Dead Space Creator Glen Schofield Retires After 35 Years in Games Industry
Glen Schofield, the executive producer behind 2008’s Dead Space and a driving force behind three Call of Duty titles, has announced he is stepping away from day-to-day game development after 35 years in the industry. Schofield shared the news in a video he posted to LinkedIn, saying, “After 35 years of making games and directing them and running teams, it’s time for me to officially retire from the day-to-day work.”
The four-minute clip, posted to his LinkedIn account, has been corroborated by multiple outlets including PC Gamer, GamesRadar+ and Shacknews, all of which independently reviewed the same video and confirmed its contents. Schofield broke the news of his retirement on LinkedIn, with a video reflecting on his 35 years in the games industry and thanking his peers, friends, and family.
From Barbie: Game Girl to Dead Space’s Birth at Visceral Games
While Schofield is best known for Dead Space and three Sledgehammer Call of Duty games, his credits list is long and reaches as far back as 1991. As art director, he’s worked on titles as varied as The Ren and Stimpy Show: Buckeroo$! and Barbie: Game Girl, and as a director he worked on Blood Omen 2: Legacy of Kain and two Gex games.
His defining achievement arrived in 2008, when he served as executive producer on Dead Space at EA’s Visceral Games, a title that helped redefine the survival-horror genre for a new console generation. He created and executive produced the 2008 sci-fi horror masterpiece Dead Space under EA, and he co-directed and produced Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, and Call of Duty: WWII during his time with Sledgehammer Games and Activision.
Sledgehammer Games and the Call of Duty Years
After leaving Visceral, Schofield co-founded Sledgehammer Games with Michael Condrey, a studio that would go on to helm three mainline entries in Activision’s flagship shooter series. In his farewell video, he singled out that partnership for gratitude, thanking Activision “for allowing him to lead development on three different Call of Duty titles.”
Schofield’s later chapter proved more turbulent. He went on to found Striking Distance Studios to build The Callisto Protocol, a spiritual successor to Dead Space that arrived in 2022 to a mixed reception. His career took a slight dip with his latest release, The Callisto Protocol, a 2022 survival horror game developed by Schofield’s Striking Distance Studios that wasn’t generally well-received. He departed the studio he co-founded not long after, and reportedly spent the following years trying to secure funding for new projects without success.
“A Front Row Seat to One of the Greatest Creative Explosions in History”
Throughout the video, Schofield struck a reflective and grateful tone rather than a bitter one. “The past couple of decades have been some of the greatest times in videogames,” Schofield said. “Some of the best games have come out over these times, [from] some of the greatest talent in the world I’ve been able to work with. I thank you all. I had a front row seat to one of the greatest creative explosions in history, I think.”
He also had specific words for the people who backed him through decades of shipping games. “To my close friends and family, and people who have stood by me, patted me on the back, listened to my crazy ideas, thank you so much,” Schofield said. “To the fans: you’ve supported me, you let mine and my teams’ games into your homes. You told me when I was good and you told me when I wasn’t so good. But you made me better. Thank you so much.”
Retiring Amid an Industry Reckoning With Layoffs and AI
Schofield’s exit lands at a fraught moment for AAA development. Tens of thousands of development roles have been shed since 2022, as the industry is eroded by the popping of the COVID bubble, ballooning development costs, lengthening production cycles, and the delusional goals of executives. That backdrop is one Schofield has spoken about candidly in recent years, including his own struggles to get new projects greenlit after leaving Striking Distance.
Despite the industry’s rocky footing, he closed his farewell message on an optimistic note aimed squarely at the developers who will carry the torch forward. Despite all available evidence, Schofield says the future is bright: “This is an amazing industry with so many talented people,” he said. “And I know times are tough right now, but man, the future ahead is really, really bright. And I wish you all the next generation of game makers the best of luck. Explore, experiment, enjoy. And don’t forget that the most important thing is the idea.”
What Schofield Leaves Behind for Horror and Shooter Fans
For a generation of horror fans across Australia and New Zealand who grew up with Isaac Clarke’s necromorph-infested Ishimura, Schofield’s name is inseparable from one of the genre’s most influential titles. He had, in recent years, publicly pushed EA to consider a fourth mainline Dead Space, though those pitches never progressed past the discussion stage. Glen Schofield’s last game was 2022’s The Callisto Protocol, which was developed by Striking Distance Studios.
Whether Dead Space itself sees a true fourth entry now rests entirely with EA and whichever studio it might assign to the franchise, with Schofield no longer steering its future. His retirement closes out a career that began with a licensed Barbie tie-in and ended with him having shaped some of the most recognisable horror and shooter IP of the last two console generations.
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