Activision Blizzard Q2 2021 Investor Call, Blizzard Employee Letter to Leadership

[Kralljin]

Blatant lies.

Obviously not.

Note "outside of modern expansion year".
In other words, the reference data is
2015 (WoD released in 2014)
2017 (Legion released in 2016)
2019 (BfA released in 2018) - altough might be a bit of a red herring as Classic launched in 2019.

It's one of those "statistical magic tricks".

[ek0zu]

Q3 is going to be crucial to see how things really go in Blizzard, if customers (us) lost faith etc, there are a lot of good games already in the market or releasing soon and we might see a drop of subscribed numbers.

[Bloomer]

Friendly reminder that 1 account can be counted as TWO or MORE "active" users.

[erifwodahs]

Q3 is going to be crucial to see how things really go in Blizzard, if customers (us) lost faith etc, there are a lot of good games already in the market or releasing soon and we might see a drop of subscribed numbers.

Next two quarters tbh, I know quite few people, including myself who are letting their subs to lapse, but we still have few months on the clock. And it has nothing to do with the scandal. Just the gameplay systems.

[nnelson54]

None of the women who worked at blizzard killed themselves, so keep making shit up. I bet it makes you feel really good inside.

It's literally part of the lawsuit and was investigated by the police when it happened.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultas...h=435006ba166c

[Kralljin]

It's literally part of the lawsuit and was investigated by the police when it happened.

Activision Blizzard as a whole is being sued, not just Blizzard Entertainment.
The case of the suicide supposedly happened at Activision Publishing, not Blizzard.

Blizzard is however in almost every other aspect the worst offender, it seems.

[justandulas]

Activision Blizzard as a whole is being sued, not just Blizzard Entertainment.
The case of the suicide supposedly happened at Activision Publishing, not Blizzard.

Blizzard is however in almost every other aspect the worst offender, it seems.

It happened at a blizzard company retreat with a blizzard employee doing the sad deed, and because her blizzard management didn’t do anything about her complaints allegedly

If anything, activision had given blizzard way too much freedom and autonomy. This doesn’t happen at the candy crush or CoD departments, only blizzard

Let’s not try and spin this into anything but the truth

[TheLucky1]

Friendly reminder that 1 account can be counted as TWO or MORE "active" users.

Isn't that really misleading if they try to sell their MAUs to the investors?
If someone for example plays d3 and sc2 here and there they already bought the game probably years ago and still count as 2..

[Kralljin]

It happened at a blizzard company retreat with a blizzard employee doing the sad deed, and because her blizzard management didn’t do anything about her complaints allegedly

I'd love to know any source that actually goes into detail of the suicide, because so far, i only heard hearsay.

This doesn’t happen at the candy crush or CoD departments, only blizzard

If nothing happened at Activision Blizzard (nor any discrimination of women), then Activision Blizzard would not get sued, then they would sue Blizzard Entertainment only.
They are however sueing the parent company and that not just for negligence of not paying attention to what Blizzard has been doing.

And the walkout for example was done not just by Blizzard employees, but Activision Blizzard employees, this isn't just a Blizzard issue where the rest just follows out of solidarity.

That's also why those employees now "founded" this whole "A Better ABK" thing, which stands for Activsion, Blizzard and King - not just Blizzard.

[CaptainV]

You really think there going to risk having another actionable case brought against them by lying in there investor report over something so small?

Tbh I suspect this report wasnt given by Jen+Mike but by JAB before he left so yes, yes I do think they probably didnt give a crap if they lied besides we already know they have Townsend trying to do damage control on a laughable level.

Also MAU's counting as 1 person playing 2 games means that you have to half the MAU's already, meaning that at most, they have 13 million MAU's which is definatley more accurate right now if you count all their games, Overwatch, Heroes, HS, WoW, WoW Classic, War 3 reforged, SC2, SC1 remastered.

In other words.

Retail right now prolly has 2-3 million MAU's while classic TBC given they report its more successful *Maybe* if your stretching has closer to 3-4 million MAU's.

The rest will be divided between other games, so I expect maybe 1-2 million in Overwatch, 500K to 1 million in Heroes and the rest is mainly gonna be Hearthstone.

[scelero]

This gives 'bro' culture a bad rap/name/etc. The first rule with bros is Bros before Hoes. So how did this happen in a 'bro' culture environment?

If anything, the women should've been ignored to play games and to make it better. If she wants to be a bro, she must be all about the games and being part of a group that gets shit done.

Weird that people think what activision blizzard did constitutes 'bro' 'culture'.


Oh, they're talking about the crap they watched in Porkys, American Pie, Road Trip, etc. Yeah, those aren't based in reality, it's a fictional story, a movie.

[mbit]

So how did this happen in a 'bro' culture environment?

bro culture = men culture = evil is about how complex their thinking is.

[Diaphin]

I'd love to know any source that actually goes into detail of the suicide, because so far, i only heard hearsay.

If nothing happened at Activision Blizzard (nor any discrimination of women), then Activision Blizzard would not get sued, then they would sue Blizzard Entertainment only.
They are however sueing the parent company and that not just for negligence of not paying attention to what Blizzard has been doing.

And the walkout for example was done not just by Blizzard employees, but Activision Blizzard employees, this isn't just a Blizzard issue where the rest just follows out of solidarity.

That's also why those employees now "founded" this whole "A Better ABK" thing, which stands for Activsion, Blizzard and King - not just Blizzard.

Blizzard Entertainment isn't the name of the company anymore for, how long was it again? 13 years? Like, you know that what we usually just shorten into Blizzard is officially Activision Blizzard? Thats the name of the studio.

- - - Updated - - -

This gives 'bro' culture a bad rap/name/etc. The first rule with bros is Bros before Hoes. So how did this happen in a 'bro' culture environment?

If anything, the women should've been ignored to play games and to make it better. If she wants to be a bro, she must be all about the games and being part of a group that gets shit done.

Weird that people think what activision blizzard did constitutes 'bro' 'culture'.


Oh, they're talking about the crap they watched in Porkys, American Pie, Road Trip, etc. Yeah, those aren't based in reality, it's a fictional story, a movie.

You know that for most people, that reads like outing yourself as a virgin?

[Kralljin]

Blizzard Entertainment isn't the name of the company anymore for, how long was it again? 13 years? Like, you know that what we usually just shorten into Blizzard is officially Activision Blizzard? Thats the name of the studio.

Activision Blizzard is the parent company (or holding company)
Blizzard entertainment is a subsidiary, on the same level with Activision (Publishing) and King.

Blizzard entertainment still exists, Activision Blizzard can however exert influence over Blizzard entertainment because it owns Blizzard entertainment.

Activision Blizzard isn't some fusion between Blizzard and Activision, Activision Blizzard is mostly ran by people who have been handpicked by Kotick, not people from (original) Blizzard.
Morhaime for example, had to answer to Activision Blizzard, despite being the CEO of Blizzard Entertainment, he's never been on the same level as Kotick, not even close.

Like, this is literally the first line on their wikipedia page:

Activision Blizzard, Inc. is an American video game holding company based in Santa Monica, California.

It then goes on

Activision Blizzard currently includes five business units: Activision Publishing, Blizzard Entertainment, King, Major League Gaming, and Activision Blizzard Studios.

[Nerovar]

Friendly reminder that 1 account can be counted as TWO or MORE "active" users.

Wait, so if I log into a trial account to see if my old server is dead yet and I play a few games of Heroes of the Storm on the weekend I get counted as two MAUs?

[Lorgar Aurelian]

Tbh I suspect this report wasnt given by Jen+Mike but by JAB before he left so yes, yes I do think they probably didnt give a crap if they lied besides we already know they have Townsend trying to do damage control on a laughable level.

Also MAU's counting as 1 person playing 2 games means that you have to half the MAU's already, meaning that at most, they have 13 million MAU's which is definatley more accurate right now if you count all their games, Overwatch, Heroes, HS, WoW, WoW Classic, War 3 reforged, SC2, SC1 remastered.

In other words.

Retail right now prolly has 2-3 million MAU's while classic TBC given they report its more successful *Maybe* if your stretching has closer to 3-4 million MAU's.

The rest will be divided between other games, so I expect maybe 1-2 million in Overwatch, 500K to 1 million in Heroes and the rest is mainly gonna be Hearthstone.

The total MUA is meaningless to the supposed lies which was.

World of Warcraft remains on track for much stronger engagement this year than is typical outside of a modern expansion year.

And it doesn’t matter who gives the report the company as a whole will get even more fucked if there found to be giving out false info and with there being so much inner conflict some one leaking the truth is pretty much guaranteed so they’d have to be incredibly stupid to try and lie.

[justandulas]

Activision Blizzard is the parent company (or holding company)
Blizzard entertainment is a subsidiary, on the same level with Activision (Publishing) and King.

Blizzard entertainment still exists, Activision Blizzard can however exert influence over Blizzard entertainment because it owns Blizzard entertainment.

Activision Blizzard isn't some fusion between Blizzard and Activision, Activision Blizzard is mostly ran by people who have been handpicked by Kotick, not people from (original) Blizzard.
Morhaime for example, had to answer to Activision Blizzard, despite being the CEO of Blizzard Entertainment, he's never been on the same level as Kotick, not even close.

Like, this is literally the first line on their wikipedia page:


It then goes on

When a player sues a corporation, let’s just say the nfl for an example… they don’t sue the Pittsburgh Steelers team, or any individual team that wronged them or injured them. They sue the shield. The nfl

When someone sues Blizz, king or cod… it will always be activision blizzard and not a small subsidiary because that’s how lawsuits work. You go for the big fish

[Will]

Color me shocked, no impending doom spelled out for WoW (or SL in particular) despite 3rd party website's OH SO RELIABLE reporting about the game supposedly losing all of its players to FFX-fucking-IV...


BUT, this quarterly is not, imo, a reliable source for seeing the fallout of the controversy on the companies. That'll come next quarterly. But, if going by the Hong Kong controversy, I'd doubt it'll have much of an impact on the financials.

This report doesn't even include when the exodus began lol

All I know is over on xiv I'm seeing ridiculous numbers of sprouts (new players) out of the wazoo. Meanwhile over on EU magtheridon my guild is dying as all trade chat seems to talk about is "I'm leaving to FFXIV"

You can say what you want but you're not the one who is seeing limsa lominsa absolutely packed and buzzing like never before outside of an expansion launch

[stoffe]

that was not bad numbers for WoW at all!

Well done!

[Kralljin]

When a player sues a corporation, let’s just say the nfl for an example… they don’t sue the Pittsburgh Steelers team, or any individual team that wronged them or injured them. They sue the shield. The nfl

That depends on the circumstance, i'm not well versed in how things work in american football leagues but i assume those clubs are still seperate legal entities.

The NFL gets sued when there's systemic issues at hand, meaning that the issue is present in the majority of / all teams and said the overarching entity does nothing to rectify this.

When one employee gets discriminated by their supervisor, they won't sue the parent company (Or NFL for that matter), they're going to sue their employer (the subsidiary) first and foremost.

The issue only gets to those levels if the person reports the incident and gets ignored by those entities, because then they have knowledge of such an incident and have at least investigate the matter.

When someone sues Blizz, king or cod… it will always be activision blizzard and not a small subsidiary because that’s how lawsuits work. You go for the big fish

They sue Activsion Blizzard because the issue they are sueing them over is allegedly present in the entire company, not just Blizzard.
After all, this lawsuit isn't just about sexual harassment, but the discrimination of women, meaning payment, promotion, termination and so forth.

They also would risk the lawsuit itself, as the DFEH wants to prove systemic discrimination within Activision Blizzard, if that is limited to a single subsidiary, then they're setting themselves up for failure.

If somebody wrecks my car, i'm not going to sue their entire family unless i can showcase they had a hand in it, i have to sue the person that damaged my car.
The comparison isn't perfect because a family is not a legal entity like a company, but should get the point across: You have to sue the right entities, not simply their higher ups for [reasons] unless you have proof that they're involved somehow.