Blizzard Hasn’t Changed According to Former WoW Designer
During a recent interview, former WoW level designer John Staats claimed that the changing leadership of Blizzard hasn’t really changed how they do things. When the leadership shifted to J. Allen Brack, many fans talked about how much the company has changed but apparently it’s untrue. The company has received a lot of heat since Brack took over as Blizzard president but it doesn’t seem like he’s the cause of Blizzard’s issues with Activision pulling the strings. Blizzard will be releasing Overwatch 2 and Diablo IV later this year for PS4, Xbox One and PC, with next gen ports likely for both titles.
“Look at the theories about Blizzard now. People think ‘Blizzard is different now’ because they’ve had a changeover. It’s just so not true. J isn’t even the CEO, you notice, he’s the company’s president. But people who don’t know the difference cannot be convinced otherwise. J Allen Brack got a lot of heat for the esports protesting controversy,” said John Staats. “It’s a perfect example of him taking the blame for what was ultimately a lawyer-driven decision. People who weren’t in Blizzard’s meetings about how Blizzard dealt with the protesters fill in the blanks them with theories that this J’s new title has changed the company.”
“Knowing how to code or paint doesn’t mean you understand the games industry, certainly not at the business level. Most devs don’t get out of their seat and walk into the CEO’s office and say, ‘hey, I was wondering why we did this,'” continued John Staats. “I noticed Blizzard employees who didn’t do that would often gossip and develop their unsubstantiated conspiracy theories, and I wrote how that negativity poisoned the WoW team during its Vanilla days. It was an incredibly contentious atmosphere some days…and all of it was based on tin-foil-hat theories. Based on the interviews I’ve conducted with devs from other companies, it happens to a lot of other studios.”
Are you surprised that a changing leadership didn’t change Blizzard much? Let us know in the comments below!
Source: wccftech