SOCOM 4 Lead Designer Departs Zipper For New Startup

Longtime Zipper Interactive employee and SOCOM 4 lead designer Travis Steiner has left the company for an unnamed startup just after the game's release last week. News of the departure appears on Steiner's LinkedIn page and was confirmed in a tweet from Zipper senior community manager Jeremy Dunham. "We all wish him the best!" Dunham writes. After graduating from Seattle's Digipen Insititute, Steiner worked as a designer at Sierra Entertainment, contributing to titles including SWAT 3. He took a position at Zipper in 2003, before the company's 2006 acquisition by Sony, working on the SOCOM series as well as the multiplayer shooter MAG. In 2008, Zipper tools engineer Greg Chudecke left the company to form startup Caffeinated Games.