Battlefield studio DICE loses creative director Craig Morrison

11.03.2024 - 21:37 / videogameschronicle.com / Respawn Entertainment / Laura Miele / Vince Zampella / Marcus Lehto / Byron Beede / Tom Ivan

The Battlefield series has lost another high-profile figure in the form of Craig Morrison, who has left his role as studio creative director at EA‘s DICE.

According to his LinkedIn profile, the veteran game designer departed the Battlefield maker last month to take on the same role at Blue Scarab Entertainment, a new studio also based in Stockholm, Sweden.

Previously, Morrison spent nine years at Funcom, including serving as creative director of its Montreal studio, and almost eight years at Blizzard, including two as a principal designer on World of Warcraft.

He joined DICE as a creative director in August 2021, before being promoted to studio creative director the following year.

Three months after Morrison started at DICE, EA announced its intention to create a “connected Battlefield universe” alongside widespread changes to the franchise’s development structure.

As part of these plans, former creative director Lars Gustavsson left DICE after 22 years, while Respawn and Infinity Ward co-founder Vince Zampella took on a new role as the overseer of the entire Battlefield franchise.

EA confirmed last month that it had closed Ridgeline Games, the studio formed in 2021 to work on a future Battlefield single-player game.

The announcement came shortly after the studio’s co-founder, Halo co-creator Marcus Lehto, left the company for apparent personal reasons.

In a statement published alongside the announcement of nearly 700 company-wide layoffs, EA Entertainment president Laura Miele said Criterion Games, the studio behind recent Need for Speed games, would now oversee Battlefield’s next single-player experience.

“Our vision for Battlefield is ambitious and exciting,” she said. “The project is making meaningful progress, thanks to the strong leadership of Vince Zampella and Byron Beede and dedicated studios committed to building a Battlefield platform our fans will love.

“Today, we have the largest Battlefield team in the franchise’s history, with passionate people in place across the globe and our studios organised to benefit from both franchise and local leadership.”

EA announced last year that DICE would serve as co-developer on the Battlefield single-player campaign that was then in the works at Ridgeline Games.

It also said DICE was working on a future multiplayer experience for the franchise, while LA-based Ripple Effect was creating a completely different Battlefield project.