Have you ever heard of “Oidashi Beya” before? Becauseaccording to Bloomberg, about 200Bandai Namcoemployees have become very familiar with the concept.Almost half of them have already quitbecause of it.
The easiest way to explain oidashi beya, or “expulsion rooms”, is in the context of Japanese law. To be brief, Japanese companies are heavily incentivized against firing people - but these laws don’t (and realistically, can’t) stop people from quitting.
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So, if a company like Bandai Namco wants to downsize their workforce… that’s where the expulsion chamber comes in. They make work harder to bear, andmake employees want to quit.
Bandai Namco has had an interesting past couple years, in terms of game releases. Most notable among them isElden Ring, a game that’s more than cemented its place in the cultural canon of fantastic games.
Most recently, they also publishedDragon Ball: Sparking! Zero, which sold 3 million units in its first 24 hours. And with that release fresh in their minds,Bandai Namco saw fit to deploy the ‘expulsion rooms.’
About 200 employees have allegedly been sent there so far, with half having already left, and the other half holding on. These employees are given largely useless work, if any at all, in the hopes that chronic boredom drives them away.
The psychological effects of “boreout” are well known at this point, enough so for corporations to weaponize the practice. If you think that a lazy work day/week/month sounds pleasant,depression and anxietymay disagree.
Bandai Namco Responds to Claims of Expulsion Rooms
According to Bandai Namco, their workplace practices area result of canceling projects, and waiting for new jobs to arrive.
“Our decisions to discontinue games are based on comprehensive assessments of the situation."
Once news of this practice reached Bloomberg, they got a reply from a Bandai Namco representative.
“Some employees may need to wait a certain amount of time before they are assigned their next project, but we do move forward with assignments as new projects emerge,”
It’s not an unlikely story - despite recent successes, Bandai Namco has been cost-cutting, canceling projects and refocusing efforts.
The Bloomberg article describes several unfinished projects, including an unnamed project “commissioned by Nintendo Co.”
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Based on these statements, Bandai Namco does appear to have a large portion of its workforce waiting around, anticipating a new project that may or may not arrive.
Whether this sentiment is true, or if it crosses a line into Oidashi Beya, remains to be seen. A statement like that indeed reads like something that would appease a judge, but employees have a different experience.
Despitemultiple recent leaksfrom Nintendo’s end, we still have no indication what the mysterious commissioned project involved.
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