Omar Gonzalez Leaves Blizzard and Joins Dreamhaven, New Battle.Net Avatars

[Kathranis]

So every game developer is in fact a software engineer as well? Holy moly, why would Blizzard hire purely Software engineers then? And why would they call them Software engineers if what they do make them a game developer? So strange. Go tell them to change their job titles mmo-champion.

Nobody is saying that all game developers are software engineers, or that all software engineers are game developers.

But software engineers who work on video games absolutely are game developers.

You're confusing "designer" and "developer."

There are different aspects of game development. Being a game developer literally just means you're one of the people that "makes video games," as opposed to people involved in publishing, testing, marketing, etc.

That includes directors, designers, concept and technical artists, sound engineers, and, yes, software engineers (programmers).

The software engineers are the programmers who build the underlying systems that make the game function, or the tools that help the designers do their jobs.

Basically, they do the under-the-hood work to make the game do what the designers want it to do, or they make tools that enable the designers to do it themselves.

As far as I know, Omar was mainly a gameplay programmer, though he also worked on programming the servers at different points. Most recently he was in charge of getting WoW Classic to run in the modern WoW game client.

[TheRevenantHero]

It's almost as if Blizzard has become a terrible company to work for or something.

[tangers58]

So every game developer is in fact a software engineer as well? Holy moly, why would Blizzard hire purely Software engineers then? And why would they call them Software engineers if what they do make them a game developer? So strange. Go tell them to change their job titles mmo-champion.

I can see you need some assistance with your reading comprehension. Let me repeat it for you, "one of the things" there are numerous roles in game development, as I said first it is a team effort.

Please give up the straw man nonsense, you aren't very good at it.

[PaladinBash]

IDK WoW can lose all the developers it has and they'll just get replaced. They literally cannot make it worse than it has been and hell, some of the changes have been good. Somewhere along the line Ret got made playable and that didn't happen in the last fucking 10 years so I'm glad they're gone. The more shakeups the better.

[Clozer]

I can see you need some assistance with your reading comprehension. Let me repeat it for you, "one of the things" there are numerous roles in game development, as I said first it is a team effort.

Please give up the straw man nonsense, you aren't very good at it.

Developing games is a team effort. Does it need software engineers? It sure does. Does that make every software engineer working on a game a game developer surely not. Thanks mr straw man nonsense.

[Khain]

Does anyone believe Dreamhaven will make triple A groundbreaking bold games? I honestly think they'll just release safe market approved games.

[vizzle]

I can't wait for Ion to leave and join one of these Blizzard offshoots. This community will be so confused on how to respond.

I doubt the OG team rates him, tbh.

[LemonDemonGirl]

I'm still waiting for a Rastakhan Bnet avatar. Hell, even more Old Gods like Y'Shaarj. That dude was(is?) cool

[DesoPL]

More people is leaving sinking ship, no suprise at all.

[Sorrowseer]

Sinking ship, terrible company, jesus people reading too much into it, point out a work place that has no turn over, lmao.

[kaintk]

It's almost as if Blizzard has become a terrible company to work for or something.

well it is

its corporate now and only think about making easy money

activision make all the call and decision for them now

activision put more and more of their employee in blizzard to make sure blizzard dont decide by themself

all the good employee had go elsewhere, joigning the old employee to make better studio right now

if it was not for d4, i would not care anymore for corporate blizzard, at this point i just hope d4 will be a flop, so i can finally go away from blizzard games =P

its sad but that it, blizzard is no more blizzard today

[kodemonkee]

blizzard could take the work of private servers fans and monetize it

lol sure buddeh

[Toppy]

Does anyone believe Dreamhaven will make triple A groundbreaking bold games? I honestly think they'll just release safe market approved games.

Going by the, quiet long history, of companies made of blizzard veterans, it'll fail since I believe its like, only 1 in 10 or so that go anywhere. Theres been two dozen times this has happened (either making a company or being the big player in another company) and only twice has it worked: Torchlight and GW1. Every other one has failed, the bigger the name the harder the fail.

[LazuOG]

I see it completely different. You make it sound like Blizzard isn’t hiring, but that’s not the case.
New people are always good, they bring fresh ideas and see things from another perspective.

Which sucks when there's too many people that don't get the game and it's playerbase though. The disconnect is huge and, for the first time, I seriously feel like I don't wanna play the game anymore. I feel like I get shit nothing for my sub money. No changes, no proper balance patches, an antique, absolutely garbage social interface.

It's way too apparent blizzard is just milking wow for money. They keep the few developers that still care severely underfunded and overworked, while funneling millions into shareholders and CEO's (looking at you, Bobby "the greedy goblin" Kotick).

The sub fee doesn't hurt me financially, at all. I just don't wanna give them my money anymore. I don't feel like I'm paying a hard-working dev team that tries to keep generating value and content for me. I feel like I'm paying ransom to billionaire slave-peddlers to keep something alive that I, for nostalgic reasons, don't want to die.

[Edward Wu]

Not surprised. Dreamhaven is probably the next Blizzard.

[Kumorii]

Does anyone believe Dreamhaven will make triple A groundbreaking bold games? I honestly think they'll just release safe market approved games.

If history is to go by the first game will be hyped up. When it's released it can't live up to the hypes and interest will fizzle out quickly. People who hate blizzard will come up with excuses why it didn't do as good as they wanted it to or try to spin it that it is more successful than it actually is etc etc.

[Super Kami Dende]

Curious how many People crying about a sinking ship in these comments actually knew who Omar was before they saw this post?

[LemonDemonGirl]

Hmm... He was working at Blizzard since I was about 2? Maybe he just wants to do something new?

[Wheeler]

Curious how many People crying about a sinking ship in these comments actually knew who Omar was before they saw this post?

Ship was sinking WELL before today. This guy clearly wasn't going to save it either way.

It sounds like a fun opportunity to work with old friends and nothing more than that. Plus, the energy from a new studio like this must be intoxicating.

[iosdeveloper]

if you think about for a moment Dreamhaven consists of old dads, that gonna be making games for their kids
the best we can get is another hearthstone-like game with a children-game attitude towards a player

i like hearthstone, but all their presentations on blizzcon and even tavern brawl descriptions reek of "who is that lucky lucky boy? yes you are"