‘Maybe I’ve directed my last game’: Dead Space creator Glen Schofield says a new AAA game ‘feels a long ways away’
Schofield also directed The Callisto Protocol, before leaving his studio after poor sales
Dead Space creator and Callisto Protocol director Glen Schofield has said that he may have directed his last game as he struggles to fund his next project.
Schofield – who founded Striking Distance in 2019 to create a new game in the PUBG universe, which evolved over time into The Callisto Protocol – has suggested he may be done directing games, due to the difficulty in finding financial backing.
“Game industry, it’s tough out there,” Schofield wrote on LinkedIn, explaining that an idea he had been working on with his daughter – herself a developer with eight years’ experience – wasn’t being picked up.
“Over the past eight months, I’ve been quietly working with my daughter, Nicole, on a new game idea. She came to me with it, and I immediately loved the idea. Something I hadn’t seen before. We’ve been calling it a new sub-genre of horror—not just horror, but something more.”
However, he explained: “We pulled the budget down to $17 million, built a prototype with a small, talented crew, and started taking meetings. People loved the concept. We got a lot of second and trhid meetings. But early feedback was ‘get it to $10 million’. Lately, that number’s dropped to $2-5 million.
“So last month, we decided to walk away. Some ideas are better left untouched than done cheap. We had a team of six here in the States and a full crew in the UK. Now, everyone’s looking for work. They’re all talented folks – if you’re hiring, let me know.”
Schofield concludes by saying he thinks AAA development “feels like it’s a long ways away” for him, and that he’ll go back to making art.
“I miss it all – the team, the chaos, the joy of building something for fans,” he wrote. “I’m still around, making art, writing stories and ideas and still cheering the industry on. But maybe I’ve directed my last game. Who knows? If so, thank you [for] playing my games.”
The Callisto Protocol received mixed reviews when it was released in December 2022, a month before EA released a critically acclaimed Dead Space remake, and reportedly failed to meet Krafton’s sales expectations. Schofield left Striking Distance in September 2023.
Schofield’s daughter Nicole was one of many developers laid off from Striking Distance Studios this year.
Striking Distance’s most recent release was October’s roguelike Callisto Protocol spin-off, Redacted, which the studio said was developed by a small team, alongside its next full-scale game, which has yet to be announced.
