Can we talk about Blizzard dying yet? Or is this gonna be removed -_-

[Agent Smith]

in 10+ years, I have never witnessed Blizzard so out of touch with their player base. WoW players are at an all time high in disappointment, Diablo fans??? Jesus Christ dont even get me started there. A mobile game? Blizzard wtf were you thinking?

You know how you're at the end of a LONG work shift and you just dont give a crap anymore? Thats what it feels like is going on. I feel like game making has become a chore as opposed to a labor of love and when you do something NOT wanting to do it, you get crappy results.

[AngryTenko]

Gamer finds out making games is an actual job and not a hobby, more news at 11.

[rrayy]

Blizzrd is nowhere near dying.

[Holyshnikies]

Its not just Blizzard. There are so many major companies that are out of touch too. I feel the problem is too much corporate structure in some of these companies where it prevents creativity and just making fun games, where they just instead look at analytics, statistics, stocks, trends, etc. And you are also in a position where you don't want to rock the boat and possibly lose that promotion. And another bad thing, and Ive personally seen this in the work place, you could be the right man for the job, know what the customers want, could probably deliver a better experience than the doofuses ahead of you, but if you don't "fit in" to the clique, you might as well just look for another job.

On another note, Blizzard may be called Blizzard, but its an entirely different company. They just kept the old name. You could call it, EA Blizz. That might make more sense going into 2019.

[Gorsameth]

The mobile market is HUGE, if its a good game it could well make Blizzard money hand over fist, more so then any of their current games are doing atm.

Its not the game 'we' want. But that doesn't make it a bad decision to make it. Just a horrible decision to make it the focus of the Blizzcon opening.

And NONE of this has anything to do with WoW which is a completely different part of the company.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

Its like Anakin Skywalker and Darth Vader. The same but different. New Blizzard has kill old Blizzard but it actually is alive and well. From the out side it has more wealth, power, and ability than it ever had before. But on the inside its dead, dark, and ruthless as it has been consumed by greed, quick money grabs, and investor calls. So it will not die anytime soon. Just the Blizzard you knew is dead.

[Soeroah]

I seem to remember when Hearthstone was first announced people were mocking it. "A card game? Really? MtG ripoff much".

Blizzard probably think since they've been successful in stepping into the card game, FPS and MOBA markets a mobile game would be a logical step. The only thing particularly bothersome about it is that it came without any announcement of a Diablo IV or anything for non-mobile fans. I'm pretty sure there were decent signs that they were working on a mobile Diablo game months ago based off job listings and the like.

[Bakis]

The news for WoW was depressing not even the usually blizzcon nerds cheered much for the news.
BfA will continue to suck.
Overwatch and HS keep doing very well.
Feels even more so that BfA will go down the annals as a shitty expac after the lack of changes.
Classic in summer was great news though.

[unbound]

There are 2 problems with the premise of Blizzard dying anytime soon.

1) What are your options? Most game studios capable of putting out large scale games are part of a handful of large corporations. EA, Ubisoft, Microsoft, Sony, 2K, and Tencent are the big players, but they mostly stay in their own lanes.

2) There are too many diehard fans that will keep Blizzard alive. They make constant excuses for Blizz failures and bad decisions as well as twisting reality to make arguments that Blizz is actually secretly great.

Blizzard should deservedly be going down in flames, but don't confuse what should happen with what will actually happen.

[Osmeric]

The conceit of the entitled gamer is to imagine that only by serving them, and only them, can a game company survive.

[Icechaosss]

So finally after all these years you've discovered that Blizzard is a big, global enterprise that builds games to market segment and analyst needs instead of catering the reclusive pasty 30+ male gamers. Yes, I know. Shocking.

And what do we do when their profits and stock soar as a result?
Post more angry posts, or something more serious like a.. petition?

And by the way, yes I'd like them to serve that 500k hardcore MMORPG niche player segment as well, because that's my past and pedigree in gaming, but I do realise the world doesn't work that way and companies won't survive if they do.

Stop having common sense on my damn MMO-C forum. What you expect a business to be a business?

[Verdugo]

The conceit of the entitled gamer is to imagine that only by serving them, and only them, can a game company survive.

The conceit of a corporate shill is to imagine that the company will reward them if they defend it on the internet.

[Jibjub]

They used to want to make great games and therefore made lots of money.

Now they want to make tons of money and therefore make mediocre games.

So it goes.

[Theangryone]

Yeah, even if WoW is down to a million subs, they are still raking in $15 million a month plus money for tokens, mounts, pets etc.. Blizz isn't dying.

[xenogear3]

Blizzard got lucky on Hearthstone.

Other new games, such as Overwatch and HotS, are in overcrowded genre.
The old games, such as Warcraft 3, are in out of dated genre.

We have to wait for the next recession to see which big game company can survive.
I bet many large game companies will be out of business.

[Blackbrd]

The mobile market is HUGE, if its a good game it could well make Blizzard money hand over fist, more so then any of their current games are doing atm.

Its not the game 'we' want. But that doesn't make it a bad decision to make it. Just a horrible decision to make it the focus of the Blizzcon opening.

And NONE of this has anything to do with WoW which is a completely different part of the company.

Ding ding ding!

Exactly. While it was a seemingly horrible decision to announce this at blizzcon, it was not meant for current d3 fans. This seems like something to draw in new players of diablo, which could then upsell to d3. This was meant for the mobile market, not the pc market (obviously).

[clevin]

Its not just Blizzard. There are so many major companies that are out of touch too. I feel the problem is too much corporate structure in some of these companies where it prevents creativity and just making fun games, where they just instead look at analytics, statistics, stocks, trends, etc.

The other issue is that when you're small you can take risks and you don't need a success to be huge to be worth it. Think about it... a $5m/year studio makes something that brings in $500k and it's a big difference to them, esp if it has room to grow from there. A $1b company would need a product to generate $100m to bring in the same money as a percentage of revenue. That dampens creativity and leads to things like mobile Diablo.

[cronotose]

The mobile market is HUGE, if its a good game it could well make Blizzard money hand over fist, more so then any of their current games are doing atm.

Its not the game 'we' want. But that doesn't make it a bad decision to make it. Just a horrible decision to make it the focus of the Blizzcon opening.

And NONE of this has anything to do with WoW which is a completely different part of the company.

I don't think you're quite getting "death" here. It isn't that the company is going bankrupt next year. It's that the company isn't (speculatively) going to be making anything near the quality they used to for a long time, if ever. Square Enix isn't out of business, but they are not who they were in the 90's and 00's by any stretch of the imagination. The company that put out 4 Final Fantasy games, a sequel to Chrono Trigger, and Xenogears in the span of about 3 years is long, long gone. It is "dead".

"Its not the game 'we' want. But that doesn't make it a bad decision to make it."

While that's true, it doesn't mean that on its own, I would argue it's a bad decision to make it anyway. It's short term money for long term damage to the brand. The reason people have loyalty to Blizzard over any other new and similar game, like say Path of Exile, is a lovable and memorable history of excellence. Take that away by showcasing that Blizzard doesn't respect their own reputation, and the customer loyalty disappears along with your advantage over younger companies. They'll make a truck load of cash now, but they're in the position that if the real D4 is in any way at all below expectations, they have a dead franchise, and they really only have 4 franchises to work with.

"And NONE of this has anything to do with WoW which is a completely different part of the company."

This strikes me as incredibly silly. Both parts of the company are reporting to the same management team, who is approving the decisions and design philosophies of both. The fish rots from the head. If multiple divisions of a company are falling flat on their face right at the same time, I'll put money on terrible upper management every single time.

[Danuel]

Ok I have one simple question: why we players, should care about amount of money activation will squeeze? We consumers should only worry about consumers rights and about quality of products we buy.

[Doffen]

People know that the mobile gaming market is huge atm right? I understand people are disappointed with Diablo, as lots us have played Blizzard games for 20 years now. But for younger people who doesn't have the same relations to Diablo this is most likely going to be a success because it do look good for a mobile/tablet game.

There is a reason why Overwatch is a big thing these days, it actually hit it's targeted audience. WoW got the same issues as Diablo. Who should Blizzard make the games for? Us "veterans", or people whos 15-20 years old? The answer is obvious.