Several Blizzard employees have been tweeting about the recent controversy, including Jeff Hamilton who is the Senior System Designer for World of Warcraft. Here is one of the tweets he made:
I know a significant amount of players have been claiming that they are canceling their subscriptions, but this situation is showing to be bad for both employees and players too. Shadowlands is going to have a legacy of being one of the most notorious expansions, in part because of the tragic happenings in the company and the prolonged release of its patches. For anyone that will still be playing, don’t be surprised if the wait for 9.2 is longer than 9.1.
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Guess the next Sylvanas patch has to wait then, oh no!
I think it’s also safe to say that there won’t be a 9.3 at this point.
I just want to see this game and company burn for what they have been doing,
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It’s the weekend.
Blizzard never works on the weekend.
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This situation will be happening for longer than a weekend.
I am happy that Blizzard has been killed off.
But i didnt have it on my bingo.
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I don’t think “All the upper management are sex weirdos” was on anyone’s Bingo sheet.
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Should have been, knowing the industry
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Eh that was barely news to me.
Isn’t that what Bingo is all about?
I think I have been playing it wrong… or maybe I’ve been playing it right!
Well that is sad. Why the company and all employees and all the players across the globe should suffer from this?
Why they just cant fire those people who really did those things and will continue to work? I’m also working in mega giant IT company, and when something like this happens in our company they just fire responsible person and give some video trainings for others. While the rest of company continues to bring value for the rest of the humanity…
Most funny thing is that there were no proofs yet about anything…
I wish to all Blizzard employees best luck!
I will hold my fists hoping that your company will swim away from this without any harm. And we will all return to our favorite world… of Warcraft in the fallowing years. 
I’m playing Warcraft since 90’. Before WoW I was playing Rock’n’roll racing on SEGA. There were also things like Starctaft, Diablo e.t.c All the games this company did were Epic… And if now company will die and our world will lose such a possibly epic gaming future because some of the employees had wrong behave, well that will be just wrong!
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Right now blizzard is on trail in the court of public opinion.
Which may be enough to get changes in the company and staff that’s player demand.
But as for the real courts, I wouldn’t be hopeful. Cosby is free man because of legal technicalities.
It’s because Blizzard’s employees morale is low, partly because of Activision’s response to the situation. It’s reasonable that they can’t work for the time being because of the intense emotions that everyone there has currently. If the situation was dealt with when it should have been then this wouldn’t have happened. The situation wasn’t dealt with properly so now everyone is forced to suffer. This also doesn’t just affect Blizzard and its customers but also the game industry itself due to how large Activision is.
In regards to there being proof, there’s been plenty enough explanations from employees themselves giving specific details that it’s difficult not to believe them. I’m usually skeptical about accusations such as these but most if not all of it fits. The people making the accusations aren’t trying to get clout or money. They aren’t demanding destruction, they’re requesting respect. The handling of this situation is being done through the legal system as it should be.
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American work culture sounds like slavery not gonna lie. Working on a weekend.
Jesus christ. I can get that if you are you know on the call in etc where they call you and you take the time but come on.
Oh well I suppose I am happy I live in a first world country.
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Blizzard as a company may not last that long.
This stuff has made it to press that investors pay attention to, and it couldn’t have come at a worse time. ATVI’s Quarterly Earnings Report should release in the first or second week of August, and you can bet that while presenting results, ATVI’s management will be asked to comment on the case. I expect that there will be at least a few attendees there specifically to hold them to this.
Based on what I know about Blizzard’s releases, I expect that the quarter results for Blizzard to be mixed at best. Their revenue trends over the past two years make it clear that they see severe spikes in revenues during quarters where they release a WoW expansion - moreso for retail than for Classic, and Q2 2021 does have TBC classic’s release in it - although I expect that it isn’t as strong as Vanilla-Classic’s release would have been. This is while Shadowlands is in expected declines. Their other franchises have been bleeding MAUs just as WoW has, so we can’t look to them either.
These factors come together to present the picture of a very weak company, and the pressure may be there from the financial point of view AND the ESG point of view that maybe it’s time to pull the plug on Blizzard entirely. This news? That production has been halted for an indeterminate amount of time on the property upon which Blizzard relies the most? That’s just more tinder for that fire.
Edit: I don’t think this would mean that Kotick would C4 the place - but it could mean that WoW gets put in maintenance mode and is confined to classic re-releases as the existing company is taken over by Activision itself. There’s a strong case to be made that these abuses happened pretty much exclusively at Blizzard, and Activision also has the financial results to assert that they would be better stewards of Blizzard’s resources.
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Wonderful news.
Scrap this expansion and start over.
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I’ve had two jobs where I’ve had to work on the weekends, one job which I enjoyed and the other I didn’t. One of those was at a grocery store where I was regularly called in at random times because for whatever reasons other employees couldn’t or didn’t work when they were scheduled to, including times where I was only able to get 3-5 hours of sleep before being called to come in at 6am. Depending on how much money you make it’s not so bad, but America definitely has wageslaves. Some people’s lives are just doing work. Some jobs should be done on weekends though, like emergency services and such.
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This may be too big for that. I’m sure a few people will get fired, but I’m willing to bet if they fired EVERYONE caught in this net, the company would likely be gutted and non-functional.
I feel for you. trust me i really do. I cant imagine what hellhole that would be.
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Activision will be fine but Blizzard has been shot in the gut. It’s a real possibility that Blizzard might stop existing as a company soon. Before this, Activision could say that 9.1 gave a bump in MAUs for the quarter, but so many people unsubscribing because of this is going to be noticeable. This is worse than the Blitzchung fiasco.
Not a hellhole, more like purgatory. People can get by. Usually it’s more boredom than anything. Part of life is enjoyment. People should be able to enjoy themselves.
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Blizzard be like “sorry bro legal and HR are swamped atm! Cant work on the game at all!”