There are increasing loud complaints at Activision Blizzard. More and more developers of World of Warcraft are speaking out and demanding changes – as employees are leaving.
In recent days, the positive atmosphere surrounding World of Warcraft has taken a significant hit again. This is not due to the content in the game, but rather the whole “surroundings” that are currently happening at Blizzard. Developers are expressing their frustrations more and more on Twitter – as beloved colleagues are leaving the company. And apparently, the cause is a rule change that hardly anyone understands.
What has changed? A few weeks ago, Activision Blizzard decided that the “Home Office” policy would be suspended again. Those who could previously work permanently from home now have to come into the next office at least 2 days a week and work from there.
The problem is that during the Corona pandemic, many employees were hired who worked entirely from home and assumed that this would continue later. Often, they live far from the nearest Activision Blizzard office or cannot afford a move to the quite expensive Irvine.
What has happened now? After one of the game producers of World of Warcraft already spoke critically yesterday, Allison Steele, who works as a game designer for WoW, is now following up. She wrote on Twitter:
The forced “return to the office” has already cost us a few fantastic people and will cost us more in the coming months.
It is a terrible, short-sighted, and self-destructive regulation that only weakens our ability to make the kind of game that we want to develop and that our players deserve.
And just to be very clear: I just want to make great games. That’s my dream. I love WoW. I’ve been playing since Vanilla and have been working on it for two years now, since Patch 9.1.5.
Everything Adam said? That. Exactly that.
Why is this strange? World of Warcraft Dragonflight has been largely created from home and is regarded by many as one of the best expansions of all time. That Activision now insists that all employees must spend 2 out of 5 days in the office seems strange. After all, the Corona pandemic has shown that working from home can be just as efficient as working in the office – Dragonflight is a great example of that.
It seems that a new wave of criticism is slowly but surely breaking through – and again it comes from the developers who have to watch as more and more colleagues leave.
The long-term effects for World of Warcraft are still not foreseeable.
