Each flag was said to represent a worker laid off since July 2025.
The action was timed around a visit from Xbox executive Asha Sharma. On the same day, Sharma posted that she had seen The Elder Scrolls VI. She praised the game’s “scale and grandeur” and said the story was “even greater.”
Why the rat showed up
Bethesda’s labor situation has been busy for years. ZeniMax QA workers unionized with CWA in 2023 after Microsoft voluntarily recognized them, making it the largest certified video game union in the US at the time. In July 2024, more than 200 Bethesda Game Studios developers followed with a “wall-to-wall” union covering multiple disciplines.
Recognition hasn’t stopped the fights over layoffs, outsourcing, return-to-office rules, and contract terms.
Microsoft has also cut deep since buying ZeniMax for around $7.5bn in 2021. Roughly 1,900 gaming jobs went in January 2024, and in May that year the company shut Arkane Austin, Tango Gameworks, and Alpha Dog Games.
