Glen Schofield on $200M Call of Duty budgets, a canceled Vietnam game, and the origin of Dead Space

Glen Schofield, the veteran developer behind Dead Space and several Call of Duty entries, is retiring from day-to-day game development. In a wide-ranging interview with GamesBeat, he opened up on topics the industry rarely discusses openly — canceled projects, nine-figure budgets, and the scrappy pitch that gave the world Dead Space.

On the canceled third-person Call of Duty set in Vietnam, codenamed Fog of War, Schofield said he spent about six months on it at Activision before management pulled the plug. Executives were "very hesitant," partly because "Vietnam was still an open wound in some people's minds." Another developer on the project described the concept as "almost like an Uncharted-meets-Call of Duty idea" — a description that lines up with what former Sledgehammer boss Michael Condrey said back in 2014, when he called it an Apocalypse Now-style take on Vietnam with a 15-minute demo that had "some great moments." The game never shipped, though Treyarch's Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War did include 1968 Vietnam flashback missions in 2020. On budgets, Schofield was unusually candid: The Callisto Protocol, his horror game with Krafton, cost around $150 million. The three Call of Duty games he led — Modern Warfare 3 (2011), Advanced Warfare (2014), and WWII (2017) — each cost more than $200 million. "Sometimes much more," he added. The Dead Space origin story is the most surprising part of the interview. EA wanted Schofield to make another James Bond game after 007: From Russia With Love. He refused, handed in his two-week notice after fielding another offer, and only stayed when EA president Paul Lee asked what it would take to keep him. Lee assumed it was money or stock options. Schofield said he just wanted to make "my own game." When he pitched the sci-fi horror concept, Lee told him flatly, "We don't make [sci-fi horror] at EA." Schofield eventually wore him down, secured a hand-picked team, and got a promise of creative independence. Schofield also took a moment to correct the record on his credit: someone edited his Wikipedia page to list him as "co-creator" of Dead Space, and he pushed back hard. "I am not. I'm the creator. That kinda sucks," he said.

Schofield's career spans some of the most commercially successful franchises in gaming history. Dead Space, released in 2008, is widely credited with revitalizing survival horror and remains one of EA's most beloved original IPs — EA Motive's remake in 2023 proved the franchise still has a strong fanbase. The Call of Duty games he worked on at Sledgehammer Games were produced during the franchise's peak commercial years, which makes the $200 million-plus budget figures less shocking in hindsight but still remarkable to hear confirmed out loud. The Callisto Protocol had a rougher landing — it launched in 2022 to mixed reviews and underperformed commercially — but the $150 million figure underlines how expensive AAA horror has become.

Schofield called retirement the "hardest decision of my life," describing game development as a "dream job" and a "dream career." He closed with a note to fans: "The fans are everything. We're nothing without the fans." No details were given about what, if anything, comes next for him professionally.