John Schappert suddenly quit as chief operating officer at the struggling Zynga (News - Alert) gaming company on Wednesday – in a move that may be connected to him recently losing control of game development.

He wasn’t at the job for too long. Just last year, Schappert was COO at Electronic Arts (EA) before moving over to Zygna.

"We can confirm that John Schappert has left Zynga and its Board of Directors effective immediately," Zynga CEO, Mark Pincus said in a statement. "John has made significant contributions to the games industry throughout his career and we appreciate all that he has done for Zynga."

A new lawsuit filed by EA against Zygna was not the cause of the resignation, according to media reports.

It also appears the troubled Zynga may not be naming a new COO soon, as David Ko, who runs Zynga's mobile operations, and Steve Chiang, the executive vice president of games, will now report directly to Pincus, compared to formerly reporting to Schappert.

Zynga shares edged down two percent to $2.89 during after-hours trading on Wednesday, according to Bloomberg (News - Alert) Businessweek. The stock was selling for $10 during last December’s IPO.

In recent news, EA’s lawsuit against Zynga claims there was copyright infringement from Zynga’s new Facebook (News - Alert) game called “The Ville.” In fact, EA says The Ville is “an unmistakable copy" of its own The Sims Social, according to a new lawsuit filed in California federal court.

In other company news, at least seven law firms were investigating Zynga on alleged insider trading questions, TMCnet said. Two law firms actually filed a class action lawsuit, according to news reports.

In addition, Zynga recently lowered its projection for the rest of 2012. Results for the latest quarter were short of projections made by analysts. As it now stands, analysts are also saying Zynga's performance will not improve soon given – among other reasons – that it doesn’t have sufficient strength in the growing mobile gaming sector, according to news reports.

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