You would have hoped that, ever since Midway and a sizable number of the company’s assets were bought by Warner Bros., news of corporate drama would be reduced by at least 80 percent, but unfortunately this is simply not the case.

It’s being reported that all 60 employees at Midway’s corporate offices in Chicago are to be let go, which represents roughly 20% of Midway’s worldwide. The affected employees have been given 60 days notice as of Monday this week, as the layoffs are said to be in effect from the beginning of September.

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Midway’s head of corporate communications, Geoff Mogilner has confirmed to Gamasutra that the publisher’s UK studio, Midway Newcastle, has unfortunately been closed, affecting some 80 employees who worked there. Mogilner said:

“We can confirm that we closed the Newcastle studio unfortunately. We had a period of time that was required by UK law to notify the employees of the pending studio closure.”

“During that time, we made every effort to find a buyer for the studio, and we were unfortunately unsuccessful at that. Today was when we had to close the studio.”

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After a sale and bid procedures motion was filed by Midway in late May, which served to notify potentially interested third-parties that a sale to Warner Bros. (a subsidiary of Time Warner, Inc.) was imminent, giving those third-parties an opportunity to put in their own bid for Midway and its assets, it appears as though Warner Bros. has emerged as the sole bidder before the deadline for new bids recently expired.

Now, with a bid of $33 million, Warner Bros. stand to secure ownership of a vast majority of Midway’s assets, including the Mortal Kombat, Spy Hunter, Joust and Wheelman franchises, as well Midway’s development studios in Chicago and Seattle.

The fate of Midway’s Newcastle and San Diego offices, which are not included in the deal, remains unclear at this time.

Before Warner Bros. can officially claim ownership of the agreed upon assets, however, several creditor complaints will need to be resolved, including one by Threshold Entertainment’s Larry Kasanoff, who produced two Mortal Kombat films and still claims possession of the franchise’s big-screen and TV distribution rights, and another complaint by the Vin Diesel-owned Tigon Studios, which claims it is owed $200 000 for Diesel’s work in Wheelman.

Last week Midway Newcastle took the wraps off their new crime noir detective story Necessary Force. While the debut trailer impressed, we were left wondering whether the game would see the light of day given that the studio needs to find financial backing for the project or a buy out within the next two weeks or face closure.

The game’s website has since been updated with a very interesting artwork section, so why not head over to www.necessaryforcegame.com to check it out. Hit the jump for a sampling of the artwork and let us know how you think the game is shaping up.

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A new game from Midway Newcastle (Wheelman, Test Drive), Necessary Force, has been revealed in debut trailer form as a kind of crime noir detective story set in an open-world, which looks to be a mash-up of Max Payne, Condemned and Grand Theft Auto.

Only really showing glimpses of in-game content, while the rest is filled in with concept art, the trailer still manages to impress with the direction the game seems to be taking, and the mood conveyed through even still images.

Watch the trailer for Necessary Force, and read about the plight of Midway Newcastle, below:

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