EPTwell made, love the article.
A short history of Activision Blizzard or how... - Page 3
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Madkipz
Norway1643 Posts
well made, love the article. | ||
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One.two
Canada116 Posts
Edit: Just read the full thing... whether or not this is biased... I don't like what I heard about this guy. I guess the old Blizz guys don't really have to care though. They must have made millions from their games and especially with WoW now. Also, I've enjoyed every one of their games including SC2; I think everyone is just cheesed off because of bnet atm, and a post like this came at the "right" time.. | ||
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tellthenightcomes
Canada66 Posts
On May 30 2010 06:20 jstar wrote: "Over 500 employees fired due to 'modest' Starcraft 2 sales" "Blizzard files lawsuit against own parent company" "ATVI drops 70% to an all time low" "Kotick found dead in his own home" ahh.. the perfect world. Grass seems greener in that world. | ||
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gillon
Sweden1578 Posts
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SichuanPanda
Canada1542 Posts
That's the key there, for a while. Once people realize the Activision (intentional typo) is simply pumping out the same re-hashed games year after year for increasingly higher prices, they will simply stop playing them. | ||
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Opinion
United States236 Posts
On May 30 2010 06:36 SichuanPanda wrote: Hey well look at MW2 now, about 15% of the people who bought the game bought the DLC, let Activision keep doing this, and they will see how their balance sheets and profit margins look when no one buys their games anymore because they are tired of the over-priced, under-developed mediocre shit they usually churn out. We can only hope the merger allowed Blizzard enough say on what it will and will not do that Kotick and the Activision side can't outright force Blizzard to follow the exact same business model. (Blizzard clearly wants to make more money from their games prior to this merger even occurred). I agree with Kotick being a major douche but at the same time you can't exactly blame him, he's a CEO and was brought on at Activision (and now Activision Blizzard), and his job is to make the companies money. Following his example, however incorrect and poorly thought out it may be, they will make money, for a while. That's the key there, for a while. Once people realize the Activision (intentional typo) is simply pumping out the same re-hashed games year after year for increasingly higher prices, they will simply stop playing them. YEAH Just like the movie industry and how people stopped going to see movies that are just remakes of old movies! Consumers are too smart to be sold the same crap in a different box... right? /cry | ||
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dcttr66
United States555 Posts
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Lightswarm
Canada966 Posts
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HyperLimen
United States278 Posts
There was a decisive swing in atmosphere regarding the blue interaction with each games respective community around the time all of this happened. It is quite interesting how they are trying to force facebook onto people while simultaneously eliminating all other means of interaction within b.net 2.0; I honestly don't expect identifiers to come back. Since the facebook terms of service say in clear terms that they sell your personal information to third parties, I could easily foresee this happening with b.net 2.0 as well. Essentially we have 1 extremely shady CEO getting in bed with an equally shady/despicable CEO. They're like the dynamic duo of gaming fascism. | ||
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Grumbels
Netherlands7028 Posts
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D3xter
Germany17 Posts
On May 30 2010 06:14 Kraz.Del wrote: Blizzard has stated multiple times on the WoW forums that activision has absolutely no say in WoW or SC2 devlopement. Blizzard owns 51% of activision anyways. That's not exactly true xD As far as I understand it, "Activision Blizzard" is a Holding company, created to merge the two "independent" companies called "Activision" and "Blizzard Entertainment". "Blizzard Entertainment" was owned by Vivendi since 1998 (when Blizzard was still owned by SIERRA, and SIERRA was part of a French publisher called Havas, and Vivendi being a French conglomerate themselves bought that one.) Vivendi currently owns 54% of its subsidiary "Activision Blizzard", the difference between "Vivendi" and "Activision" being, that Vivendi owns other things like Canal+, the Maroc Telecom, Universal Music, parts of NBC Universal, Universal Studios and a bunch of other stuff detailed here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assets_owned_by_Vivendi Vivendi let Blizzard do their thing, because they did not exactly have much "knowledge" in the video game business and didn't care that much, Activision being a lot different as their main and only business IS games. As Kotick stated himself several times, he paid almost 7 billion $ for the deal to happen: http://gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2010/01/18/news-Kotick_3A00_-Activision-Could-Have-Bought-Blizzard-For-_2400_7-Million.aspx "I was talking to [Blizzard founder] Mike Morhaime the other day and I said, 'You know, I could have bought you for seven million and instead it was seven billion.' [Laughs] He said, 'Yeah, could you imagine if I had just held out for the seven billion instead of the seven million?'” It’s difficult to imagine what the gaming landscape would be like if Kotick had been the one acquiring Blizzard way back then, rather than Vivendi doing the buying. The thing is, while it might be true that most (some?) of the development teams might not have been directly influenced or changed by the merger early on, things like company policy, marketing and economic factors did change on a higher level and directly transferred down to the other stuff... I think noone can argue that "StarCraft 2" itself is a bad game, but all the shit surrounding it, especially B.Net 2.0 and the monetization and marketing is. On May 30 2010 06:20 jstar wrote: "Over 500 employees fired due to 'modest' Starcraft 2 sales" "Blizzard files lawsuit against own parent company" "ATVI drops 70% to an all time low" "Kotick found dead in his own home" ahh.. the perfect world. Yeah sure, as if that'll happen  Maybe by the time StarCraft 6 and Diablo 7 comes out and people have a different view on matters like with all those "Hero"-games and "Tony Hawk". | ||
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green.at
Austria1459 Posts
On May 30 2010 06:34 FrozenArbiter wrote: Seriously, this guy is a terrible human being. He's almost so evil it makes me feel like it has to be a cover for something =[ Lets hope he is from the future and knows that sc2 will destroy the planet, and he came back in time to be the biggest asshole on earth to stop any development of sc2 or esports...... | ||
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Art.FeeL
1163 Posts
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Ai52487963
United Kingdom136 Posts
On May 30 2010 06:34 KinosJourney2 wrote: Great article, i never liked the fact that Blizzard merged with other companies. Blizzard is Blizzard and doesn't need any help from other developers that will just fuck up their games  Wrong. Blizzard is Activision now. | ||
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Level10Peon
United States59 Posts
The battlecruiser shot, graphics revamp, nerfing of the mothership, etc. You guys are blowing things way out of proportion. Yes, Battlenet 2.0 may be less than ideal, but the core game is still fantastic, and they still are very engaged with the community for a modern game developer. You all also do realize that everything Blizzard did was for a reason, not because their evil money gabbers. You may disagree with their reasons, but they are not just trying to be some evil corporate entity, and Activision is not trying to make them one. For example, the game was split into three parts because the campaign was so big and intricate. The expansions will be no more than $40, and we'll be gifted with double the new units we would normally get. TLDR: The write-up is fundamentally flawed. It takes things out of context and ignores many facts without directly linking all the events it described to BNet 2.0's currents state. Activision has zero control over Blizzard, and neither entity is trying to make SCII some cheap money grab. | ||
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The6357
United States1268 Posts
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Count_Waltz
United States48 Posts
Ah well, I'll just practice the piano in the mean time. :p Count Waltz | ||
Jibba
United States22883 Posts
I had defended Blizzard before, especially with the Kespa deal, but not anymore. | ||
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TzTz
Germany511 Posts
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AmstAff
Germany949 Posts
FUCK YOU EA FUCK YOU BLIZZARD i will go back to the roots and play on my old nintendo and atari. | ||
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