Eidos Montreal founder leaves over 'lack of leadership' from Square Enix

The founder and general manager of Eidos Montreal has departed from the studio, citing irreconcilable differences with Square Enix Europe's management. Stephane D'Astous gave a statement to Polygon explaining his departure.

"Since last year's financial short-coming performance of Square Enix Europe, we (HQ London and GM Eidos Montreal) have had growing and divergent opinions on what needed to be done to correct the situation," D'Astous said. "The lack of leadership, lack of courage and the lack of communication were so evident, that I wasn't able to conduct my job correctly. I realized that our differences were irreconcilable, and that the best decision was unfortunately to part ways."

Square Enix reorganized much of its Western leadership last month. Former Deus Ex: Human Revolution executive producer David Anfossi will succeed D'Astous as GM of Eidos Montreal, which is currently working on Thief.

D'Astous founded the studio in 2007 as part of Eidos Interactive. Eidos' operations were acquired by Square Enix in April 2009 and folded into its nascent Square Enix Europe group.

Connor Sheridan

I got a BA in journalism from Central Michigan University - though the best education I received there was from CM Life, its student-run newspaper. Long before that, I started pursuing my degree in video games by bugging my older brother to let me play Zelda on the Super Nintendo. I've previously been a news intern for GameSpot, a news writer for CVG, and now I'm a staff writer here at GamesRadar.