This is sad to hear. And I suspect that it's a move that Blizzard will eventually come to regret.
He mentioned freelancing for Blizzard. I don't really think he'll need to unless he actually wants to. He very likely has some good days ahead once Hollywood understands he's been turned loose and is available.
I do believe that this is a mistake on Blizzard's part.
- - - Updated - - -
He's clearly not leaving because he wants to. This is different.
"...money's most powerful ability is to allow bad people to continue doing bad things at the expense of those who don't have it."
Godspeed, Russell.
Why wouldn't he want to? It's not like Hollywood is going to make him a way better offer, Blizzard is extremely wealthy. And it's not like he's unknown but suddenly on the scene. He worked at Warner Bros, DiC, and Disney prior to Blizzard. Any group could have made him an offer while he was still at Blizzard if they were that eager to get their hands on him.
If there is anything good in the game yet is the Soundtrack, holy shit xD
Very sad news considering I've always enjoyed his music.
"How many eyes does Lord Bloodraven have? A thousand eyes, and one."
This is actually a disaster. Russell Brower IS WoW - his music is the first thing you hear when you boot up the game.
I must admit that at his age, the best creative years are behind him (18-50 is considered the best years) so it probably is time to send him to a rest home and replace him with a younger artist. Seriously though, im not too surprised that blizzard/activision is pointing fingers, with sub numbers staying stubbornly low and higher management not willing to look at Ion Hazzikostasmillions as a possible big mistake. The unwillingness to listen to millions of people that have now left the game because of systems that killed the communities in game is also amazingly ignorant. The problem is that they are throwing out talent faster than they can replace them or they are being replaced by 2 or 3 mediocres that will only create more uninteresting content. I wouldn't be surprised if WoW is sold to EA under a management contract since Blizzard might be thinking that WoW is the cash cow thats getting more and more expensive to feed and gives less and less cash in return.
P.S. he made music for Grizzly hills that made me stop playing the game just so i could listen to it, he truly is and was a composer that made emotional music waves i wanted to sail away on.
Last edited by khazmodan; 2017-08-26 at 07:39 PM.
He has a hell of a resume. I wish him even greater success . Perhaps making movie scores
For me this is pretty depressing. I've always felt like wow was not utilizing music as well as it could, instead just using it only as ambience or to invoke emotion in cutscenes. When i played some of ff14, all the other things aside i think they are doing an amazing job with music making areas and boss fights more intense.
I really doubt this will make them put the music a bit more on the foreground, disappointed me quite a bit.
His music always did bring so much more to the world...