From reddit: "A word about Activion Blizzard vs Blizzard Entertainment; perhaps a thousand?"

I have always been puzzled why people believe Activision controls Blizzard. They are both separate subsidiaries of Activision Blizzard, which is merely a holding company. The article below on reddit does a good job of explaining this and I thought people should read it to help dispel some of the “fake news” and conspiracies surrounding the Blizzard and Activision relationship. I am not necessarily defending any recent decisions. Conversely, this may also serve to shift blame for design decisions that are disliked back where they squarely belong - to Blizzard.

A lot of people would have you believe that Activision is ruining Blizzard games. They say that WotLK is the final good expansion where you no longer see Activision influences. To be clear, the merger occurred in July 2008. WotLK came out November 2008.

Basically everything but the launch content in Wrath of the Lich King was after the merger. Even then, they had almost 4 months to exert pressure prior to Wrath Launch. Blizzard has said before that they’re not run by Activision. It’s important to understand how all of this works, so I’d like to display it here for everyone.

Blizzard was a subsidiary company underneath the umbrella company known as Vivendi Games. Vivendi Games publishers distributed, but did not personally develop, the games made by some of the companies underneath them. Because they were a publisher, they were able to set criteria for what they wanted published, and hand down the word of the messiah to those companies.

  • In 2008, Vivendi Games and Activision engaged in a merger. All Activision shares were merged with Vivendi shares and sold as shares of the new parent company Activision Blizzard. Vivendi purchased 52% of the shares and retained majority control for a number of years. The subsidiary company, Blizzard Entertainment, was not restructured and continued to operate as it had before. Blizzard Entertainment, as a company, developed and published in house, separate from Vivendi previously. Activision Blizzard did not begin to publish Blizzard Entertainment games, but left them independent.
  • In 2013, Activision Blizzard purchased majority control of its company from Vivendi, abandoning the parent company entirely. It was now a publicly traded company, instead of being privately owned by Vivendi. Blizzard Entertainment retains its name, and remains a independent company under a new parent company. It still develops and publishes its own games independently of Activision Blizzard.

So the real questions come up now.

  1. If Blizzard is an independent subsidiary, how much control does Activision Blizzard have?

As the parent company Activision Blizzard is akin to, well, a parent. They have the capacity to fire directors, and vote out board members in their subsidiaries. However, they act more like stockholders than direct controllers.

The director of an independent subsidiary’s job description is to make decisions for the benefit of the company he works for, not the parent company.

Furthermore, there’s a degree of liability separation in this case. If an independent subsidiary is sued, the parent company is less likely to be liable for damages, or be held accountable.

The amount of control a parent company has varies, but being independent grants much more leeway and freedom than other situations. Typically a director of an independent subsidiary doesn’t report to their parent company except for stock reports and financial reports. Unlike the standard subsidiary, an independent subsidiary doesn’t need to get permission or direction on how to design or manage their product unless something has gone wrong, in which case it’s likely removal of directors instead of hand holding or insisting on design of a product.

  1. If Activision Blizzard is a publisher, doesn’t that mean they publish, and have control over, game design of all and sundry Blizzard Entertainment games? In fact any of their subsidiaries?

No. Or, at least, not in this case.

A publishing company that has an independent company as their subsidiary that is also a publishing company does not publish those games themselves.

If you look closely, you’ll find that on Blizzard Entertainment websites, you’ll always see the trademarks as “Blizzard Entertainment, Inc”. Even BlizzCon is marketed and listed as such. This is because they’re produced, sold, and marketed by Blizzard Entertainment, not Activision Blizzard.

  1. Doesn’t everyone know that Blizzard games are developed by Activision Blizzard now?

To quote Ion:

They think they do, but they don’t.

Activision Blizzard does not control Blizzard Entertainment on a developmental level, which is why they’re independent. The design teams have never been merged, and Activision Blizzard is not their publisher so they don’t have to worry about messages from god.

  1. So what does this all mean?

It means that, for good or ill, Activision is not the one in charge, and ever has been. They’re a publicly traded parent company that has left Blizzard Entertainment as an Independent Subsidiary. If something is wrong with the game, it remains Blizzard Entertainments fault.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comments/9p7ocn/a_word_about_activion_blizzard_vs_blizzard/

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In 2013, Bobby Kotick purchased majority control of Blizzard

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If you think Activision is some sort of benign overlord, then I have a bridge to sell you.

Right now they are in damage control mode.

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Activision was keen on letting Blizzard doing it’s thing and pumping out money, but now that the goose laying less golden eggs Activision is about to cut them open in hopes of finding more.

They’re already pushing Blizzard to cut costs and have put an Activision finance person in charge of examining their finances or something like that. We’re already starting to see those consequences. Not to say Blizzard is entirely blameless.

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they need a new game / mentality to buff away all this grime.

diablo 4 PC or wow2 ; nothing else would do it , there’s a thicc layer of gunk on the emblem for now ; and nobody to blame but themselves.

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If you think that Activision Blizzard is micro-managing design decisions in WoW, I also have a bridge to sell you.

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They don’t micromanage in the sense of “Hey, put 15 pet tokens on that quest, instead of 13”

They do “micromanage” when subs plummet drastically as a result of an announcement regarding “no flying”.

And they do “micromanage” when they tell that division to “cut costs”

And they do “micromanage” when release 100 CS folks, and also cut back the QA department, yet are looking to hire more Mobile developers.

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Bobby Kotick is CEO of Activision Blizzard. J. Allen Brack is President of Blizzard but reports to Kotick. I’m not sure how you can say Activision doesn’t control Blizzard. They are basically one company at this point.

I get what you’re trying to say, that “don’t blame Activision for Blizzard’s problems” but really there is no distinction between the two now. That is the problem. They’re running Blizz like their other subsidiary, King, which makes - wait for it - Candy Crush.

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Those aren’t design decisions, so my point still stands. Plus with the CS people they were offering a full year’s salary for that program which has existed for ages, are you saying you wouldn’t take that to leave?

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Infinite growth on a finite planet is folly.

Someday, maybe business will realize this.

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Looks like a lot of folks didn’t read the post. They’re too hellbent on foaming at the mouth while blathering something something Activision bad.

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In other news, the world is flat. If you go too far you’ll fall off!!1!1

  1. I thought having over 51% of a company shares was majority control ?
  2. Kotick no longer has that many shares. It’s like less then 1% now
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Huh? No, my statement wasn’t a conspiracy theory, it was a mathematical fact.

You did not say “design decision” you said “micro manage”. I explained the nuance(s) therein.

But hey, I’ll play it your way.

Flying debacle? ON BLIZZARD

Level-scaling? ON BLIZZARD

Sharding issues? ON BLIZZARD

RNG? ON BLIZZARD

Ridiculous story? ON BLIZZARD

Sub-par leveling experience? ON BLIZZARD

Let me know when I should stop.

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Fact the human race continues to grow at an exponential pace and the world(s) will accommodate in due time? Sociology professor telling you society is evil again?

Buggy rushed release with lack of QC?
Activision pressing financial cuts.

No class design director?
Activision pressing financial cuts.

Artificial scarcity for cash store incentives?
Activision pressing financial cuts.

Reduced customer service availability re-Ireland?
Activision pressing financial cuts.

Content/game decisions and parent company culture are two separate things but they are not mutually exclusive.

Blizzard can no longer afford to take the expensive time required to properly develop content they way we came to expect because they have to deliver their bottom line to investors. The financial investment directly impacts the quality of content, but in business you will typically cut spending to increase profits - these two concepts are at odds with each other. Doesn’t take a genius to figure out that’s a bad mix.

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People keep confusing “Activision Blizzard” and “Activision”.

Activision is just like Blizzard. Both are owned/held/whatever by Activision Blizzard.

And Activision is just the trendy boogeyman atm. Something goes right? (MoP, Legion). They get no credit. Something goes wrong? 100% Activision’s fault.

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This expansion has way too much cut and paste from the previous, which has never happened. Even WoD had new and different ideas.

Yes there is new content we haven’t seen, warfronts, warmode, raids and dungeons. The core game play of world quests, weekly world bosses, invasions, it all feels the same. Even the island Expeditions are a redo of 3 man content, just not as good as the originals in MoP.

Alot of folks say the developers got lazy, and it does feel that way in terms of the daily content we do at max level. But if Activision played a part in those decisions, why would they hurt the golden goose?

You and Feora are going to have to get together on your defense of Blizzard.

1 Like