Tag Archives: glen schofield

Visceral boss Glen Schofield’s claimed in the latest EA podcast that twice as many people played Dead Space than actually bought the game new.

The developer “did studies on sort of how many unique users there were on the PSN network and Xbox Live. And realized, you know what, there’s over three million people that have played Dead Space.

“Maybe we’ve only sold 1.5 million or whatever the number is. But there’s something there because that means that, OK, there were a lot of used sales,” said Schofield.

Thanks, Kotaku.

Visceral Games head Glen Schofield has told VG247 that EA is “not ready” to show any of the studio’s titles past Dante’s Inferno and Dead Space: Extraction, and has refused to be drawn on timing for a Dead Space 2 reveal.

“Our two big games are Extraction and Dante’s Inferno: we’re not ready to announce anything [else] yet, no,” Schofield said, talking in a phone interview.

“These two games are the games we’re really focussing on. One of the reasons we changed the [studio's] name [to Visceral] is to go, ‘We’re focussing on quality.’ So right now the focus is on getting these two games to the highest quality. The studio is really working on that.

“I think talking about anything other than that just takes the focus away from the games we’re working on.”

When asked specifically when we can expect to see Dead Space 2 announced, EA PR jumped in with a “no comment”.

Visceral said it was working on two unannounced games in May when it rebranded away from EA Redwood Shores.

Just after the rebranding announcement, Dead Space 2 was inadvertently announced via a developer LinkedIn profile, although the title has now been edited out of the CV.

Visceral GM Glen Schofield has told VG247 that the EA studio, currently developing Dante’s Inferno, isn’t blind to the fact that the Divine Comedy is a trilogy.

Inferno is followed by Paradiso and Purgatory, “so there’s at least room for two more [games] after that,” said the exec, talking in a phone interview before E3.

“And that could take you quite a long time.”

Schofield was quick to add, however, that sequels are currently far away from the Inferno team’s thoughts.

“We’re not going to make any other games unless this one comes out fantastic, and that’s the same thing with any game that we’re working on,” he said.

“We focus, focus, focus on this one, knowing that there are opportunities to make others, but nobody’s thinking about them right now.”

Dante’s Inferno releases for 360, PS3 and PSP next year.

Visceral Games boss Glen Schofield isn’t put off by the relative failure of other core Wii products – Dead Space: Extraction will do the business, he’s told GI.

“I’m confident – it is an experiment, but there’s going to be 50 million Wiis out there by the time the game comes out, so if you only hit 2 per cent of the installed base and you’ve got a huge number,” he said.

“I don’t know – there have been some already, Resident Evil and House of the Dead, that have done really well, so we’re pushing for that 80-plus-rated game, and that’ll put you in the top 5 per cent of all Wii games… because most do not have a great score.”

Extraction is out this autumn. The game’s exec producer, Steve Papoutsis, told VG247 recently that the title was needed for Wii.

“As a hardcore gamer myself, I want stuff like this on the Wii,” he said.

“I love the Wii, I love Nintendo. I love all the platforms, but I really want something that I can play co-operatively on the Wii with a friend that hits that sweet spot I think Dead Space: Extraction is in.”

Speaking to Gamespot, Visceral Games boss Glen Schofield’s confirmed that Dead Space has thus far sold 1.4 million units.

Good stuff, and great news for the IP’s continuation.

Remember: EA full-year financials tonight.

Thanks, Kotaku.

EA’s Glen Schofield is keeping his fingers crossed that Sony fortunes pick up with PS3.

Speaking with GamesIndustry.biz, Schofield never came right out and said that Sony should cut prices on its console, but that’s pretty much it.

“I’m really not sure what’s going on with Sony,” he said. “They’ve been such a great, great partner and PlayStation 2 being such a great machine that, God, I hope they get out of this and they figure it out and they’re around for a long time.”

“You know, I can’t tell them what to do. I don’t know their finances”, he added.”

With rumors of a price cut circling the globe once more, he might just get his wish.

More through the link.

EA Redwood’s Glen Schofield has told GI that he’s told EA employees that those involved with the creation of quality games at the company will survive the current round of job losses.

“People who aren’t making great games are going to lose their jobs,” said Schofield.

“But if you’re making quality and we continue to push on that, and you’re a quality person then you’re going to keep your job.”

He added: “If we continue to make great games, if we continue to push this, we’re not going to lose our jobs. Because we’re making great stuff.”

EA’s position as a major brand means the company’s a good place to be, said the exec.

“I think the fact that it’s happening all over the world, and that it’s happening in every industry, makes it a little easier because you say, look guys, we still have a job, EA’s a big brand and it’s a great company – we’re going to survive this. We’re looking to fix things. And they realize that: it’s a big, big brand.”

Redwood Studios was behind Dead Space, which did not perform at retail as well as EA had hoped.

EA Redwood Shores dev head Glen Schofield has said EA should learn from last year’s mistakes and stop bunching releases together.

“The one big thing we learned was, we came out with a bunch of new IP, actually with a bunch of new games at the same time,” he said, speaking to GI.

“Some people are calling this last year one of the best years in the history of videogames. You just had one great game after another, so we were just right in the middle of it, and you have to have a lot of money behind you to shout out.”

Wise words, Glen. He even gt a little wiser.

“I think the industry has finally gone, ‘Wow, we could probably just come out just like the movies do’. Movies launch on Christmas day, they launch blockbusters during the summer, and we’re now learning that we could probably launch a game at any time, and if it’s a good game it will be well received,” he said.

“I think that we traditionally thought that people only buy games at Christmas or around holiday time, and now we’re looking back and going, ‘You know what, GTA launched in May; Resident Evil comes out in March’.”

Speaking to Variety, Dead Space exec producer Glen Schofield has said that “everyone” at EA sees the game’s development as the route forward for the firm, with new IP being seen as vehicles for different media genres from the outset.

“People used to think of things like that as a distraction, but I think our game is stronger because of the influence of the comics and the animated movie,” said Schofield.

“Everyone internally is looking at Dead Space as the model now because there’s just so much content that we’ve generated.”

The concept is being called “IP cubed” at the firm, with brand new properties being the way to go, apparently.

“We found a few years ago that we had a set of problems where EA’s reputation became one of just doing sports games, sequels, and licenses and the market was reacting to newer properties like Grand Theft Auto and Halo,” added EA Games president Frank Gibeau.

“At the same time, movie and sports licensors started jacking up their rates and it was becoming less profitable to chase licenses.”

Full thing through the link. Thanks, 1UP.

Speaking to Variety, Dead Space exec producer Glen Schofield has confirmed that a Dead Space sequel is in the works.

There’s no detail on what to expect from the next in the horror series there, but it’s heartening to know nonetheless.

Apparently there’s going to be another Army of Two, as well: hit the link for more.

Speaking to Edge, Dead Space exec producer Glen Schofield admitted that the development team studied images of car crashes and war corpses to create “convincing” models of dead people in the game.

“This sounds horrible, but we had to go look at pictures of car accidents and war scenes and things like that because we had to get it right; we had to portray scenes of terrible carnage and realism,” he said.

“It’s a big part of making that experience convincing.”

Schofield said he threw back the team’s first attempts at corpses in the game for not being realistic enough.

“We knew this would be difficult to portray, because sometimes gore in games looks cheap and unrealistic,” he said. “Sure enough, the first few corpses that we did, just weren’t convincing enough. I rejected them.”

More through there.

According to this GamePlayer story, EA’s planning to offer the Dead Space engine as middleware.

The news comes from the game’s producer, Glen Schofield. Apparently:

The engine’s origins are in From Russia with Love and The Godfather game, but soon after that open-world mafia hit was released the engine was taken internally within the Dead Space studio and worked on for two and half years.

Glen was very excited about what the engine can offer, and how malleable it is. Lawyers are currently on the job sorting out the legalities of officially naming the engine and an announcement on this will be made soon. The engine is already being used in the creation of The Godfather 2 video game, and following the completion of the naming process, Glen hopes the engine will become a key tool across multiple upcoming games and openly invited his compatriots to come and take a look.

Plenty more through there.

There’s a new Dead Space developer diary after the break detailing the game’s use of gravity, or lack of it. Every time we see this it looks better. There’s lot of leaping around on floors and ceilings in there, and the promise of necromorphs specific to both with and without gravity situations.

Dead Space is out at the end of October for PC, PS3 and 360.

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So. Want. This. The footage after the link show upcoming EA horror Dead Space is stunning form, detailing how protagonist Isaac need to “get creative” with weapons to tear enemies limb from limb.

The game looks gory, frightening and superbly childish. Bring it. It’s out for PC, 360 and PS3 on Hallowe’en.

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After the link. Watch executive producer Glen Schofield talk about story structure and how the Dead Space’s gameplay had to fit around it. Dead Space is one of this year’s hottest prospects as far as we’re concerned, so take a look.

It releases for PC, PS3 and 360 on October 31.

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Dead Space executive producer Glen Schofield has told videogaming247 that the promising new EA horror game is likely to just be the start of an ongoing series.

“We can definitely do more with this world,” he said. “And I’d love to.”

Dead Space – currently in development in California and set for release 360, PS3 and PC on Hallowe’en this year – is already surrounding itself with cross-media properties, including a graphic novel and recently confirmed cartoon film.

“We have written a huge story with a rich universe and characters,” said Schofield. “That’s why we have a comic series and an animated feature.”

But the focus right now is on getting the game out of the door, the dev lead was at pains to point out, and not on what comes next.

“We are completely focused on this game,” he said. “Right now every waking moment is dedicated to Dead Space.”

Hit the link for the rest of Glen’s answers to our questions, including confirmation that the game will be HUD-free and the “complete misquote” regarding the use of pause during play.

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