At least 20 former developers from Striking Distance Studios aren’t listed in the credits for The Callisto Protocol. Speaking to GamesIndustry, multiple ex-staffers across various departments at the studio say their names have been left out of the December 2022 game’s nearly 20-minute long credit roll.
According to those former employees, some staff who left the title mid-production have been listed as “additional help” in specific departments, while others were vaguely grouped in a “miscellaneous” section. Others are gone completely.
Crediting developers has been a longstanding issue in games, and developers such as Sony Santa Monica and Obsidian Entertainment have recently been called out for respectively not crediting audio or localization staff.
In April 2022, the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) released credit standards stating that an employee who worked at a studio for minimum 30 days qualifies for credit inclusion, as do contractors. Additionally, the IGDA also stressed that a studio cannot remove an employee’s name if that person left the studio before the game’s launch.
One developer told GamesIndustry that Striking Distance may have been “playing favorites” with who was credited properly and who was not. “My impression is that they pretty much picked people they liked or had some sort of relationship with, and those would get credit and the others wouldn’t.”
For other ex-Striking Distance members, being left out of The Callisto Protocol’s credits came as a complete surprise. Many said they had positive experiences working there, and thought the feeling was mutual. To one developer, learning their name was left out of the credits came across as incredibly personal.
“It felt like obvious F-U,” they said. “Somebody wanted to send a message, and the message was, ‘Next time have a bit more loyalty to us.'”
GamesIndustry’s report has more to say on The Callisto Protocol’s credits omissions, and the alleged tension at Striking Distance Studios between calling itself “people first” and allowing crunch to happen during the game’s development.