Jared Neuss replies to RTO policy speculation

General Discussion
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I can’t screenshot or link cos perms but I’ll quote (2 hours ago from this post):

"I’ve seen speculation that the changes to PvE scope on Overwatch 2 are related to Blizzard’s RTO policy. For the record, that isn’t true.
Managing PvE and PvP development simultaneously has been a challenge for the team for years. It’s a less exciting headline but it’s reality."

RTO: Return to Office: A policy enforced to encourage employees to cease working from home and return to working at Blizzard, or else they’re fired.

"We’ll go into a bit more historical detail in the next Director’s Take.
I hope that the additional context can shed some light on why we made this decision."

So we’re expecting a director’s take, hopefully it has alot of detail

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more lies. that’s all this is, more lies. rto had nothing to do with it? sure, jerry. sure.

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also… rto means return to office.

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Ngl even after adding the definition of RTO to the thread to add more clarity I still don’t really understand what it is

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Can’t wait for a snake in a suit to explain to me something that involves layoffs, policy changes, and firings without giving their turnover rates.

By someone that thinks they have credibility to speak on behalf of their employees no less.

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It’s the “Return from Home” policy. They had employees working at home and are basically demanding them to return to the office or find a new job.

Oh, also, the policy changes had other things involved. Like cuts to employee bonuses.

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Ohh yeah I remember hearing about that return from home policy from somewhere, I didn’t know about the bonus cuts tho; if thats directed towards the devs and not the higher ups who are massively overpaid (kotick) then that’s awful

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Kotick cut his own salary as a statement to say they will fix gender equality and to tell his employees to also accept a pay cut until “equality is restored”.
Then he was greenlit for a 150 million dollar bonus to follow with it. For himself. Lmao.

The execs do not get bonus cuts and still get to work from home. Only the devs and other employees are told to come to the office or find a new job.

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jfc the entitlement of execs and degradation of working conditions for devs is horrendous, to think I was aspiring to work at Blizzard half a decade ago before everything went poopy

I feel so bad for the devs that are just trying to do their jobs in a terrible work environment, and after the harassment lawsuits I imagine being able to work from home was such a great opportunity for them to be productive and not be in such a place, and now being forced back or else they lose their jobs??

They deserve so much better, and honestly we as a community should be sympathetic to their situation and keep it all in mind when some people accuse the devs of these things rather than the ones who really make the decisions

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bobby will say anything to make him look good

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What it was like is hard for me to imagine especially after the alleged work place changes. I don’t personally. I know one thing, though. Working from home in Southern California is a dream. A five mile drive can take an hour sometimes in bad traffic. California is literal hell and an expensive hell.

I was not sure and still not sure the impact RTO policy changes had, but I also find it pretty funny there is a response to the supposed accusations I have BARELY heard of in… less than 24 hours.

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probably will go into a lot. I’m assuming they didn’t plan this and will attempt to find a scapegoat

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I wouldn’t know I’m in the UK, but EU forums are so dead compared to US ones
Working from home tho was probs bigger for you guys though since the UK is so much smaller

I think I heard whispers of it yesterday but it was no means the biggest speculation for why everything went so wrong

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I completely understand. Well let me tell you, unlike your country we don’t have public transportation luxuries and are very car-centric.

I saw a small post here with barely any likes reading like a conspiracy theory. I thought it was, too. If the company in such short time feels the need to make a public statement so quickly, that doesn’t look good for their image and I am starting to think the tinfoil hat wearers could be on to something.

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I’ll give you a sneak preview, it will be a lot of blaming the “popularity” of the live service game and “demand” for more content for it. And there will be a tear jerking story on how there’s not enough people on the team to meet the amount of work needed to satisfy that demand, and so having a team that’s smaller than WoW’s split in to too many things (managing the game, making new seasonal content, PVE) is unsustainable.

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Coming from the country that we learn is massively associated with railroads in History, that’s surprising
But it’s not much a luxury rn :sob: So many workforces have been going on strike because of stagnant wages is a cost of living crisis including railway workers which are still ongoing since 2022 making train travel just not a thing for days, it makes travelling to work and back home an inconvenience - I still wholeheartedly support all of them, the Tory government are full of greedy, evil people run by a PM we didn’t vote for

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I hope when they mention that, they also admit that during their most profitable year, 2019, they fired a thousand employees.

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I hear you. I might be American, but I read news. I hope the French succeed in their burning of the Black Rock building. From one human to another.
Also, hope you like the song. I think you will.

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At this point it just feels like “It’s just going to be more lies.”

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(Not towards you but to rebuke their words if they say these things) They still had 4 years to work on it, through which we had the smallest updates ever, so if it isn’t the consequences of their own actions -_-

I could’ve sworn their dev team grew massively when they moved everyone off Diablo 3 and Heroes of the Storm

Just get more people lmao, they wanted Overwatch 2 to be their golden child so invest in it sillies

I wonder how it’s being presented in america

Lmao knowing the French’s incredible ability to get things done with protesting, I’m not worried :smile:

Never trust a Tory, yeah truer words have never been said; it was a bit distracting seeing the Margaret Thatcher mask as the thumbnail tho hah, I think the whole United Kingdom will celebrate the same way when Sunak loses in 2025, 13 years in power the Tories have been and they’ve driven the country to the ground

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