Contrasted against the ever-unsatisfactory brouhaha of Geoff Keighley’s Game Awards, the annual GDC Awards in San Francisco are an oasis: a relatively quiet night of industry professionals honoring each others’ accomplishments. This year, however, the main headlines coming out of the show were not exactly positive, though they were certainly telling: Variations on “No One Was Around To Collect Life Is Strange: Double Exposure's Award For Social Impact Following Layoffs” circulated a couple days after the show, painting a grim picture of a night meant to be celebratory. But while the broad arc of those stories was correct, they didn’t quite nail the particulars.
Though articles on sites like PC Gamer and Kotaku clarified in their body text that some former Deck Nine employees were present at GDC, a narrative prevailed that nobody who worked on Double Exposure was in the room when the big moment happened – that nothing more could’ve been done. This is incorrect.
"On the night of the GDC Awards, I was in the audience, sitting in the section meant for the general public," narrative designer Giselle Francis told Aftermath. "I was unaware that anything I had worked on had been nominated and had kind of went on a whim. When we won the award for Social Impact, and [presenter] Jay [Justice] announced that ‘The team was unable to be here this evening,’ I felt like I was going insane because I was right there! I was stunned and confused and hurt and angry. No one had told me anything. No one had given me the choice. If they had, I would have gladly gone on stage to accept the award."
I felt like I was going insane because I was right there!
Francis has publicly taken issue with the way publications and pundits framed the moment because, well, she’s not “no one.” "So often Black people are erased from our accomplishments and from the conversation,” she said on Bluesky.
On its official website, GDC says the Social Impact award is meant to recognize “a game that advances equality, justice, intersectionality, and/or sustainability, and works to positively impact the lives of its players in a meaningful way.” Though Deck Nine is not the original creator of the Life Is Strange series, a previous entry developed by the studio, Life Is Strange: True Colors, won the Games For Impact award at the Game Awards in 2021, as well as a GLAAD Media Award in 2022. Despite this impressive track record, a 2024 report from IGN suggested that management wasn’t so supportive behind the scenes and allowed a toxic work environment to fester at the studio. According to the report, Deck Nine’s C-suite “protected multiple abusive leaders, encouraged crunch, and allowed bullying of individuals advocating internally for more authentic representation in Life Is Strange."
In the past couple years, Deck Nine has been hit hard by layoffs, cutting around 30 employees in May 2023, letting go of around 20 percent of remaining staff in early 2024, and then parting ways with an unspecified number of additional employees in December 2024. "This was an extremely difficult decision and reflects the challenging times many companies in our industry are currently facing," CEO Mark Lyons said in a statement at the time of the most recent round of layoffs.
Francis told Aftermath that upon realizing that Deck Nine had failed to coordinate with current or former employees to accept the award, she began messaging members of her old team, at least five of whom were in town for GDC. It was only after Francis and others sounded alarm bells on Bluesky that Justice, the writer, game dev, and accessibility-focused consultant who presented the award, realized what was going on.
"As the presenter for the Social Impact award at the GDCAs, I was not told who the winner would be in advance. I found out as I read the teleprompter, at the same time as everyone else,” Justice told Aftermath. “I had been told in rehearsals that the – at the time, unnamed – winner would not be there, but I know Giselle, I knew she had worked on [Life Is Strange: Double Exposure], and I knew she was attending GDC this year, though I did not know she was in the audience at this time. So after I read the name I realized there was at least one person who could have accepted it. Still, with seconds to keep the show running on time, I took the award backstage and handed it off to event staff. I then checked my phone, where on Bluesky I had been tagged in a thread where another developer who worked on [Double Exposure] commented about winning the award."
Imagine what it could have done for our careers if we had been allowed to go on stage and speak? To have our faces streamed out to the thousands of people who were watching?
Justice proceeded to invite Francis and other former Deck Nine employees backstage for a photoshoot. They were then allowed to collect the award, spend the final 30 minutes of the show in the VIP section, and attend the GDC Awards afterparty, same as other nominees.
But as far as Francis is concerned, the kerfuffle still proved consequential.
“I keep thinking about all of the opportunities that were denied to us because of our exclusion,” she said. “All of us have since [we worked on Double Exposure] been laid off from Deck Nine, and most of us are still looking for jobs. I have been out of work for a year. Imagine what it could have done for our careers if we had been allowed to go on stage and speak? To have our faces streamed out to the thousands of people who were watching? To get a seat in the VIP section and actual time to mingle with the executives who might have been looking to hire?”
Another ex-Deck Nine employee who attended GDC, former staff writer Alice Camp, backed up Francis’ account of events, noting that in her estimate, at least nine current and former Deck Nine devs were present at GDC – including COO Jeff Litchford, who posted on LinkedIn about attending the conference. Further, she told Aftermath that awards show organizers let ex-employees know the next day that Deck Nine had been informed about the nomination, even as studio co-owner Lucie Lyons wrote on Bluesky that she and others “were not aware.” “So glad you were there to accept the award,” she said in response to a since-deleted post from an ex-employee.
Based on Deck Nine’s actions and Lyons’ supportive reply, ex-employees in attendance assumed that the studio was not interested in receiving the award and decided it should go to a former lead whom they felt contributed a notable amount to Double Exposure’s social impact, but who had not traveled to GDC. However, on GDC’s final day, they received word from organizers that Deck Nine wanted the award after all – and that former employees would have to return it.
"When we heard from GDC that we needed to return the award, we thought there might've been a misunderstanding, so we tried to get in contact with someone at [Deck Nine],” said Camp. “The person we got through to told us that Jeff Litchford had just gotten on the plane and wouldn't be reachable until after the deadline GDC gave us. Later, a GDC organizer clarified for us that [Deck Nine] had in fact contacted them to ask for it back, so we returned it."
“We were forced to give the award back, and… it was because [Deck Nine] demanded it,” said Francis.
Personally, I've been out of a job for an entire year.
Aftermath reached out to Deck Nine and GDC for additional details, but the former did not reply as of this publishing, and the latter declined to comment on record.
On Bluesky, Francis published the speech she would have given had she been able to come up on stage and accept the award.
"I did not prepare a speech because I did not even know we were nominated. But I am truly honored to accept this award on behalf of my amazing team,” she wrote, also thanking her narrative team colleagues by name. “When I was first getting into this industry, I was a college student, unsure of whether or not to change my major. The original Life Is Strange was one of the games that made that decision for me, so it was a full circle moment and an honor for me to get to work on this game: bruises, bumps, and all. … And to all of you out there with narrative jobs: all of these amazing people were let go, including myself. Personally, I've been out of a job for an entire year. We are all talented, award-winning writers and you won't regret having us on your team. So please, hire us. Thank you and goodnight!"
