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je1 healthcare posted:Something I've been thinking about, it's obvious that Activision has some serious structural issues regardless workplace harassment, just going by what we've heard out of Blizzard. But what's the workplace situation at their Call of Duty studios? Infinity Ward, Sledgehammer Games, and Treyarch don't pay nearly as much lip service to equality initiatives or denouncing sexism. And I think we can safely assume that those studios are much less concerned about building a diverse workforce (or purging racist teens from multiplayer), as they've been squarely pandering to an audience of white males for a decade now. Three years ago if you were to ask me which of Activision's studios would have widespread issues with sexual harassment, Blizzard would be at the bottom of my list. ...no? I mean, if you're going to speculate about how the lack of sexual harassment claims at Infinity Ward is actually a bad sign, than there's really no end to it.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:07
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The impression I get is that with the CoD dev teams the big problem is the crunching. Heck, Activision laid off a ton of the QA team right before Warzone had the biggest update in its life.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:09
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je1 healthcare posted:Something I've been thinking about, it's obvious that Activision has some serious structural issues regardless workplace harassment, just going by what we've heard out of Blizzard. But what's the workplace situation at their Call of Duty studios? Infinity Ward, Sledgehammer Games, and Treyarch don't pay nearly as much lip service to equality initiatives or denouncing sexism. And I think we can safely assume that those studios are much less concerned about building a diverse workforce (or purging racist teens from multiplayer), as they've been squarely pandering to an audience of white males for a decade now. Three years ago if you were to ask me which of Activision's studios would have widespread issues with sexual harassment, Blizzard would be at the bottom of my list. Treyarch's studio head had sexual harrasment allegations in November, was left/kicked out, and the organization released a statement in December. https://www.nme.com/news/gaming-news/treyarchs-inclusivity-statement-written-by-women-at-the-studio-3126579 Sledgehammer games had a bunch of friction w/ Raven IIRC and were cut out of developing MW2020 bc of that. Last time I heard of Infinity Ward drama was 10 years ago.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:09
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The main lawsuit that grabbed headlines was specifically activision wide and some of the most notable stuff (eg the employee driven to suicide while on a business trip with her supervisor) wasn't blizzard. Blizzard employees appeared to be the main people the investigators had talked to, though, so many of the details reflected that.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:11
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also pandering to a young-white-male audience is one thing, but it's not as if there hasn't been some very high profile cases of harassment and assault in independent scenes, and queer-centric independent scenes at that.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:12
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Feels Villeneuve posted:also pandering to a young-white-male audience is one thing, but it's not as if there hasn't been some very high profile cases of harassment and assault in independent scenes, and queer-centric independent scenes at that.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:21
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https://twitter.com/dan0play/status/1483449480804454400
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Jan 18, 2022 20:28
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Warthur posted:The distinction does seem to be that small/indie studios are easier to tear down whereas the ActiBlizzes of this world can just cram their ears with money and ignore any bad publicity. Those with power are insulated from consequences. That's one of the things power does.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:35
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je1 healthcare posted:Something I've been thinking about, it's obvious that Activision has some serious structural issues regardless workplace harassment, just going by what we've heard out of Blizzard. But what's the workplace situation at their Call of Duty studios? Infinity Ward, Sledgehammer Games, and Treyarch don't pay nearly as much lip service to equality initiatives or denouncing sexism. And I think we can safely assume that those studios are much less concerned about building a diverse workforce (or purging racist teens from multiplayer), as they've been squarely pandering to an audience of white males for a decade now. Three years ago if you were to ask me which of Activision's studios would have widespread issues with sexual harassment, Blizzard would be at the bottom of my list. There were some issues at Treyarch like was mentioned above. They are pumping the CoD games out like clockwork though, so if there are issues with crunch, they will be reflected in staff turnover after every major release. Who knows, maybe management is somewhat competent? Not like it's a high bar to clear in this industry.
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Jan 18, 2022 20:48
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I’m legitimately curious: how has CoD kept chugging along for all these years, when basically everyone knows that they’re formulaically churned out on a fairly constant schedule? Is it just a rolling audience of teens/young adults where by the time the “current” generation gets tired of them, they already have the next one lined up?
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Jan 18, 2022 20:59
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Regalingualius posted:I’m legitimately curious: how has CoD kept chugging along for all these years, when basically everyone knows that they’re formulaically churned out on a fairly constant schedule? Is it just a rolling audience of teens/young adults where by the time the “current” generation gets tired of them, they already have the next one lined up? If you enjoy the multiplayer you're probably gonna jump to the new game each year because that's the new hotness everyone will be playing (And now that Warzone exists and is a big deal, that's another tangible benefit to staying up to date with the series). Way more changes between each CoD than, say, Madden. Especially since they have a rotating team of three studios that will try poo poo out to see if it sticks or not.
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Jan 18, 2022 21:04
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Regalingualius posted:I’m legitimately curious: how has CoD kept chugging along for all these years, when basically everyone knows that they’re formulaically churned out on a fairly constant schedule? Is it just a rolling audience of teens/young adults where by the time the “current” generation gets tired of them, they already have the next one lined up? Inertia. That and massive, massive advertising spending. Same reason that there's some mobile game brands that just can't die. They got into the market early enough and spend so much money on reminding people that they exist, so they always float to the top of "most downloaded" lists and appear as constant ads in all the other F2P titles people play. Clash of Clans has 57 million user reviews on the Android store. Candy Crush Saga has 33 million. They will never go away. ErrEff fucked around with this message at 21:09 on Jan 18, 2022 |
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Jan 18, 2022 21:05
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Warthur posted:The distinction does seem to be that small/indie studios are easier to tear down whereas the ActiBlizzes of this world can just cram their ears with money and ignore any bad publicity. To an extent yeah, it's more that I don't think people in even explicitly queer/LGBT game scenes are less capable or even likely to be abusive as a company who makes things for teen boys
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Jan 18, 2022 21:07
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Regalingualius posted:I’m legitimately curious: how has CoD kept chugging along for all these years, when basically everyone knows that they’re formulaically churned out on a fairly constant schedule? Is it just a rolling audience of teens/young adults where by the time the “current” generation gets tired of them, they already have the next one lined up? I think it's because people like cod
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Jan 18, 2022 21:09
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Regalingualius posted:I’m legitimately curious: how has CoD kept chugging along for all these years, when basically everyone knows that they’re formulaically churned out on a fairly constant schedule? Is it just a rolling audience of teens/young adults where by the time the “current” generation gets tired of them, they already have the next one lined up? gestures at Madden But really the answer is that any game with a large enough multiplayer component will basically self-sustain unless the wheels really come off; if you establish the model of "we release a new game and if you don't buy it then you won't have anyone to play with online on the old game" early enough then it's normalized for the franchise barring something really bad blowing your game up later on Case in point for ABK, anyone trying to do a dual "paid full game price expansion packs on top of a monthly sub" nowadays is going to have a tremendously uphill battle whereas WoW it's nearly taken for granted unless someone who's already fed up and leaving is looking for something to add to a list of complaints about the game
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Jan 18, 2022 21:10
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Srice posted:If you enjoy the multiplayer you're probably gonna jump to the new game each year because that's the new hotness everyone will be playing (And now that Warzone exists and is a big deal, that's another tangible benefit to staying up to date with the series). I never really hear people talk about CoD anymore unless it's in the context of Activision/industry chat. It doesn't ever feel like the new hotness anymore. It seems to be purely running on inertia, feeding off the same group of fans who play that and only that each year. Then again Roblox is the biggest game on the planet and the only time I ever hear people talk about it is parents bemused by their kids spending all their free time and cash on it.
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Jan 18, 2022 21:19
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stev posted:I never really hear people talk about CoD anymore unless it's in the context of Activision/industry chat. It doesn't ever feel like the new hotness anymore. It seems to be purely running on inertia, feeding off the same group of fans who play that and only that each year. It's pretty much just the way a lot of pop culture is. New CoD games still sell millions of copies but if you're not in that bubble you won't hear anything outside of news that breaks through it.
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Jan 18, 2022 21:23
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External Organs posted:Do any Microsoft owned studios have unions? Yes, but only in countries where unions are protected. So you might have a studio with two teams across the world, one with unions and one without Microsoft itself is very anti union and has been structured in a way where its very hard to unionize after a big effort by contractors in the 90s
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Jan 18, 2022 21:28
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BULBASAUR posted:Yes, but only in countries where unions are protected. So you might have a studio with two teams across the world, one with unions and one without That's unfortunate. It was really neat to see the Union stuff building seam at ActiBlizz, and I think there's an alternate reality where this acquisition doesn't happen, and the unionization efforts succeed and that model helps it spread to other parts of the industry.
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Jan 18, 2022 21:31
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Yep, it sucks. It's always an uphill fight from almost zero in this country
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Jan 18, 2022 21:36
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Srice posted:If you enjoy the multiplayer you're probably gonna jump to the new game each year because that's the new hotness everyone will be playing (And now that Warzone exists and is a big deal, that's another tangible benefit to staying up to date with the series). Yeah, it's more accurate to recognize that the CoD series is effectively three different studios putting out games in the same genre on a tri-yearly rotating basis than a Madden situation. "Call of Duty" is less of a singular game series and more of an umbrella term for a specific style of gameplay subgenre at this point.
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Jan 18, 2022 22:41
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Regalingualius posted:I’m legitimately curious: how has CoD kept chugging along for all these years, when basically everyone knows that they’re formulaically churned out on a fairly constant schedule? Is it just a rolling audience of teens/young adults where by the time the “current” generation gets tired of them, they already have the next one lined up? i've been banging on this drum for a while, but COD: IW is actually really solid and quite innovative in its own terms, unfortunately everyone hated it 
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Jan 18, 2022 22:43
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I have what’s probably a dumb question - the title of this thread implies it’s for discussing a certain type of game industry news, but the discussion here seems to indicate that it’s also a general industry news/numbers kind of thread. Can anyone clarify?
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Jan 18, 2022 23:00
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Anno posted:I have what’s probably a dumb question - the title of this thread implies it’s for discussing a certain type of game industry news, but the discussion here seems to indicate that it’s also a general industry news/numbers kind of thread. Can anyone clarify? It's about dysfunction(typically of the gross kind), but it's kind of sprawled out in the last few pages because the Microsoft acquisition of Extremely Dysfunctional And lovely Company actiblizz has lots of ramifications. People started talking about CoD because of questions like "what makes it worthwhile for Microsoft to acquire such a stinking shitpile?"
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Jan 18, 2022 23:09
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Kanos posted:It's about dysfunction(typically of the gross kind), but it's kind of sprawled out in the last few pages because the Microsoft acquisition of Extremely Dysfunctional And lovely Company actiblizz has lots of ramifications. People started talking about CoD because of questions like "what makes it worthwhile for Microsoft to acquire such a stinking shitpile?" Ok cool. That’s what I figured but wanted to make sure.
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Jan 18, 2022 23:12
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https://twitter.com/jasonschreier/status/1483565063990620161?s=20
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Jan 18, 2022 23:28
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The acquisition is a mixed bag because Microsoft gobbling up another company is never good, but let's be honest: this is realistically the only way Kotick gets kicked out once it became clear the current Board won't do it. There's so much rot within ActiBlizz there was no way they could (or would) fix it themselves so Microsoft moving in and doing it is probably the only path for rebuilding the company. Not holding my breath for it to actually be a 'good' place to work, but it should at least stop being a breeding ground for serial harassers and breast milk thieves. I also imagine the Microsoft execs are so baffled by ABK's incompetence at managing their non-COD IPs they bought the company so they could to do it themselves.
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Jan 18, 2022 23:29
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Actually, speaking of, what’s MS’s games division’s public track record on sexual/racial harassment?
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Jan 18, 2022 23:32
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Regalingualius posted:Actually, speaking of, what’s MS’s games division’s public track record on sexual/racial harassment? Ben Kilgore, who was one of the senior Blizzard staff (CTO) fired for repeated sexual harassment last year, was previously high-up at Xbox, he worked there from 2000-2014, and there's been murmurings that he was just as bad there. unrelated but from the Bloomberg article: quote:“I’ll just say to players out there who are playing Activision Blizzard games on Sony’s platform: It’s not our intent to pull communities away from that platform and we remained committed to that,” Spencer said in an interview. so any ongoing ActiBlizz game on that's on Playstation or Switch isn't going anywhere, but this still leaves open the very real possibility that CoD becomes an Xbox exclusive somewhere down the line (if they even stick to the annual model) lih fucked around with this message at 23:40 on Jan 18, 2022 |
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Jan 18, 2022 23:37
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Regalingualius posted:Actually, speaking of, what’s MS’s games division’s public track record on sexual/racial harassment? I wanna say there was some stuff back in the xbox 360 / xbox one transition days that lead to the games divisions loses some heads, but I don't have any links to hand.
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Jan 18, 2022 23:37
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Listening to the Bombcast, which just recorded an episode today (only a Twitch recording right now). According to Jeff Grubb's sources, Microsoft began talks in October/November and the deal itself was put together over the holidays. It sounds like Microsoft saw an opportunity and jumped on it, and Kotick gets to have the best possible outcome thanks to that.
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Jan 18, 2022 23:41
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External Organs posted:That's unfortunate. It was really neat to see the Union stuff building seam at ActiBlizz, and I think there's an alternate reality where this acquisition doesn't happen, and the unionization efforts succeed and that model helps it spread to other parts of the industry. I wonder how much the sale was done to escape the growing unionization.
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Jan 18, 2022 23:47
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ironically he might be right that not shipping those titles did more to bring down activisions value than the sexual harassment and assault scandals... if you ignore that the single biggest reason why productivity has been poo poo is the aforementioned harassment and its waves of fallout (and before some says, 'what about covid?' they haven't released a new game since 2016, their development issues very much pre-date covid). He of course 1000% deserves to go down as "ceo driven out for many years of refusing to address a culture of discrimination and sexual harassment' either way lih posted:Ben Kilgore, who was one of the senior Blizzard staff (CTO) fired for repeated sexual harassment last year, was previously high-up at Xbox, he worked there from 2000-2014, and there's been murmurings that he was just as bad there. given that cod franchise is an absolute cashcow and one of the single biggest things that MS gets out of the deal, I would be unbelievably surprised if they start making massive changes to what is apparently a very working formula Herstory Begins Now fucked around with this message at 23:54 on Jan 18, 2022 |
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Jan 18, 2022 23:48
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sebmojo posted:i've been banging on this drum for a while, but COD: IW is actually really solid and quite innovative in its own terms, unfortunately everyone hated it think this is a singleplayer/multiplayer split i think us weirdos that like a good single player cod campaign loved IW, while i can totally understand why all the sci fi poo poo wasn't what the multiplayer fanbase wanted. Basically IW suffered by being stuck under a game that is primarily enjoyed by hardcore competitive gamers who like a contemporary modern war setting. It's brand is too strong for any real innovation to game play or setting.
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Jan 18, 2022 23:52
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lih posted:so any ongoing ActiBlizz game on that's on Playstation or Switch isn't going anywhere, but this still leaves open the very real possibility that CoD becomes an Xbox exclusive somewhere down the line (if they even stick to the annual model) Microsoft was saying the same thing while they were buying Bethesda. Then suddenly Starfield and Elder Scrolls 6 were Xbox exclusive. The only Bethesda games still coming out on Playstation are the ones that deals were signed for before MS brought Bethesda. After this purchase is finalised, I don't think there is a chance that games like CoD or whatever else will still come out on PS. Like this year's and maybe next year's CoD will hit PS, but 2024's? Nah.
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Jan 19, 2022 00:02
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It really feels like every important merger over the last two decades is now under Microsoft's umbrella. 2008: Vivendi/Blizzard acquires Activision, approximately $5B 2013: Activision/Blizzard buys majority shares, approximately $6B 2014: Microsoft purchases Mojang, approximately $2.5B 2021: Microsoft purchases Bethesda, approximately $7.5B 2022: Microsoft purchases Activision/Blizzard, approximately $70B I'm racking my head trying to think of gaming acquisition news prior to 2008 and the best I can do is come up with the Sierra Dynamix merger.
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Jan 19, 2022 00:07
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Veotax posted:Microsoft was saying the same thing while they were buying Bethesda. Then suddenly Starfield and Elder Scrolls 6 were Xbox exclusive. The only Bethesda games still coming out on Playstation are the ones that deals were signed for before MS brought Bethesda. My impression was Spencer is talking about existing games - they're not going to eventually make say, Overwatch, an Xbox exclusive in the same way that ESO and Minecraft are still available on Playstation, but yes, CoD 2024 or even 2023 will very likely be Xbox exclusive, if they even stick to that annual model.
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Jan 19, 2022 00:11
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An interesting thing here is that arguably the most important non-mobile CoD game is already multiplat and will presumably be updated for a long time to come. Even if new games are exclusive starting in 2023/2024 PlayStation people will still have Warzone.
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Jan 19, 2022 00:20
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The last Call of Duty game sales were way down, yet it was still the top-selling (physical) game for December and 2021 I think
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Jan 19, 2022 00:25
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Not sure if it's been brought up before, but one amusing outcome of this merger is that two of the Playstation's most well-known character mascots (Crash and Spyro) are now wholly owned by its chief competitor.
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Jan 19, 2022 00:28
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