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Activision Blizzard fires almost 800 employees
Activision Blizzard published its quarterly earnings for 2018. The company achieved a record turnover, but at the same time 8 percent of the employees were made redundant, which is 800 people out of 9600 employees.
They announced in their publication of the quarterly figures that it is increasingly going to focus on its largest franchises with titles like Call of Duty, Candy Crush, Overwatch, Warcraft and Diablo. Mostly, staff are dismissed that is not directly involved in the development of games. According to sources of game site Kotaku there is cut in the publishing and e-sports divisions.
“Over the last few years, many of our non-development teams expanded to support various needs,” Blizzard president J. Allen Brack said in a note to staff around 1pm PT that was obtained by Kotaku. “Currently staffing levels on some teams are out of proportion with our current release slate. This means we need to scale down some areas of our organization. I’m sorry to share that we will be parting ways with some of our colleagues in the U.S. today. In our regional offices, we anticipate similar evaluations, subject to local requirements.”
The letter also promised “a comprehensive severance package,” continued health benefits, career coaching, and job placement assistance as well as profit-sharing bonuses for the previous year to those who are being laid off at Blizzard. (Blizzard employees receive twice yearly bonuses based on how the company performed financially.) “There’s no way to make this transition easy for impacted employees, but we are doing what we can to support our colleagues,” Brack wrote.
The news follows months of rumors about layoffs at the publisher, which heated up early last week as word began to spread that hundreds of people across Activision Blizzard’s various divisions might lose their jobs. Leading up to today, some of the publisher’s employees had been coming to work with no clue as to what might happen. One person at Blizzard told me this morning that as employees arrived, they cried and exchanged hugs in the parking lot.
Bobby Kotick, Activision Blizzard's CEO, said at the announcement of the quarterly figures that the financial results for 2018 are the best in the history of the company, but that 'not the full potential was realized'.
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Reqruiz
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#5639113 Posted on: 02/13/2019 05:03 PM
Maybe this sounds weird but I'm glad that they're fired from this shitty company. I hope they're going to find better workplace with better management and we'll see in future good games instead of this crap made by Blizzard / Activison.
Maybe this sounds weird but I'm glad that they're fired from this shitty company. I hope they're going to find better workplace with better management and we'll see in future good games instead of this crap made by Blizzard / Activison.
slyphnier
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Posts: 687
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#5639181 Posted on: 02/13/2019 06:23 PM
many blizzard fans said blame activision
back 10years ago blizzard is like western game-developer king
those warcraft-starcraft then with WoW
but all lost now.... except their cinematic quality
i wonder, with that workload, they like developing nothing
where warcraft4 ? its been years since warcraft3
what they doing is like just patching their old game, adding expansion
then when announcing new game, its for mobile which i bet like most of smartphone its gatcha-cash-grab game
many blizzard fans said blame activision
back 10years ago blizzard is like western game-developer king
those warcraft-starcraft then with WoW
but all lost now.... except their cinematic quality
i wonder, with that workload, they like developing nothing
where warcraft4 ? its been years since warcraft3
what they doing is like just patching their old game, adding expansion
then when announcing new game, its for mobile which i bet like most of smartphone its gatcha-cash-grab game
RzrTrek
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Posts: 2358
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#5639241 Posted on: 02/13/2019 08:02 PM
0blivious
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#5639364 Posted on: 02/14/2019 12:20 AM
People who do nothing but trade money are the scum of the Earth. These people make absolutely NOTHING. They direct companies making record profits to make even MORE money. Their net worth to society is nil. This is the 1%, affecting our gaming so they can squeeze every last nickel from the consumer and companies making them.
How long since the French Revolution?
People who do nothing but trade money are the scum of the Earth. These people make absolutely NOTHING. They direct companies making record profits to make even MORE money. Their net worth to society is nil. This is the 1%, affecting our gaming so they can squeeze every last nickel from the consumer and companies making them.
How long since the French Revolution?
metagamer
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#5639366 Posted on: 02/14/2019 12:24 AM
Any company worth their salt makes "record earnings" year after year. They have targets and they beat them. Every half decent company achieves this. So the emphasis on Blizz having a great year is moot.
Firing 800 people... Depends on what kind of people they fired. Maybe they fired 800 WoW game masters because nobody really plays WoW any more.
Any company worth their salt makes "record earnings" year after year. They have targets and they beat them. Every half decent company achieves this. So the emphasis on Blizz having a great year is moot.
Firing 800 people... Depends on what kind of people they fired. Maybe they fired 800 WoW game masters because nobody really plays WoW any more.
Loobyluggs
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#5639522 Posted on: 02/14/2019 11:22 AM
minimum wage is sooooo bad - it needs to be gotten rid of. globally. forever.
minimum wage is sooooo bad - it needs to be gotten rid of. globally. forever.
Gabriele Coulson
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#5639563 Posted on: 02/14/2019 01:10 PM
Holy shit, I didn't think it was this bad, I suppose I was quite naive. I always liked the games that Blizzard made and figured it was all fine and dandy but you never know what's happening behind the curtains.
Holy shit, I didn't think it was this bad, I suppose I was quite naive. I always liked the games that Blizzard made and figured it was all fine and dandy but you never know what's happening behind the curtains.
RzrTrek
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#5639607 Posted on: 02/14/2019 02:25 PM
A majority of them don't see it as we do and think of long term gains and profits, but in the end, it's up to us gamers (or "consumers", if you will) to be principled, vote with our dollars and not give into temptation.
People who do nothing but trade money are the scum of the Earth. These people make absolutely NOTHING. They direct companies making record profits to make even MORE money. Their net worth to society is nil. This is the 1%, affecting our gaming so they can squeeze every last nickel from the consumer and companies making them. How long since the French Revolution?
A majority of them don't see it as we do and think of long term gains and profits, but in the end, it's up to us gamers (or "consumers", if you will) to be principled, vote with our dollars and not give into temptation.
Brasky
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#5639646 Posted on: 02/14/2019 03:25 PM
The blizzard that you all know and loved died years ago, soon hopefully this will get through to you and after a brief grieving period, you'll be fine. This happened to me with Bungie.
Don't forget about Diablo Immortal aka Diablo Mobile...
The blizzard that you all know and loved died years ago, soon hopefully this will get through to you and after a brief grieving period, you'll be fine. This happened to me with Bungie.
Don't forget about Diablo Immortal aka Diablo Mobile...
fantaskarsef
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#5639651 Posted on: 02/14/2019 03:36 PM
Don't worry, some of those 800 will find work with ex blizz devs and companies. And there's more of those than you might think.
Still it sucks, the responsible people should get fired themselves, since in the end, every problem can be traced back to mismanagement, rather than bad work on the people fired.
Don't worry, some of those 800 will find work with ex blizz devs and companies. And there's more of those than you might think.
Still it sucks, the responsible people should get fired themselves, since in the end, every problem can be traced back to mismanagement, rather than bad work on the people fired.
Amaze
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#5639652 Posted on: 02/14/2019 03:37 PM
The layoffs affect Activision, Blizzard and King. It's not just Blizzard.
With the lackluster performance recently, is it not a smart thing to cut positions deemed unnecessary and increase developer funding.
You can dislike the way it was handled, I do as well, but the end goal seems to be the right way to go.
Diablo in particular will get a big boost, with multiple projects ongoing.
The layoffs affect Activision, Blizzard and King. It's not just Blizzard.
With the lackluster performance recently, is it not a smart thing to cut positions deemed unnecessary and increase developer funding.
You can dislike the way it was handled, I do as well, but the end goal seems to be the right way to go.
Those layoffs seek to, in the words of CEO Bobby Kotick, fund a 20 percent increase in developers directly working on Call of Duty, Candy Crush, Overwatch, Warcraft, Hearthstone, and Diablo by “de-prioritizing initiatives that are not meeting expectations” and reducing administrative positions and certain other deemed to “non-development” roles across its studios.
Diablo in particular will get a big boost, with multiple projects ongoing.
GamerNerves
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#5639698 Posted on: 02/14/2019 05:26 PM
The direction for gamers is good. Cut the esports stuff, focus on games like new Warcraft and titles that are really wanted, possibly make even solely a single player game. Too bad jobs are lost, but recently Blizzard's priorities were not right so they reorganize.
Reminder that Diablo: Immortal is only a good thing. Many mobile gamers play all sort of trash, but Immortal looks honestly an engaging mobile game. Mobile games are not nearly as expensive to produce as AAA-titles, so they can be managed by a smaller group.
The direction for gamers is good. Cut the esports stuff, focus on games like new Warcraft and titles that are really wanted, possibly make even solely a single player game. Too bad jobs are lost, but recently Blizzard's priorities were not right so they reorganize.
Reminder that Diablo: Immortal is only a good thing. Many mobile gamers play all sort of trash, but Immortal looks honestly an engaging mobile game. Mobile games are not nearly as expensive to produce as AAA-titles, so they can be managed by a smaller group.
The Laughing Ma
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#5639729 Posted on: 02/14/2019 06:32 PM
With the lackluster performance recently, is it not a smart thing to cut positions deemed unnecessary and increase developer funding.
You can dislike the way it was handled, I do as well, but the end goal seems to be the right way to go.
Correct me if I am wrong but doesn't the topic state that they just announced a 'record turnover'? No shock really, every business is like this (ps I will be paraphrasing from events within my own job of late.) Tough financial climate where other folks are barely scraping a profit, we have L4L sales that beat last year but because we aren't making the ludicrous 'targets' for this year it's time to cut the workforce's hours followed by the CEO actually saying and I kid you f*cking not 'time to do more with less' and that's the reality the guys at the top won't be making a cut in their pay and chances are they won't be working harder it's everyone else that has to pull up the slack not because the company is failing but because they have had to tell the shareholders that they will be making a little bit less than they were promised.
Well a company has record turnover, but loses half it's stock value. How is it possible, I mean where does the profit come from if there is so little faith in the company from the investors ?
Very easy, if the guys running the operation make ludicrous promises to share holders about their expected profits and then all we hear after that is how the game that, by any other standard, sold very very well didn't sell as well as the d*ckheads at the top expected the result is the shareholders get twitchy which has a knock on effect on the stock value. It's a simple case of they were promised that they would make ALL the money and they actually only made SOME of the money. Or to put it another way that record turnover is actually less than whatever moron in charge promised their actually turn over would be to shareholders.
I suspect that their is also a fair amount of reality starting to set in for some of these assh*ts. That gamers are starting to get fed up with their wallets being raided at every opportunity by predatory never ending microtransactions. That the bubble of massive amounts of cash that these systems produced for the companies is starting to burst and the reality that the shareholders will now only be able to make SOME of the money instead of ALL of the money is starting to set in.
With the lackluster performance recently, is it not a smart thing to cut positions deemed unnecessary and increase developer funding.
You can dislike the way it was handled, I do as well, but the end goal seems to be the right way to go.
Correct me if I am wrong but doesn't the topic state that they just announced a 'record turnover'? No shock really, every business is like this (ps I will be paraphrasing from events within my own job of late.) Tough financial climate where other folks are barely scraping a profit, we have L4L sales that beat last year but because we aren't making the ludicrous 'targets' for this year it's time to cut the workforce's hours followed by the CEO actually saying and I kid you f*cking not 'time to do more with less' and that's the reality the guys at the top won't be making a cut in their pay and chances are they won't be working harder it's everyone else that has to pull up the slack not because the company is failing but because they have had to tell the shareholders that they will be making a little bit less than they were promised.
Well a company has record turnover, but loses half it's stock value. How is it possible, I mean where does the profit come from if there is so little faith in the company from the investors ?
Very easy, if the guys running the operation make ludicrous promises to share holders about their expected profits and then all we hear after that is how the game that, by any other standard, sold very very well didn't sell as well as the d*ckheads at the top expected the result is the shareholders get twitchy which has a knock on effect on the stock value. It's a simple case of they were promised that they would make ALL the money and they actually only made SOME of the money. Or to put it another way that record turnover is actually less than whatever moron in charge promised their actually turn over would be to shareholders.
I suspect that their is also a fair amount of reality starting to set in for some of these assh*ts. That gamers are starting to get fed up with their wallets being raided at every opportunity by predatory never ending microtransactions. That the bubble of massive amounts of cash that these systems produced for the companies is starting to burst and the reality that the shareholders will now only be able to make SOME of the money instead of ALL of the money is starting to set in.
Amaze
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#5639766 Posted on: 02/14/2019 08:06 PM
Correct me if I am wrong but doesn't the topic state that they just announced a 'record turnover'? No shock really, every business is like this (ps I will be paraphrasing from events within my own job of late.) Tough financial climate where other folks are barely scraping a profit, we have L4L sales that beat last year but because we aren't making the ludicrous 'targets' for this year it's time to cut the workforce's hours followed by the CEO actually saying and I kid you f*cking not 'time to do more with less' and that's the reality the guys at the top won't be making a cut in their pay and chances are they won't be working harder it's everyone else that has to pull up the slack not because the company is failing but because they have had to tell the shareholders that they will be making a little bit less than they were promised.
Record turnover doesn't mean every job in a 9600 workforce company is still relevant though. In Blizzard's case I'd say every single one of their franchises is in decline right now, at the very least they're not growing. So there's less need for CS.
There was a purge in 2012 as well, I think due to more automated CS systems. Judging by Twitter alone, most of the people that were let go were community managers and in PR.
As for Activision I have no idea what's going on there. I haven't bought any of their games since Black Ops 1.
And no, the CEO's definitely won't be taking any paycuts, they're not Nintendo.
Correct me if I am wrong but doesn't the topic state that they just announced a 'record turnover'? No shock really, every business is like this (ps I will be paraphrasing from events within my own job of late.) Tough financial climate where other folks are barely scraping a profit, we have L4L sales that beat last year but because we aren't making the ludicrous 'targets' for this year it's time to cut the workforce's hours followed by the CEO actually saying and I kid you f*cking not 'time to do more with less' and that's the reality the guys at the top won't be making a cut in their pay and chances are they won't be working harder it's everyone else that has to pull up the slack not because the company is failing but because they have had to tell the shareholders that they will be making a little bit less than they were promised.
Record turnover doesn't mean every job in a 9600 workforce company is still relevant though. In Blizzard's case I'd say every single one of their franchises is in decline right now, at the very least they're not growing. So there's less need for CS.
There was a purge in 2012 as well, I think due to more automated CS systems. Judging by Twitter alone, most of the people that were let go were community managers and in PR.
As for Activision I have no idea what's going on there. I haven't bought any of their games since Black Ops 1.
And no, the CEO's definitely won't be taking any paycuts, they're not Nintendo.
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The crash is real