THE CRUNCH
Glen Schofield, co-creator of Dead Space, has blamed Krafton management for the problems that beset his horror game The Callisto Protocol. In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, the Striking Distance founder said the Korean publisher, best known for PUBG, promised the studio three extra months of development time and then withdrew the offer, leaving the game to ship in December 2022 instead of March 2023. "I was forced to ship the game," Schofield said, describing how the Covid pandemic repeatedly disrupted his team, with four to six staff falling ill each month and a small studio in Spain temporarily shut down.
Schofield argued Krafton was unprepared for triple-A publishing. He said the company lacked experience releasing a single-player physical game, so Striking Distance had to build an internal team to handle it. He also alleged Krafton mandated a PlayStation 4 version alongside PS5, which he said cost "another $20 million" and required sending out 200 dev kits during a global chip shortage.
According to Schofield, Krafton came to view the game as a failure financially. He said that while the publisher complained, his studio shipped 86 patches and finished all the DLC to get the game "back to where it needed to be". The Callisto Protocol had a mixed reception at launch, with criticism aimed at technical and performance issues as well as its combat design; Eurogamer's review praised its production values but found it lacked the depth and tension of Dead Space.