Notorious Studios - New Video Game Studio Founded by Former WoW Developers

[Lumy]

Notorious Studios - New Video Game Studio Founded by Former WoW Developers
Chris Kaleiki, former systems and class designer on World of Warcraft, has announced Notorious Studios - a new video game studio founded by former developers of World of Warcraft.

The studio has nine people right now, all former Blizzard developers, many of which were also in Notorious - a World of Warcraft guild of 17 years. Chris told Venture Beat that they want to grow the studio to 12 people by early next year.

[Musta]

" former systems and class designer" .... depending on what expac, theres no hope

[Kralljin]

" former systems and class designer" .... depending on what expac, theres no hope

Kaleiki worked on WoW since Wotlk and left Blizzard shortly before SL release.

Altough, needs to be said, he alongside the other studio head (Colin Volrath) were heavily involved in Ashran in WoD.

[willtron]

Altough, needs to be said, he alongside the other studio head (Colin Volrath) were heavily involved in Ashran in WoD.

I loved Ashran, so thats a good thing to me aha.

[Ealyssa]

Yay for another empty studio announcing nothing, so fresh and different.

[SinR]

Groovy?

I mean... how's Dreamhaven doing? WHAT'S Dreamhaven doing? Where is Dreamhaven doing it?

[RoKPaNda]

In all seriousness have any of the former Blizzard devs gone on to actually make something hugely successful? I'm just not thinking of anything off the top of my head. I just know that I used to have very high hopes for great games from these companies that form from former Blizzard alumni and I don't think I've ever actually seen a really great finished product from them. I know it sounds really negative and I don't mean for it to at all, obviously I want them to churn out some great products.

[aceperson]

Kaleiki worked on WoW since Wotlk and left Blizzard shortly before SL release.

Altough, needs to be said, he alongside the other studio head (Colin Volrath) were heavily involved in Ashran in WoD.

so all in all, this guy is responsible for the legion, bfa, and shadowlands systems. throw on the fact that who knows how many of these former wow devs were part of the problem and i think this studio might be notorious for the wrong reasons...

[Cwimge]

Real easy to say whatever the hell you think will sound good right at the outset. Blizzard is such a poisoned well at this point that these clowns have a weight of original sin to work past.

[mojusk]

'"Former WoW Developers" doesnt have the same prestige to it nowadays.

[Wekko]

so all in all, this guy is responsible for the legion, bfa, and shadowlands systems. throw on the fact that who knows how many of these former wow devs were part of the problem and i think this studio might be notorious for the wrong reasons...

Yep 100% responsible, you cracked the case.

[azuraji]

Values - seems like a great thing to start with. Well done!

[Orby]

'"Former WoW Developers" doesnt have the same prestige to it nowadays.

I'll take 'which one was the rapist?' for 500.

[Musta]

Yep 100% responsible, you cracked the case.

He had a hand, more than enough for me.

[Kralljin]

so all in all, this guy is responsible for the legion, bfa, and shadowlands systems. throw on the fact that who knows how many of these former wow devs were part of the problem and i think this studio might be notorious for the wrong reasons...

Feels a bit unfair to reduce a 13 year career down to the last ~4-5, disregarding that the decisions to implement those systems were likely made above him as he's been mostly a class / pvp designer.

https://kaleiki.com/#work

That's a list made by himself where he contributed / worked on, there are enough "questionable" elements in there without going down the hole "systems" discussion.

Frankly, i would have more reasons to hate the guy as he worked on Shaman in Wotlk, but that's another story.

[Hotmail]

Twelve WHOLE people? Might be enough to get a small indie game out by 2025

[crusadernero]

In all seriousness have any of the former Blizzard devs gone on to actually make something hugely successful? I'm just not thinking of anything off the top of my head. I just know that I used to have very high hopes for great games from these companies that form from former Blizzard alumni and I don't think I've ever actually seen a really great finished product from them. I know it sounds really negative and I don't mean for it to at all, obviously I want them to churn out some great products.

Not really. The ones that have moved on and started new studios have really just started the companies. Its not like these guys can churn out a epic game in no time. They have limited staff, nowhere near what Blizzard has.

Also, these people are probably much more free to create whatever they want. They are free to follow theyre passions and ideas and that kind of game dont always reach AAA status. Its more of a "create a cool game cause we can".


A game like wow had before launch years and years of development. The Warcraft RTS was a huge help in building a fanbase and let everyone learn the lore. So long before we even had wow, there was lots of Warcraft lore and games to play.

To expect these people to create anything big in the next few years is a big ask.

[Gamingsince1981]

Funny how one of their things is "team first then players" sounds exactly like wow now and how they change things to fit their ideas of what they want and not listen to players and why the game is such a boring time played metric grind.

Maybe start off by listening to players at the start.

[Steelangel]

This guy designed monk in MoP, war mode, and the Shadow Priest revamp for SL?
I have high hopes; each of those were absolutely great additions to the game.

[Morgaith]

Twelve WHOLE people? Might be enough to get a small indie game out by 2025

Keep in mind that great games have come out even from single person developer teams so there's hope. I do agree that i don't have massive hopes for a game that i'd be interested in playing any time soon though.