Glen Schofield, the creator of Dead Space, left Activision Blizzard recently during its massive corporate shake-up. As Activision’s business decisions run the risk of being aired in public as part of the aftermath of all these lawsuits, it’s now emerged that Activision rejected original IP from Schofield - potentially one of their most profitable devs - prior to his departure.
Schofield announced his departure from Activision Blizzard on Twitter in December last year to take some time off from the industry and to try something new. Notably, he worked on a number of Activision Blizzard’s most popular Call of Duty titles (including Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare, and Call of Duty: WWII) during his time there, and the company appeared to recognize that by extending a corporate role to Schofield earlier in 2018.
Despite Schofield being offered that corporate role, he revealed in an interview with GameInformer on YouTube that Activision rejected original IP from him. Schofield noted that the company “didn’t go for it, but they should have,” on account of a worthwhile IP being difficult to chance upon and maintain. There was a prototype created by Sledgehammer at the time, but it looks like Activision Blizzard didn’t want to bite, even though Schofield and his team had been involved in some of the company’s most lucrative titles since inception, like Call of Duty: WWII.
On top of the decisions already made by Activision Blizzard since late last year, turning down a new property from one of their most prolific creators seems like it would have been a mistake. Schofield’s departure shortly after to go his own way despite Activision Blizzard’s sweetener of a corporate position along with the raft of other executives who have departed since last year seems to suggest a fundamental problem at the company with treating existing profitable talent.
This can’t be a good look for Activision Blizzard, especially with the collection of class action lawsuits headed the company’s way from investors. Considering that the basis of these upcoming lawsuits seems to be that the company was misleading investors and shareholders about information material to the value of the company and its projects, it may well be that the reason why Activision Blizzard rejected original IP from the likes of Schofield and some of its other questionable decisions become public knowledge soon enough.
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Source: GameInformer
