The Callisto Protocol

Partner studio: Puny Human

Concept

Set on a maximum-security prison moon of Jupiter in 2320, players fight to escape Black Iron Prison as an infection tears through its population. Built by a studio founded by the co-creator of Dead Space, the game leans hard on cinematic presentation, dense environmental detail and a deliberate, tactile combat model — a technically demanding target to hold across five platforms spanning two console generations.

Requirement

The partner needed additional senior capacity across engineering, technical art and build infrastructure through the closing stretch of production, with the ability to add contract developers quickly and task them without a long ramp. Work had to be coordinated across a distributed vendor network spanning California, Spain, Virtuos and Free Range Games, and had to hold through certification, launch and the post-launch patch cycle.

Approach

A vendor team was stood up and managed end to end — contracts secured, renewals negotiated, and contract developers hired and onboarded directly into the client's pipeline.

Engineers worked on gameplay, platform and systems code alongside game and render performance optimization across the console and PC targets. Technical art covered sequencing, rigging, animation and level design. In parallel, the DevOps practice worked directly with the client's own DevOps team to extend the game development pipeline on Amazon AWS.

A dedicated vendor project manager sat between the client's producers and the wider partner network, keeping tasking, priorities and dependencies visible on both sides.

Delivery scope

• Gameplay engineering
• Platform and systems programming
• Game and render performance optimization
• Sequencing and cinematics
• Character rigging
• Animation
• Level design
• Build engineering
• DevOps and cloud engineering (AWS)
• Vendor and contract staffing management
• Cross-partner coordination

Results

• 13-month engagement, March 2022 to March 2023, spanning final production, launch and post-launch support
• 100–140 person-months delivered, at a peak of 8–12 embedded developers
• Shipped across five platforms: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, Xbox One and PC
• Client CTO: “They integrated seamlessly with the team at Striking Distance enabling almost instant tasking on the project.”
• Client Senior Technical Producer: “…can always be counted on to deliver their work on time and to the highest of quality.”
• Onboarding to productive tasking measured in days rather than weeks

Engine: Unreal Engine 4.