Glen Schofield, director of the upcoming The Callisto Protocol as well as producer for several Call of Duty titles, is being called out for overworking his studio.
His current role is CEO of Striking Distance Studios, which is working on The Callisto Protocol. Scheduled for a December 2, 2022 release, it seems that Schofield and the rest of the development team are on crunch time to make it to release.
In a now deleted tweet, Schofield said “I only talk about the game during an event. We r working 6-7 days a week, nobody's forcing us. Exhaustion, tired, Covid but we're working. Bugs, glitches, [performance] fixes. 1 last pass thru audio. 12-15 hr days. This is gaming. Hard work. Lunch, dinner working. U do it cause ya luv it.”
This has since gathered attention from a lot of audience, most of which disagree with his sentiment.
.@GlenSchofield has never met a person or heard of power dynamics
it's you, genius. you're forcing people
"we break ourselves because we love it!" shouts man who can, at a whim, fire anyone who doesn't, and thinks it will have no effect on people who refuse pic.twitter.com/lDGqglHA6G
— christina 死神 (GAY) (MILF) (@chhopsky) September 3, 2022
Have you considered letting your employers enjoy life rather than abusing them @GlenSchofield?
You claim they do it because they love it, but the reality is that they do it because you'd quickly punish them if they didn't. The game industry way. They are being forced implicitly.— Chris Wray (@TheChrisWray) September 3, 2022
This, from a studio head, is crunch culture defined. Of course nobody is “forced” to work insane hours. But imagine the reduced bonuses and lack of promotion opportunities if you don’t? “You do it because you love it.” Weaponized passion. This is why people burn out of gaming pic.twitter.com/seyE7tkPuf
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) September 3, 2022
Shortly after, the CEO has posted a follow-up apology tweet that read “Anyone who knows me knows how passionate I am about the people I work with. Earlier I tweeted how proud I was of the effort and hours the team was putting in. That was wrong. We value passion and creativity, not long hours. I'm sorry to the team for coming across like this.”
Glen Schofield is credited as the creator and executive producer for Dead Space, and co-director and producer for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (2011), Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, and Call of Duty WWII. He has worked in a wide genre of games, from lead artist of Barbie: Game Girl, game director of Gex 3: Deep Cover Gecko, and now director for The Callisto Protocol, Striking Distance Studio's first game.
On the official Striking Distance Studios website, Glen Schofield is described to be “[managing] the overall operations and resources of the company, while also taking creative lead on the development of Striking Distance’s new survival horror game, The Callisto Protocol.” The website also mentions a “People First” value that only adds to the irony. It reads “Everything starts with the people who make our games and the fans we make them for. Within our studio and community, we strive for an environment of mutual respect and trust, diversity, and creative courage.”
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