Gas Powered Games had several games canned last minute

Gas Powered Games' sudden financial troubles, which resulted in the layoff of most of the team, may have been caused by the termination of several nearly-completed projects.

"There's multiple games that we got almost to the finish line on," studio head Chris Taylor said. "We got a phone call from the publisher and they said, 'We're terminating.' And we're like, 'Yeah but we're only a month away from beta!' And they're like, 'Yeah we're still terminating.'"

Speaking to Eurogamer, Taylor said the cancellations forced the developer to turn to Kickstarter for Wildman. And with initial response tepid at best, Taylor had to examine other options.

"GPG is in a very interesting situation, as we had enough money to get us through to the end of the campaign," Taylor said in a recent Reddit AMA. "What became obvious by day four is that the campaign was going so poorly there was no way it was going to happen."

Taylor has started hiring a few of the team back, now that the project has picked up a bit of momentum on Kickstarter, with slightly more than $300,000 of its $1.1 million goal with 24 days left. But he said they are aware of what will happen if the goal is not met. "They have a very clear picture of the risks and had the weekend to think clearly about what they wanted. Some people have chosen to move on, and those who stay know that the future is uncertain."