Callisto Protocol Director Takes Responsibility for Crunching Staff
Callisto Protocol director Glen has addressed his tweet where he proudly celebrated his team crunching towards the finish line on The Callisto Protocol. The director now says it was his fault for putting the team through crunch.
In September, Schofield in a now-deleted Tweet said he was proud of his team working "6-7 days a week" and after hours in order to finish The Callisto Protocol, a new survival horror game from the studio.
"The truth is, I messed up," Schofield says in an interview with Inverse. "We're a small-ish team and we were so good about it through the entire development, but at the end I messed up and we worked more than we should have. That one got away from us," Schofield admits.
The director also says that the backlash that followed his September tweet was "educational' and that he hopes it will serve as a "catalyst for change overall."
Much has been written about the practice of crunch in the video game industry. It is typically defined as when developers are asked to work overtime, in excess, for a concentrated period of time. While previously looked at by some in the industry as a rite of passage, the practice has come under intense scrutiny and is said to be a reason for why the video game industry has such a high-turnover rate among employees.
Schofield promises that crunch is "not a thing that happens in our next project or any future project."
The Callisto Protocol is a spiritual successor of sorts to Dead Space, which Scofield also created. It is set to be released on December 2 and you can read our hands-on preview of the survival horror game on IGN.
Matt T.M. Kim is IGN's News Editor. You can reach him @lawoftd.
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