Perfect Dark Design Director leaves the initiative

Perfect Dark Design Director leaves the initiative

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The design director of the Perfect Dark studio The Initiative has announced that he is leaving the project. Drew Murray of the Initiative announced the news on Twitter (as seen by VGC). Murray previously worked on Resistance, Ratchet & Clank and Sunset Overdrive at Insomniac Games before leaving in 2018 to help Microsoft’s first party studio. He leaves to focus on his’ life outside of work ‘and tweeted that the farewell felt bitterly sweet after working with’ ‘such a talented and experienced team’.

“The team has the vision and talent to knock the game and the franchise out of the park,” Murray tweeted regarding the future of the project, noting that the preview still gives him goosebumps. Interestingly, Murray points out that when he joined The Initiative, he was unaware that the team would be working on a Perfect Dark game.

Murray says the silver lining of this is that he will experience Perfect Dark as a fan on launch day. The Perfect Dark reload project was announced at The Game Awards in December 2020 and promises to deliver an ‘eco sci-fi’ first-person shooter. You can learn more about the game in our coverage of the revelation.

The Santa Monica studio The Initiative was unveiled by Microsoft in 2018 and famously described as ‘AAAA’ standards in mailing lists. The development team is currently led by Darrell Gallagher, a veteran of Rockstar Games, Crystal Dynamics and Activision, where he has worked on games such as GTA IV and Tomb Raider.

The lead producer of God of War Brian Westergaard and the lead author of Red Dead Redemption, Christian Cantamessa, also work at The Initiative, which is likely to contribute to Perfect Dark. It is part of Microsoft’s growing program for studios following the recent acquisition of Zenimax Media.

Jordan Oloman is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.

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