If you are a player of card games, then the name Richard Garfield is one that you are most likely very familiar with. Garfield is the creator of one of the most successful and popular card games in history: Magic: The Gathering. He was later contracted by Valve in order to work on their game Artifact. Garfield’s company, 3 Donkeys, is no longer under contract with Artifact so his role on the project has come to an end.
There is no information as to the reason behind the contract and Valve isn’t letting any information out of the bag just yet. What we do know is that there was a small layoff at Valve as 13 staff members were let go from their positions within the company but it doesn’t really give any indication if terminating the 3 Donkeys contract was a part of that business decision.
What this means for the future of Artifact remains to be seen. The game launched as a card game based off of Defense of the Ancients. Despite a rocky launch, it gained popularity in the early going but most of the people who switched to playing it have gone back to playing other similar card games that they were before.
Source: Gamasutra