The studio Proletariat is known for the battle royale Spellbreak. However, it will be closed in 2023. Now it has come to light: Blizzard has acquired the studio and the associated employees. They are now supposed to advance the development of the new WoW expansion.
How many employees does Blizzard get with this? As reported by Venturebeat, Blizzard is said to have gained 100 additional employees through the purchase of the studio. They are initially supposed to focus on advancing the development of Dragonflight .
The new expansion is supposed to be released in 2022, but many players are skeptical. So far, too few contents have been shown, and no beta has started yet. However, there are only 6 months left in the year.
The announcement that new employees are joining Blizzard lowers the skepticism of some players. The company is said to have been collaborating with Blizzard since May.
The development of Shadowlands was tough
What do the companies say about the acquisition? Venturebeat spoke with Seth Sivak, the CEO of Proletariat. When asked about the current issues at Blizzard, such as the sexism scandal, he said: “I believe the Blizzard team has recognized some of the challenges they faced. In some of the early conversations, we discussed how they want to further improve the culture and create a great workplace for developers.”
He sees collaboration with Blizzard and working on WoW as an opportunity to further develop the Proletariat studio.
John Hight, General Manager of WoW, explained that WoW players have an insatiable hunger for new content. Blizzard has had trouble satisfying this hunger with Shadowlands. As early as the end of 2021, they looked for ways to hire more employees.
The first effects of the new employees should already be felt at the launch of Dragonflight.
How big is this deal? The acquisition of an entire studio and the hiring of 100 employees is the biggest expansion for Blizzard in the last 15 years. Recently, the company has made headlines for layoffs:
- In 2019, 8% of the entire studio, nearly 800 employees, were laid off. This primarily affected the publishing and e-sports departments.
- In 2021, numerous individuals were laid off again. It reportedly affected employees in all areas, particularly e-sports and live events.
- In addition, 20 employees were fired following the known sexism scandal.
Only the acquisition of Vicarious Visions, which worked on Diablo 2 Resurrected, was comparably large as this acquisition of Proletariat. However, this studio remained independent and is also reportedly working on other projects related to Activision Blizzard.
The employees of Proletariat are supposed to be integrated into the team in Boston.
More about Dragonflight can be found in our podcast:
Employees worked on mobile MMOs and battle royale
What kind of new employees are these? Proletariat was founded in 2012 by veterans in the industry. They had previously worked on MMORPGs such as Lord of the Rings Online, Dungeons & Dragons Online, or Asheron’s Call.
In 2015, the studio released its first game, World Zombination. It was a mobile MMO and reached over 4 million players worldwide. They gained recognition through Spellbreak, a battle royale that was released for PC, PS4, Xbox One, and later Nintendo Switch.
However, this very game is now being discontinued. More about it here:
Unique battle royale with wizards is 85% positive on Steam – Must now close anyway
