Gonzo Hiring Back to Life

It looks like Gonzo managed to not only slow down its staff-cutting freefall that began at the end of 2008, dragging the studio down the dreaded "corporate restructuring" path. But maybe - just maybe - the tables are turning and Gonzo is coming back to life, with a rejuvenated staff. Hopefully one that will be capable of animating more than just some random game cinematics (like they did for BlazBlue, Super Street Fighter IV and even Crackdown 2, in the past year).



This week's good news comes by way of Gonzo's official website, whose "Jobs" section is now listing several openings for animation production staffers. The company is hiring animation runners, one "international production operations assistant" fluent in English, "enthusiastic" in-between animators, production desk managers, and designers. All of these, for upcoming "TV series as well as theatrical films".

Gonzo was last known to work on an anime project for Spring 2011, one that would take advantage of the new stereoscopic 3D televisions. Early character designs for this (or another?) project were displayed by Gonzo at this year's Tokyo International Anime Fair, back in March. And the same event also saw the announcement of a "Cheer Figu!!" character project, with Gonzo credited alongside the project's main creation studio Dogakobo (who, at the time, could not say if Cheer Figu!! would also become an anime).

Furthermore, rumor has it that there's a rumor about a possible Solty Rei anime sequel being rumored, allegedly... But take that with a grain of salt and a cold beer to go with it. The point is, anyway, that there may be a whole lot going on in Gonzo's backyard that we don't know about. Yet.