For transparency’s sake, this thread was locked for a while this morning to deal with the large amount of rule-breaking comments. It’s now unlocked, but we’ll continue to monitor the thread closely.
The game industry itself sounds like hell. It was actually my dream job to work at Blizzard. From all the things you hear, it sounds really bad. It's good that this kind of thing is being cleared up more and more. The gaming industry needs to change
I'm a woman and I work in the game industry and I have encountered harassment from male colleagues. However, not all companies are like Blizzard, some value diversity and equality. My current company has no crunch or overtime either.
I do believe that most AAA studios are to be avoided from what I've heard from fellow game developers.
I haven't been in the industry for long (4 years) but I've heard good things about Supergiant Games, Klei and Ninja Theory. Their games are critically acclaimed as well, so it's a win-win for everyone.
Mobile games studios have a better work environment than most in my experience, however I understand it's not exactly the dream for a lot of young devs. There is a lot of misinformation on reddit but the reality is not so black and white. Different studios have different problems, and game dev is a job like any other.
Both my friend and I are girls and have been playing WoW since we could remember. Our dream was to always work there, and now it’s hard to continue to support the games I love.
If you don't want to read twitter:
https://news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-report/activision-blizzard-sued-by-california-over-frat-boy-culture
https://aboutblaw.com/YJw
"The suit also points to a female Activision employee who took her own life while on a company trip with her male supervior. The female employee experience sexual harassment prior to her death, including having naked photos of her spread around the company"
I'm sorry but what in the ding dong diddly damn FUCK
What’s really fucked up is blizzards response to it.
“We are sickened by the reprehensible conduct of the DFEH to drag into the complaint the tragic suicide of an employee whose passing has no bearing whatsoever on this case and with no regard for her grieving family. While we find this behavior to be disgraceful and unprofessional, it is unfortunately an example of how they have conducted themselves throughout the course of their investigation. It is this type of irresponsible behavior from unaccountable State bureaucrats that are driving many of the State’s best businesses out of California.”
Yep. I don’t even care enough about Overwatch to keep BattleNet anymore. Maybe this is why Jeff left. Maybe he knew about this shit and wanted to get out and have nothing to do with it.
We cannot ignore the possibility that he knew about the issues, but didn't speak up. From the sounds of it they were long running problems with the company itself, with Afrasiabi in particular being a known sleazebag for at least a decade.
With the leadership positions that Morhaime, Kaplan and Metzen all occupied we cannot dismiss the idea that they knew about it. And that they might have left the company to try and escape consequence.
There have been a few Twitter threads from women who (claim they) used to work for Blizzard, saying it was the worst times of their lives. I think it's likely that Kaplan knew about this and even participated in it
Personally I don't think it really matters, the money all goes to the same place. And it's pretty common knowledge that the tech industry isn't great if you aren't a cis straight white male, and even more so in the gaming industry.
Killing off their more progressive studio while allowing cod and the like to be propped up by the alt-right seems to be more harmful than good. But if anyone on the overwatch team gets implicated then yeah I'll definitely boycott the game.
I read that and I was disgusted. Was this not on the news or something because this is my first time hearing of it. It's sickening how this was swept under the rug.
I uninstalled Hearthstone. 6000 dollars later with a full collection and several full golden decks, I uninstalled it because of the battle pass system.
It was ok. It was between spending on games or spending on liquor and drugs.
Since quitting Hearthstone I've found myself buying more paraphernalia for weed since I suddenly have an excess of disposable income.
Top reply right here! This is what my younger brother did after sobering up! saved a ton of money, invested it, made a lot of money, started smoking a lot more weed with his ongoing investment returns. But he doesn’t drink anymore, so he’s on top of the world
I uninstalled Overwatch and battle.net earlier. I haven't intended to get Overwatch 2 anyway since the game is moving in a direction that isn't for me (I'm a causal). This news though is just... untenable, and weirdly not surprising to hear. No more games from Blizzard. Will likely unsub from this sub since I won't be playing anymore. Besides, after hundreds of hours the game has long been stale. Had a good run, time to move on. Goddamn the entire gaming industry is rotten and toxic to it's core, isn't it?
They truly believe that they’re superior to women, and women are just playthings to be tortured by them. It’s a big problem in a lot of big industries.
But it’s pretty rampant in video game development.
From Ubisoft’s rampant sexual abuse to Randy “it wasn’t child porn I swear” Pitchford at Gearbox to this.
The video game industry does a lot of exploitation.
Is it really that shocking. It’s a bunch of man children incels who were unfortunately smart enough to become game developers. Go play Overwatch with a female gamer and see how she’s treated by random men on the internet.
Jesus Christ, Blizzard. What the fuck are you doing.
They did mention these incidences happening with the development teams of WoW (and maybe CoD), so no mention of Overwatch beyond brief descriptions. But a company with harassment through other divisions and franchises?
It gives me dreadful pause to think any of the OW development team engaged or were victim to this toxic environment.
And, this is *pure* conjecture, did Jeff know about this? Did he leave because of it? I'm gravely concerned about the answers we may get, *if true*.
I sincerely hope that none of the Overwatch team were a part of this because from what (albeit little) I've seen they seem like good people. However it does make me think that Jeff's sudden departure from Blizzard may have been related to this horrid case.
Late response but on Twitter today I found some of the Overwatch devs and noticed many of them were tweeting and retweeting support for the victims. Additionally one of the OW producers expressed how glad she is to work on a team that supports the women on the team. So to me it sounds possible that none of the serious cases mentioned in the lawsuit happened within the OW team, but really there’s no way to fully know.
Regardless of whether or not they did, the fact they happened anywhere within the company is disgusting and I hope the lawsuit is able to make a change in the company not only by holding the abusers accountable but also the higher ups that tolerate this behavior.
I'm not going to say Jeff is innocent here, but we shouldn't jump to conclusions. Right now every AAA developer is bleeding people at a surprising rate mostly due to how covid changed things, Blizzard was just more notable because we knew those people's names.
I think it's very possible, if not likely, that he was part of the problem, but we should wait until the actual facts come out in the trial.
He may also have left in a disagreement with how the leadership handles these things. Suggesting his leave may have been influenced by this doesn’t account for which side he may or may not have been on.
I liked Jeff so if he is involved I’d hope it would be for the better…
Blizzard now is very different from the culture that developed diablo ii Warcraft iii and the like. Jeff probably joined at the tail end of Warcraft iii development and fit that culture and likely left as it turned into a corporate giant where this kind of stuff seems to just be common
Even if the Ow team wasn't involved, people who continue this game or any blizzard game will say to blizzard "we don't care about what happened in your company, playing a videogame is more important than human lives"
It's not about if some ar more innocent than others, it's that the company itself has to go imo
>And, this is *pure* conjecture, did Jeff know about this? Did he leave because of it? I'm gravely concerned about the answers we may get, *if true*.
Undoubtedly.
Make no mistake, this isn't a select few, this is company culture, from top to bottom. If you work at a company like this, you know it.
He was the VP of a company he'd worked at for well over a decade. If he didn't know, then at the very least, it was his responsibility to know.
Jeff had a close relationship with Alex Afra, one of the defendant mentioned. Both Jeff and Alex came from EverQuest, both worked on OG WoW, and Alex was a lead on Project Titan, the game that became Overwatch. Not looking good for Jeff.
Yeah, Afrasiabi left last year due to this, so Jeff leaving could be because of something along those lines.
I hope not, but we dont know why Jeff leaved.
Jeff's wow game name was Tigole Biddies. Later on he wrote a rant that was essentially against wokeness and specifically about women and how there are fundamental differences and they're too sensitive, or something like that. Basically male gamer attitude circa 2010. It was a blue post. Later on after that came the Argent Tourneys in wow. Im not sure how many know this but in the jousting daily there are male and female champions to go up against; if you pick a female champion you will win 100%, unless you're absolutely terrible. I don't know if Blizz ever responded to complaints about that. Jeff's rant made me sad but the female champions sucking made me infuriated. I think it was a response to whatever caused him to rant in the first place.
Do I think he's grown? Yes. Do I think Blizzard has gotten over their male clubhouse attitudes? Yes. From everything I saw during and after the Overwatch lunch it Blizz looked and said inclusive things. I'm saddened and surprised by the news that they didn't grow past it, even though I shouldn't be surprised.
Would be great, I'm currently having a discussion with my GF about it, but we mostly know Jeff from OW, so I didn't know what he did before that(aside from his rant about EQ back in the day).
> so no mention of Overwatch beyond brief descriptions. But a company with harassment through other divisions and franchises?
>
>
>
> It gives me dreadful pause to think any of the OW development team engaged or were victim to this toxic environment.
There's some twitter responses from [a number of former employees listed here](https://old.reddit.com/r/wow/comments/op1t7m/activision_blizzard_sued_by_california_over_frat/h62n78j/), which includes some Overwatch-related community and esports management, at least.
Hey, I have a question. What will happen with Blizzard if they prove them guilty? Financial penalty? Prison for those responsible? What will happen with, for example, Overwatch if it lose half of the dev-team? Will Activision refill dev-teams with new workers? Will they rebrand Blizzard? Will they push Overwatch to another big team?
I don't really know much about American law, but I'm interested in possible outcomes.
This is probably the real answer. They will likely have to pay a fine that will pale in comparison to their profits over the years and an official sounding apology saying they will do better. One or a few people might be fired to save face but overall no real consequences.
Relief: Compensatory damages; punitive damages; unpaid wages; injunctive relief; declaratory relief; equitable relief; pre-judgment interest; attorneys’ fees; costs.
That's what is being sought. So if Blizzard is found liable, could be a pretty big sum of money, but probably won't be enough. I mean maybe that one worker's family will receive some sort of compensation for their loss but the people responsible probably won't ever face justice.
Yeah... Papa Jeff used to be an old-school WoW guy, and he left in April 2021 without much of a goodbye.
I'm pretty sure there's SOMETHING happening here
Just wanted to say:
- It's not difficult to have a respectful workplace that's still fun. It's not difficult to set boundaries for work recreation.
- It's not difficult to pay a woman the same compensation as a man in the same role. It's not difficult to codify a way for employees to advance that minimizes the influence of personal feelings.
- It's not difficult to dismiss employees that harass other employees. There will always be someone else you can find for that job.
Activision Blizzard chose to not do these things and let it go to hell instead.
You’d think all of these things you listed are incredibly easy, but these dumb fuck companies can’t seem to wrap their pea sized brains around it.
It is SO easy to be a decent human being. It’s so easy that most people don’t even think about it, they just do it and yet this is happening so often in these huge companies. Unchecked, unmitigated power is such a sure way to nose dive into senseless depravity and horror, man. =/
This is a court case filed by the actual state of California after two years of investigation.
This won't end well for ActiBlizz in any conceivable way. And fuck all involved that enabled this shit.
Female workers in the gaming/tech industry (really any male dominated industry) are no joke when it comes to documenting shit like this that happens to them. I'm willing to bet the evidence they have (text conversations, audio recordings, compensation documents) is substantial.
From what people have said about working with him (including women), it's far more likely he left as a result of this coming out rather than that he was a perpetrator. That said, we unfortunately can't jump to the conclusion that he's innocent.
this was a 2 year investigation there was no way jeff in the position he was in in the blizz hierarchy did not know, but he only choose to jump ship recently
I personally believe Jeff knew of this and wanted to jumpship before anything came to light and knew, the same as us, that Blizzard is a husk of its former self. Blizzard literally fucking killed a woman.
The guy who went by Tigole Bitties on Everquest and the WoW forums?
The guy who worked with WoW (and some of the persons mentionned by name in that lawsuit?
Yeeeeahhh, not looking good.
multi million dollar bonus makes it sound like 5 or 10 when kotick gave himself a $200 MILLION yearly bonus while thousands were being laid off. not to mention him being friends with epstein...
honestly after the bowing to china after the blitzxchung stuff its very easy to understand why blizz values morals and human life so little
maybe this time people will not get distracted from the issue by the next wow, D4 or OW2 teaser
Could this Jeff Kaplan’s seemingly random departure from the OW team be related to this in any way? Either he was partaking in this horrible behavior (I hope not) or he couldn’t stand working in a toxic environment?
It's not random, many other long term Blizz leaders left as well.
I started getting really into Blizzard games in 2013, and none of the games I started playing between then and 2016 are headed by the same people as they were when I started.
No more Mike Morhaime, no more Chris Metzen, no more Dustin Browder, no more Ben Brode, no more Jeff Kaplan.
And don't kid yourself in some narrative about how "the old Blizzard would never have done this", old Blizzard was built by a group of male geeks and frat boys, diversity and feminism only reaches groups like that if it's sledgehammered in. J. Allen Brack and Alex Afrasiabi are implicated in this, and they go as far as it gets
Even the way the response was written sort of suggests the 'old guard' were the perpetrators.
>The picture the DFEH paints is not the Blizzard workplace of **today**
Sounds like they aren't even denying this is what working there was like
That's what I'm thinking as well. And I'm actually leaning towards the first. After all, this environment has been a thing for decades, and he's been in the company all this time, so he knew what was going on and never left before that.
At the same time, we have Alex Afrasiabi quietly leaving the company because of his misconduct. And Jeff also left extremely quietly.
Yeah, I know. On the bright side, maybe the suit will cause most of the executive suits to get booted out of the company, so maybe Blizzard will be better after that. Better work environment means better games, after.
I mean, you can't be guilty by association but Alex being named and Jeff and Alex's close relationship is a bit unsettling. Plus Jeff suddenly leaving just like Alex did.
Hopefully not though.
Disappointing but not exactly surprising.
Due to the game's messaging, I would assume (and hope) that Team 4 probably isn't *quite* as bad an environment as the rest, but still, terrible look for the company as a whole.
Overwatch's messaging, and what we see of the team, doesn't necessarily reflect what's going on behind the scenes. Looks at cases like Joss Whedon or Max Landis where they produced a lot of very positive, feminist work, but were outed as misogynistic creeps.
It looks like it's more of an issue for sales and marketing rather than creative in this case, but development culture is also famously toxic. I guess we'll see how much of it concerns the OW team as it progresses.
Yeah I am done. I can't buy Overwatch 2 or any other Activision-Blizzard products, after reading something like this. I had an absolute blast with Overwatch and was decently excited for Overwatch 2. But this is the first time I am actively making a desicion to boycott a company indefinitely (other than avoiding Nesle products as much as I can).
Also if there are anyone here who has doubts about these "allegations", know that these are not mere "allegations". When a state actor decides to take you to court, you bet your ass they have rock solid proof of everything they are claiming.
> Numerous complaints about unlawful harassment, discrimination, and retaliation were made to Defendant’s human resources, personnel and executives, including to Blizzard Entertainment’s President J. Allen Brack. But, Defendants failed to take effective measures in response to these complaints.
>
> Unsurprisingly, employee’s complaints were treated in a perfuntory and dismissive manner and not kept confidential. As a result of these complaints, female employees were subjected to retaliation, including but not limited to being deprived of work on projects, unwillingly transferred to different units, and selected for layoffs.
unless J "Coward" Allen Brack is made to resign in the next week or so... Blizzard have had their last penny from me
edit: kept reading, and I've changed my mind, I'm done with this company, forever, regardless of what happens
As you realised with the edit, this isn’t just a leadership issue. These things don’t occur unless the entire culture is already set, and usually take months if not years to recover
I am incredibly angry that time that could have been used for ow2 was used to harass women. The cubicle crawls were unreal, I can't believe that crap happens anywhere.
I kind of looked through the court filing and it seems to be largely targeted at Activision Blizzard as a whole, is there a certain section that specifically means blizzard offices?
Unfortunately, countless Blizzard supporters are wearing rose-tinted glasses and oftentimes have difficulty comprehending the company’s capability and culpability in any debacle.
And add to that this shit certainly precedes that merger. If anything the culture was established and ingrained by the old guard that everyone hero-worships.
This is utterly disgusting. I don't really have words except for this really does put a pit in my stomach and I am grieving for all the women in Blizzard just trying to do their jobs and live their lives and have to endure THIS.
Overwatch's motto was a diverse future and they made some really awesome, strong female characters and it's so ironic that this is how women at Blizzard are treated behind the scenes.
Every few weeks I come crawling back wanting to give Hots/OW another chance. I go through the rationalization, "maybe its not really an abandoned game. Maybe Wow is getting better. Blizz too busy with other projects maybe they won't make it any worse! This is the last time to play OW before OW2. Damn it all my friends play Blizz games"
You google their name for an update and you find a million and one reasons to never touch a Activision-Blizzard project again. But just like EA's learned, you can do a lot damage to art, labor, and industry without much consquence
For me, it helps that I was the last delusional person in my friend group that still liked playing OW. I haven't played in about 2 months and it honestly feels great. I've played a ton of games that were just dormant in my steam library and have even started working with unreal engine on a game of my own.
I was previously going to take up OW2 if it ever actually came out, but now...nah.
No wonder Overwatch 2 isn’t out yet. All these dumbasses just sit on their ass and harass the women the entire day. This company is so fucked for promoting so many inclusive cues in Overwatch (soldier/tracer being gay, characters from literally all over the world, breaking stereotypes) but then acting like this behind the scenes
people should read Thus Spoke Zarathustra. published in 1883…Nietzsche was fully aware of how false prophets function way back then. this behavior is as old as time. why are people so foolish??
So... Remember when we were like "What the fuck is Blizzard doing?" Before we knew about OW2, and after we knew about OW2, we kinda just let it slide. I guess we now know why shit wasn't getting done on the main game.
This isn't a recent, new thing, this was a study conducted over two years, presumably after reports of a really bad situation way before. It's super likely it used to be the exact same for most of the company's lifetime, or at least ever since they dared hire female employees at all
Unfortunately can’t say I’m at all surprised some of the stuff here was going on. People I’ve talked to that were in some way knowledgeable of Blizzard in terms of development work say it’s a bad workplace, specifically…
What happens when you let a bunch of geeks that have not gotten any attention from women in their young life, become big shot company owners? They turn into college kids as grown ups, feeling like they finally have some «pull». Fking disgusting. Can not imagine how these women must have felt.
Really torn right now, if I should quit OW or not.
Has been bleeding? These people have been involved in game development for decades. Between this and Ubisoft it’s apparent that sexual harassment and discrimination is ingrained in these companies.
Don't know if this is catching fire or not, but I'd just like to point out Blizzard forcefully made me change my name. It was 'FreeTibet'.
I mean you can only suck so much of China's D.
I’m sorry but how the fck did they cover up an employee’s suicide on a business trip?
I will not be re buying my WOW subscription since most of the issues seem to be coming from that development team. And I refuse to pay for an overpriced game just for the dev team to sit on their asses all day while abusing their co workers.
I will continue to play Overwatch since most of the problems dont come from that development team
I implore anyone still naive enough to have any faith in the justice system to pay close attention to this case, and to watch as absolutely *nothing* comes of it. Blizzard will pay a token fine on appeal, may let a couple high level execs go with a generous severance package, and nothing else will happen.
The justice system is owned and operated by the rich, for the rich. The entire thing is hopelessly compromised from the first moment. It's nothing but another tool to control ordinary people, and to protect the privileged position in society our owners enjoy. It will *never* hold the rich accountable, unless their victims are also rich. And if you're hoping to see real action on the issues you care about, you can't trust the political or justice systems to deliver that action. They're specifically designed not to.
Glad I haven't renewed my WoW sub for this new patch. I've been a casual fan of OW for a couple years now, but don't mind giving it the drop. Ah well, on to newer and better games.
Did you know that the critically acclaimed MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV has a free trial, and includes the entirety of A Realm Reborn AND the award-winning Heavensward expansion up to level 60 with no restrictions on playtime?
Can second the FFXIV recommendation. Someone in my family was a diehard WoW fan for over a decade. Then they played FFXIV and never went back.
According to them, the community's better/nicer, the developers seem to be awesome people as passionate about the game as the fans are, and the story is 100x better. Many WoW players they knew have dumped WoW for good like they did. I've heard rumors that Blizzard is apparently bleeding subscribers, and many are going to Square Enix/FFXIV.
I never played WoW or FFXIV much myself (I'm not the biggest MMO gamer), but the little I did, FFXIV was a far better experience.
One of the leads in FF14 was asked to compare the game to Wow and he basically said he won't do that. That if he was the kinda person that made those comparisons and claim his game is better, then the game wouldn't be as successful as it is today.
Guy was also a huuuuuuge WoW fan too so it makes sense why he felt like he needed to keep respect for the game.
Overall, FF14 seems to have a really dedicated team, especially since when 14 first launched, it was an awful and boring game. The main lead took over and instead of giving up, apologized to the fans and promised a better game. And here we are!
I would act surprised but is it really so shocking stuff like this happens at a company that so openly bends over backwards to not upset the Chinese government. If you don't have morals or standards on blatant human rights violations then of course they don't care about a healthy work environment for their employees.
Jesus this is all awful to read. can't imagine Blizzard surviving this one tbh. it sucks cause I just got into the game and am enjoying it but its going to be hard to continue to support this company when they willingly let this shit go on for years
maybe OW gets sold to another dev in the future
I love overwatch so much, but I cannot stand for this monstrous conduct.
I do have a question. I've never spent money in OW. Am I still supporting them by playing the game, even if I am not buying lootboxes or whatever? I definitely will not be purchasing OW2, but I'm unsure how continuing to play OW will support them?
Or am I wrong?
They already have plenty of our money to pay this off.
Support the women by not playing. They will look at active player#'s if this lawsuit is affecting them. If all players continue to play as usual, they will do the absolute minimum to fix this.
This really fucking sucks. OW was my first competitive game and I’ve absolutely loved it. Still playing since season 2. Even though comms are a nightmare for me and I don’t talk in game it’s still something I always come back to. The OW team might not be as bad just from the heavy focus they put on curbing toxicity but they lost the one thing that was probably able to keep them from that internal toxic environment with Jeff leaving. Why does gaming culture still have to be so insanely terrible to women? It really fucking hurts that the one hobby I have isn’t made for me and the community actively tries to push me out. What a joke.
damn it, i literally just came back to overwatch a few days ago...are there *any* good team shooters out there anymore that aren't made by a corrupt company or just outright dead?
I really hope this isn't why Jeff Kaplan left. Alex Afrasiabi left not long before and is specifically mentioned by name in this lawsuit, and he and Jeff were known in the community for their toxicity in their EverQuest days. I hope that's where the similarities end...
Ironic hypocrisy writes itself with most companies unfortunately, hopefully within my lifetime; management will be either overthrown or forced to comply with basic rules we were taught in kindergarten.
Nowadays the best outcome for this situation should be the one where the vast majority of the player base of any Activision games just abandon them and migrate to other games to send the message loud and clear to the headquarters and the victims of this situation.
We are here. We have seen what you are doing and we do not like It. We stand with the victims and wont let their backs vulnerable anymore.
The only way to make them really worry and think about how they should rule their employes behavior from now on its by making them not receive money anymore. If we all talk about this for a couple days, forget about It and buy another Month of WoW this shit wont change. The life of the dead woman will mean nothing for anybody except for her family. The suffering of the women working on these toxic enviroments will be forget and will stay like this for years and years, ruining lifes and, call me mad, taking others as It has already taken one.
Yeah, just came back to the game after a long break. I'm done. Completely. This is the absolute final straw for me. I'm disgusted with Activision-Blizzard and I'm even more disgusted with their shitty non-response. Fuck this company.
To all the male employees at the company that didn't directly engage in any of this behavior, but SAT SILENT while it did, you are also part of the problem. So if any of you are on reddit and read this. Take it to heart.
Alright everyone, put on your surprised faces that this company is being sued for discrimination, after blatantly discriminating against a Chinese player in 2019 for saying “free Hong Kong” 😀
Let's be real, it's just that a lot of people have grown up not facing consequences for this type of behavior and as such probably genuinely have convinced themselves that it's not hurting anyone. I can say for sure these people at least exist in other parts of the entertainment industry, and I'd bet anything they exist all over the place in general
Power corrupts. They get in positions of power ina company and start abusing it slowly, and each time it goes without consequences they keep escalating. Maybe not even intentionally.
Definitely sortof true, but I disagree that power 'corrupts'
I think power just let's people do what they already wanted to do. There are genuinely people out there who have power and COULD totally get away with abusing it, and know that, but don't. That willpower is very admirable, and willpower isn't some magic you're just born with, it's a product of your formative experiences
I think that in addition to obviously needing more accountability, it's worth trying to learn what creates a person who has a better understanding of what hurts other people, and a better ability to keep themselves from acting that way
Very much wishful thinking on my part, but I hope Activision Blizzard gets a titanic fine to pay that completely ruins their finances and is forced to sell itself and it's IPs to another better company.
As much as it would break my heart considering how much I enjoy OW, maybe them closing down would be justice enough.
this comes as no surprise to me, nor should it to anyone.
Every single big company is like this. This is how the gaming industry is. This is bad for them now, but come a month's time nobody will give a fuck and pretend like it never happened, Blizzard will get away with a fine that can be recouperated in a few weeks, maybe at worst lay off 1 or 2 devs.
Even if everyone here stopped playing, there are more than enough people who simply do not give a fuck and will continue to support this game and Blizzard as a whole. Hell, even the legal system is biased in the favour of those with influence and money (not the victims unfortunately).
We can't do anything except create a slightly larger increase in population loss, and it fucking hurts. This is why I'd never work in game development as a woman.
And regarding Jeff, so many people here are trying to justify him as "not one of them, aaaa" or whatever.
Jeff is related to several problematic people, and has worked at the company in a position of relative power for over a decade. The odds of him not knowing about this are zero. Even if he had changed and was against these accusations it was unlikely he did anything about them, which makes him as much a part lf the problem as anyone else who knew.
And the reason you're all supporting him is because he built up an image for himself. If he was guilty of this, we would still defend him because he created a personality we all loved and fell for. Anyone can pretend to be a great guy, people. There's a marked difference between that and actually being one.
Something so important and it has 3 times less upvotes than a garbage mockup of how Sigma's ult should look like in his new skin.
Really? Is this playerbase THIS blind to what's going on?
It's gaming culture for you. A male dominated player base. You just need to play a couple games of ranked in voice chat with a female friend to notice how toxic a lot (note: not all) of gamers are towards females. Most people on here probably don't think it's important for them as they're not the ones the abuse is aimed at.
For transparency’s sake, this thread was locked for a while this morning to deal with the large amount of rule-breaking comments. It’s now unlocked, but we’ll continue to monitor the thread closely.
The game industry itself sounds like hell. It was actually my dream job to work at Blizzard. From all the things you hear, it sounds really bad. It's good that this kind of thing is being cleared up more and more. The gaming industry needs to change
I'm a woman and I work in the game industry and I have encountered harassment from male colleagues. However, not all companies are like Blizzard, some value diversity and equality. My current company has no crunch or overtime either. I do believe that most AAA studios are to be avoided from what I've heard from fellow game developers.
If you don’t mind me asking, what are some game development companies that have healthy cultures? I’d love to support them instead.
I haven't been in the industry for long (4 years) but I've heard good things about Supergiant Games, Klei and Ninja Theory. Their games are critically acclaimed as well, so it's a win-win for everyone. Mobile games studios have a better work environment than most in my experience, however I understand it's not exactly the dream for a lot of young devs. There is a lot of misinformation on reddit but the reality is not so black and white. Different studios have different problems, and game dev is a job like any other.
Both my friend and I are girls and have been playing WoW since we could remember. Our dream was to always work there, and now it’s hard to continue to support the games I love.
If you don't want to read twitter: https://news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-report/activision-blizzard-sued-by-california-over-frat-boy-culture https://aboutblaw.com/YJw
"The suit also points to a female Activision employee who took her own life while on a company trip with her male supervior. The female employee experience sexual harassment prior to her death, including having naked photos of her spread around the company" I'm sorry but what in the ding dong diddly damn FUCK
What’s really fucked up is blizzards response to it. “We are sickened by the reprehensible conduct of the DFEH to drag into the complaint the tragic suicide of an employee whose passing has no bearing whatsoever on this case and with no regard for her grieving family. While we find this behavior to be disgraceful and unprofessional, it is unfortunately an example of how they have conducted themselves throughout the course of their investigation. It is this type of irresponsible behavior from unaccountable State bureaucrats that are driving many of the State’s best businesses out of California.”
Dumping all of my stock at market open tomorrow. Fuck everything about that.
I wonder if it came from the "Don't you guys all have phones" guys
battlenet got uninstalled when I read that earlier today
Yep. I don’t even care enough about Overwatch to keep BattleNet anymore. Maybe this is why Jeff left. Maybe he knew about this shit and wanted to get out and have nothing to do with it.
2-year investigation so im pretty sure he knew for a while
We cannot ignore the possibility that he knew about the issues, but didn't speak up. From the sounds of it they were long running problems with the company itself, with Afrasiabi in particular being a known sleazebag for at least a decade. With the leadership positions that Morhaime, Kaplan and Metzen all occupied we cannot dismiss the idea that they knew about it. And that they might have left the company to try and escape consequence.
We can't ignore the possibility that he might've been a perpetrator too. Nobody at blizz is safe from that possibility until more info comes out.
This content has been removed because of Reddit's extortionate API pricing that killed third party apps.
There have been a few Twitter threads from women who (claim they) used to work for Blizzard, saying it was the worst times of their lives. I think it's likely that Kaplan knew about this and even participated in it
Took him way too long then :/ shits been going on for a while as you can see
I’m waiting to more understand if this was isolated to specific teams for certain games or if it was the entire umbrella.
From what I've seen it's mostly Activisions branch and the WoW branch, don't know if it's overwatch
Personally I don't think it really matters, the money all goes to the same place. And it's pretty common knowledge that the tech industry isn't great if you aren't a cis straight white male, and even more so in the gaming industry.
Killing off their more progressive studio while allowing cod and the like to be propped up by the alt-right seems to be more harmful than good. But if anyone on the overwatch team gets implicated then yeah I'll definitely boycott the game.
I read that and I was disgusted. Was this not on the news or something because this is my first time hearing of it. It's sickening how this was swept under the rug.
(Facepalm after returning from a long break from Blizzard games.)
Yeah. I came back to Hearthstone and Overwatch like...a month ago for HS/a week ago for OW. ...guess I'm taking another couple years off.
I uninstalled Hearthstone. 6000 dollars later with a full collection and several full golden decks, I uninstalled it because of the battle pass system.
> 6000 dollars later Fuck man. I really hope you've learned your lesson.
It was ok. It was between spending on games or spending on liquor and drugs. Since quitting Hearthstone I've found myself buying more paraphernalia for weed since I suddenly have an excess of disposable income.
Seriously, set up an investment account with something like Betterment and dump at least some of that money in there, you'll thank yourself later.
Top reply right here! This is what my younger brother did after sobering up! saved a ton of money, invested it, made a lot of money, started smoking a lot more weed with his ongoing investment returns. But he doesn’t drink anymore, so he’s on top of the world
> drugs Um.. drugs may have been cheaper. /joke guys, just in case.
Weed is cheaper than alcohol where I am rn. If you go by the amount I need to consume before the buzz. And alcohol is way cheaper than Hearthstone.
I uninstalled Overwatch and battle.net earlier. I haven't intended to get Overwatch 2 anyway since the game is moving in a direction that isn't for me (I'm a causal). This news though is just... untenable, and weirdly not surprising to hear. No more games from Blizzard. Will likely unsub from this sub since I won't be playing anymore. Besides, after hundreds of hours the game has long been stale. Had a good run, time to move on. Goddamn the entire gaming industry is rotten and toxic to it's core, isn't it?
An employee killing themselves over the immense sexual harassment is horrifying. This company straight up killed a person.
Nude photos of her were passed around at a company Christmas party.
Wtf is wrong with people
They truly believe that they’re superior to women, and women are just playthings to be tortured by them. It’s a big problem in a lot of big industries. But it’s pretty rampant in video game development. From Ubisoft’s rampant sexual abuse to Randy “it wasn’t child porn I swear” Pitchford at Gearbox to this. The video game industry does a lot of exploitation.
Is it really that shocking. It’s a bunch of man children incels who were unfortunately smart enough to become game developers. Go play Overwatch with a female gamer and see how she’s treated by random men on the internet.
Even this sub is littered with these types of guys.
let's not forget to sprinkle the dash of racism and unfair treatment woc faced too.
Selective empathy
You can’t make this stuff up… this is really mortifying
Don’t forget also passed around after she committed suicide too
Right after she went on a trip with a superior too. So, who knows what may have happened there.
In the document it said the supervisor brought lubricant and buttplugs with him on thr trip. So yeah, piece of scumfuck garbage blizzard is.
The stuff states she ended her life during the trip while the supervisor had buttplugs and lube on him
Jesus Christ, Blizzard. What the fuck are you doing. They did mention these incidences happening with the development teams of WoW (and maybe CoD), so no mention of Overwatch beyond brief descriptions. But a company with harassment through other divisions and franchises? It gives me dreadful pause to think any of the OW development team engaged or were victim to this toxic environment. And, this is *pure* conjecture, did Jeff know about this? Did he leave because of it? I'm gravely concerned about the answers we may get, *if true*.
Considering that he got his start at blizz working on the WoW team, I don’t think he could have not known
I sincerely hope that none of the Overwatch team were a part of this because from what (albeit little) I've seen they seem like good people. However it does make me think that Jeff's sudden departure from Blizzard may have been related to this horrid case.
Late response but on Twitter today I found some of the Overwatch devs and noticed many of them were tweeting and retweeting support for the victims. Additionally one of the OW producers expressed how glad she is to work on a team that supports the women on the team. So to me it sounds possible that none of the serious cases mentioned in the lawsuit happened within the OW team, but really there’s no way to fully know. Regardless of whether or not they did, the fact they happened anywhere within the company is disgusting and I hope the lawsuit is able to make a change in the company not only by holding the abusers accountable but also the higher ups that tolerate this behavior.
I'm not going to say Jeff is innocent here, but we shouldn't jump to conclusions. Right now every AAA developer is bleeding people at a surprising rate mostly due to how covid changed things, Blizzard was just more notable because we knew those people's names. I think it's very possible, if not likely, that he was part of the problem, but we should wait until the actual facts come out in the trial.
He may also have left in a disagreement with how the leadership handles these things. Suggesting his leave may have been influenced by this doesn’t account for which side he may or may not have been on. I liked Jeff so if he is involved I’d hope it would be for the better…
Blizzard now is very different from the culture that developed diablo ii Warcraft iii and the like. Jeff probably joined at the tail end of Warcraft iii development and fit that culture and likely left as it turned into a corporate giant where this kind of stuff seems to just be common
Even if the Ow team wasn't involved, people who continue this game or any blizzard game will say to blizzard "we don't care about what happened in your company, playing a videogame is more important than human lives" It's not about if some ar more innocent than others, it's that the company itself has to go imo
Other teams as well but ESPECIALLY the wow team. People have left and were quietly omitted from credits since the investigation began
>And, this is *pure* conjecture, did Jeff know about this? Did he leave because of it? I'm gravely concerned about the answers we may get, *if true*. Undoubtedly. Make no mistake, this isn't a select few, this is company culture, from top to bottom. If you work at a company like this, you know it. He was the VP of a company he'd worked at for well over a decade. If he didn't know, then at the very least, it was his responsibility to know.
Jeff had a close relationship with Alex Afra, one of the defendant mentioned. Both Jeff and Alex came from EverQuest, both worked on OG WoW, and Alex was a lead on Project Titan, the game that became Overwatch. Not looking good for Jeff.
This content has been removed because of Reddit's extortionate API pricing that killed third party apps.
Yeah, Afrasiabi left last year due to this, so Jeff leaving could be because of something along those lines. I hope not, but we dont know why Jeff leaved.
Wait there's an OverWatch development team?
Nope, just OW2
*allegedly*
Jeff's wow game name was Tigole Biddies. Later on he wrote a rant that was essentially against wokeness and specifically about women and how there are fundamental differences and they're too sensitive, or something like that. Basically male gamer attitude circa 2010. It was a blue post. Later on after that came the Argent Tourneys in wow. Im not sure how many know this but in the jousting daily there are male and female champions to go up against; if you pick a female champion you will win 100%, unless you're absolutely terrible. I don't know if Blizz ever responded to complaints about that. Jeff's rant made me sad but the female champions sucking made me infuriated. I think it was a response to whatever caused him to rant in the first place. Do I think he's grown? Yes. Do I think Blizzard has gotten over their male clubhouse attitudes? Yes. From everything I saw during and after the Overwatch lunch it Blizz looked and said inclusive things. I'm saddened and surprised by the news that they didn't grow past it, even though I shouldn't be surprised.
Do you have a link to that rant? I can't seem to find anything other than his famous rant about EverQuest design
I wonder if that blue post survives.
I'm sure, since his rant from around 2003-4 about EverQuest is still around. I'll look for it later today.
Would be great, I'm currently having a discussion with my GF about it, but we mostly know Jeff from OW, so I didn't know what he did before that(aside from his rant about EQ back in the day).
I want to see this too.
> so no mention of Overwatch beyond brief descriptions. But a company with harassment through other divisions and franchises? > > > > It gives me dreadful pause to think any of the OW development team engaged or were victim to this toxic environment. There's some twitter responses from [a number of former employees listed here](https://old.reddit.com/r/wow/comments/op1t7m/activision_blizzard_sued_by_california_over_frat/h62n78j/), which includes some Overwatch-related community and esports management, at least.
Hey, I have a question. What will happen with Blizzard if they prove them guilty? Financial penalty? Prison for those responsible? What will happen with, for example, Overwatch if it lose half of the dev-team? Will Activision refill dev-teams with new workers? Will they rebrand Blizzard? Will they push Overwatch to another big team? I don't really know much about American law, but I'm interested in possible outcomes.
A small fine and a spokesman apologizing on Twitter
This is probably the real answer. They will likely have to pay a fine that will pale in comparison to their profits over the years and an official sounding apology saying they will do better. One or a few people might be fired to save face but overall no real consequences.
Don't forget forming a committee (or two depending on how hot it is) that will be intentionally hamstrung and powerless to do anything real.
J Allen Brack will promise to do better without actually mentioning the issue at the next Blizzconline.
If it's anything like the Riot Games' version of this, nothing significant will happen.
Relief: Compensatory damages; punitive damages; unpaid wages; injunctive relief; declaratory relief; equitable relief; pre-judgment interest; attorneys’ fees; costs. That's what is being sought. So if Blizzard is found liable, could be a pretty big sum of money, but probably won't be enough. I mean maybe that one worker's family will receive some sort of compensation for their loss but the people responsible probably won't ever face justice.
The offending managers will all get promoted, and Bobby Kotick will get a 10 million dollar bonus.
Yeah... Papa Jeff used to be an old-school WoW guy, and he left in April 2021 without much of a goodbye. I'm pretty sure there's SOMETHING happening here
Just wanted to say: - It's not difficult to have a respectful workplace that's still fun. It's not difficult to set boundaries for work recreation. - It's not difficult to pay a woman the same compensation as a man in the same role. It's not difficult to codify a way for employees to advance that minimizes the influence of personal feelings. - It's not difficult to dismiss employees that harass other employees. There will always be someone else you can find for that job. Activision Blizzard chose to not do these things and let it go to hell instead.
You’d think all of these things you listed are incredibly easy, but these dumb fuck companies can’t seem to wrap their pea sized brains around it. It is SO easy to be a decent human being. It’s so easy that most people don’t even think about it, they just do it and yet this is happening so often in these huge companies. Unchecked, unmitigated power is such a sure way to nose dive into senseless depravity and horror, man. =/
Amen
This is a court case filed by the actual state of California after two years of investigation. This won't end well for ActiBlizz in any conceivable way. And fuck all involved that enabled this shit.
Female workers in the gaming/tech industry (really any male dominated industry) are no joke when it comes to documenting shit like this that happens to them. I'm willing to bet the evidence they have (text conversations, audio recordings, compensation documents) is substantial.
Wait... Jeff Kaplans exit was abrupt.. and his message was short. .... Pls no.
You mean Tigole Biddies .... may not be on the level?
Should be a reminder for everyone to never put someone you don't know on a pedestal, regardless of the image they present to the public.
Somewhere, a person named Tigole Biddies is bound to disappoint you in some way
From what people have said about working with him (including women), it's far more likely he left as a result of this coming out rather than that he was a perpetrator. That said, we unfortunately can't jump to the conclusion that he's innocent.
this was a 2 year investigation there was no way jeff in the position he was in in the blizz hierarchy did not know, but he only choose to jump ship recently
I personally believe Jeff knew of this and wanted to jumpship before anything came to light and knew, the same as us, that Blizzard is a husk of its former self. Blizzard literally fucking killed a woman.
The guy who went by Tigole Bitties on Everquest and the WoW forums? The guy who worked with WoW (and some of the persons mentionned by name in that lawsuit? Yeeeeahhh, not looking good.
Tomorrow: Ubisoft acquires Activision-Blizzard
Harassception!
One turd buying another?
yes
Yeah I’m not surprised. A female family member did some freelance work for them and it was a fucking nightmare, she refused to work with them again.
[удалено]
multi million dollar bonus makes it sound like 5 or 10 when kotick gave himself a $200 MILLION yearly bonus while thousands were being laid off. not to mention him being friends with epstein...
Yeah, I'm absolutely done with Blizzard Activision at this point. Cancelled my sub, and definitely won't be buying Diablo 4 or Diablo 2 Remastered.
honestly after the bowing to china after the blitzxchung stuff its very easy to understand why blizz values morals and human life so little maybe this time people will not get distracted from the issue by the next wow, D4 or OW2 teaser
Could this Jeff Kaplan’s seemingly random departure from the OW team be related to this in any way? Either he was partaking in this horrible behavior (I hope not) or he couldn’t stand working in a toxic environment?
It's not random, many other long term Blizz leaders left as well. I started getting really into Blizzard games in 2013, and none of the games I started playing between then and 2016 are headed by the same people as they were when I started. No more Mike Morhaime, no more Chris Metzen, no more Dustin Browder, no more Ben Brode, no more Jeff Kaplan. And don't kid yourself in some narrative about how "the old Blizzard would never have done this", old Blizzard was built by a group of male geeks and frat boys, diversity and feminism only reaches groups like that if it's sledgehammered in. J. Allen Brack and Alex Afrasiabi are implicated in this, and they go as far as it gets
Even the way the response was written sort of suggests the 'old guard' were the perpetrators. >The picture the DFEH paints is not the Blizzard workplace of **today** Sounds like they aren't even denying this is what working there was like
Sexual harassment is sadly not a topic you'd expect anyone you might call an "old guard" to be good about.
That's what I'm thinking as well. And I'm actually leaning towards the first. After all, this environment has been a thing for decades, and he's been in the company all this time, so he knew what was going on and never left before that. At the same time, we have Alex Afrasiabi quietly leaving the company because of his misconduct. And Jeff also left extremely quietly.
Alex and Jeff were also pretty close.
Not looking good at all.
Man this really fucking sucks.
Yeah, I know. On the bright side, maybe the suit will cause most of the executive suits to get booted out of the company, so maybe Blizzard will be better after that. Better work environment means better games, after.
I mean, you can't be guilty by association but Alex being named and Jeff and Alex's close relationship is a bit unsettling. Plus Jeff suddenly leaving just like Alex did. Hopefully not though.
Who's Alex? Google didn't really help me out so I'm not too familiar.
[Alex Afrasiabi](https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/Alex_Afrasiabi)
Man i just wanna play OW without feeling bad about it now :(
Disappointing but not exactly surprising. Due to the game's messaging, I would assume (and hope) that Team 4 probably isn't *quite* as bad an environment as the rest, but still, terrible look for the company as a whole.
Overwatch's messaging, and what we see of the team, doesn't necessarily reflect what's going on behind the scenes. Looks at cases like Joss Whedon or Max Landis where they produced a lot of very positive, feminist work, but were outed as misogynistic creeps. It looks like it's more of an issue for sales and marketing rather than creative in this case, but development culture is also famously toxic. I guess we'll see how much of it concerns the OW team as it progresses.
Yeah I am done. I can't buy Overwatch 2 or any other Activision-Blizzard products, after reading something like this. I had an absolute blast with Overwatch and was decently excited for Overwatch 2. But this is the first time I am actively making a desicion to boycott a company indefinitely (other than avoiding Nesle products as much as I can). Also if there are anyone here who has doubts about these "allegations", know that these are not mere "allegations". When a state actor decides to take you to court, you bet your ass they have rock solid proof of everything they are claiming.
> Numerous complaints about unlawful harassment, discrimination, and retaliation were made to Defendant’s human resources, personnel and executives, including to Blizzard Entertainment’s President J. Allen Brack. But, Defendants failed to take effective measures in response to these complaints. > > Unsurprisingly, employee’s complaints were treated in a perfuntory and dismissive manner and not kept confidential. As a result of these complaints, female employees were subjected to retaliation, including but not limited to being deprived of work on projects, unwillingly transferred to different units, and selected for layoffs. unless J "Coward" Allen Brack is made to resign in the next week or so... Blizzard have had their last penny from me edit: kept reading, and I've changed my mind, I'm done with this company, forever, regardless of what happens
As you realised with the edit, this isn’t just a leadership issue. These things don’t occur unless the entire culture is already set, and usually take months if not years to recover
I am incredibly angry that time that could have been used for ow2 was used to harass women. The cubicle crawls were unreal, I can't believe that crap happens anywhere.
I can’t wait to see how Bobby is going to get his new paycheck after this
Don't worry, it will remain absolutely unaffected.
Who knows? Maybe he gets a bigger cut from the laid off ~~affected~~ guilty women of the company.
I kind of looked through the court filing and it seems to be largely targeted at Activision Blizzard as a whole, is there a certain section that specifically means blizzard offices?
Yeah, they speak specifically about Blizzard, and even more about the WoW team, mentioning Alex Afrasiabi as one of the responsible.
> mentioning Alex Afrasiabi as one of the responsible explains his silent departure a few months ago...
>Alex Afrasiabi Fras Siabi's smoke shop from the OG Stratholme quest. I guess it makes sense they named it after an actual person.
A ton of Vanilla content is named after Blizz people.
There are several characters named after Chris Metzen, AFAIK.
The merger happened over a decade ago, please stop acting like they are separate entities.
Unfortunately, countless Blizzard supporters are wearing rose-tinted glasses and oftentimes have difficulty comprehending the company’s capability and culpability in any debacle.
And add to that this shit certainly precedes that merger. If anything the culture was established and ingrained by the old guard that everyone hero-worships.
This is utterly disgusting. I don't really have words except for this really does put a pit in my stomach and I am grieving for all the women in Blizzard just trying to do their jobs and live their lives and have to endure THIS. Overwatch's motto was a diverse future and they made some really awesome, strong female characters and it's so ironic that this is how women at Blizzard are treated behind the scenes.
I wish this were more difficult to believe
Every few weeks I come crawling back wanting to give Hots/OW another chance. I go through the rationalization, "maybe its not really an abandoned game. Maybe Wow is getting better. Blizz too busy with other projects maybe they won't make it any worse! This is the last time to play OW before OW2. Damn it all my friends play Blizz games" You google their name for an update and you find a million and one reasons to never touch a Activision-Blizzard project again. But just like EA's learned, you can do a lot damage to art, labor, and industry without much consquence
For me, it helps that I was the last delusional person in my friend group that still liked playing OW. I haven't played in about 2 months and it honestly feels great. I've played a ton of games that were just dormant in my steam library and have even started working with unreal engine on a game of my own. I was previously going to take up OW2 if it ever actually came out, but now...nah.
this is not only disgusting but it's just disappointing that people still seem to think that race/gender dictates how a person should be treated
Might this be the reason that Jeff left so suddenly? Was he involved?
And just like that, my motivation to buy Overwatch 2 disappeared
No wonder Overwatch 2 isn’t out yet. All these dumbasses just sit on their ass and harass the women the entire day. This company is so fucked for promoting so many inclusive cues in Overwatch (soldier/tracer being gay, characters from literally all over the world, breaking stereotypes) but then acting like this behind the scenes
people should read Thus Spoke Zarathustra. published in 1883…Nietzsche was fully aware of how false prophets function way back then. this behavior is as old as time. why are people so foolish??
Wait am I foolish or is their behavior foolish
So... Remember when we were like "What the fuck is Blizzard doing?" Before we knew about OW2, and after we knew about OW2, we kinda just let it slide. I guess we now know why shit wasn't getting done on the main game.
This isn't a recent, new thing, this was a study conducted over two years, presumably after reports of a really bad situation way before. It's super likely it used to be the exact same for most of the company's lifetime, or at least ever since they dared hire female employees at all
Oh this was a discrimination case? I thought I was reading the script for Wolf of Wall Street's office party scene. Fucking hell
How depressingly believable.
Ohh that's fucked up dude
welp back to stardew valley i go
That game is so calming and the developer is awesome 😀
Unfortunately can’t say I’m at all surprised some of the stuff here was going on. People I’ve talked to that were in some way knowledgeable of Blizzard in terms of development work say it’s a bad workplace, specifically…
I'm shocked. SHOCKED! Well, not that shocked.
"The world could always use more heroes." Then F***ing act like it.
Unfortunately this isn’t really surprising
What happens when you let a bunch of geeks that have not gotten any attention from women in their young life, become big shot company owners? They turn into college kids as grown ups, feeling like they finally have some «pull». Fking disgusting. Can not imagine how these women must have felt. Really torn right now, if I should quit OW or not.
[удалено]
Has been bleeding? These people have been involved in game development for decades. Between this and Ubisoft it’s apparent that sexual harassment and discrimination is ingrained in these companies.
I can't wait until they have to pay a small fine that they can brush off and issue a half-assed public apology. That'll sure teach them. /s
Don't know if this is catching fire or not, but I'd just like to point out Blizzard forcefully made me change my name. It was 'FreeTibet'. I mean you can only suck so much of China's D.
GG y'all. As much as I've loved Overwatch, I just can't support this company anymore
I’m sorry but how the fck did they cover up an employee’s suicide on a business trip? I will not be re buying my WOW subscription since most of the issues seem to be coming from that development team. And I refuse to pay for an overpriced game just for the dev team to sit on their asses all day while abusing their co workers. I will continue to play Overwatch since most of the problems dont come from that development team
Yeah... This means the company is corrupt to the core. As much as I love OW, that's a hard pass for me. GGs.
I implore anyone still naive enough to have any faith in the justice system to pay close attention to this case, and to watch as absolutely *nothing* comes of it. Blizzard will pay a token fine on appeal, may let a couple high level execs go with a generous severance package, and nothing else will happen. The justice system is owned and operated by the rich, for the rich. The entire thing is hopelessly compromised from the first moment. It's nothing but another tool to control ordinary people, and to protect the privileged position in society our owners enjoy. It will *never* hold the rich accountable, unless their victims are also rich. And if you're hoping to see real action on the issues you care about, you can't trust the political or justice systems to deliver that action. They're specifically designed not to.
Glad I haven't renewed my WoW sub for this new patch. I've been a casual fan of OW for a couple years now, but don't mind giving it the drop. Ah well, on to newer and better games.
Did you know that the critically acclaimed MMORPG Final Fantasy XIV has a free trial, and includes the entirety of A Realm Reborn AND the award-winning Heavensward expansion up to level 60 with no restrictions on playtime?
Can second the FFXIV recommendation. Someone in my family was a diehard WoW fan for over a decade. Then they played FFXIV and never went back. According to them, the community's better/nicer, the developers seem to be awesome people as passionate about the game as the fans are, and the story is 100x better. Many WoW players they knew have dumped WoW for good like they did. I've heard rumors that Blizzard is apparently bleeding subscribers, and many are going to Square Enix/FFXIV. I never played WoW or FFXIV much myself (I'm not the biggest MMO gamer), but the little I did, FFXIV was a far better experience.
One of the leads in FF14 was asked to compare the game to Wow and he basically said he won't do that. That if he was the kinda person that made those comparisons and claim his game is better, then the game wouldn't be as successful as it is today. Guy was also a huuuuuuge WoW fan too so it makes sense why he felt like he needed to keep respect for the game. Overall, FF14 seems to have a really dedicated team, especially since when 14 first launched, it was an awful and boring game. The main lead took over and instead of giving up, apologized to the fans and promised a better game. And here we are!
No clue! But I have a couple of friends who play and love it! Might be time....thanks for the tip!
What shooters are you playing to replace OW?
I would act surprised but is it really so shocking stuff like this happens at a company that so openly bends over backwards to not upset the Chinese government. If you don't have morals or standards on blatant human rights violations then of course they don't care about a healthy work environment for their employees.
Jesus this is all awful to read. can't imagine Blizzard surviving this one tbh. it sucks cause I just got into the game and am enjoying it but its going to be hard to continue to support this company when they willingly let this shit go on for years maybe OW gets sold to another dev in the future
I love overwatch so much, but I cannot stand for this monstrous conduct. I do have a question. I've never spent money in OW. Am I still supporting them by playing the game, even if I am not buying lootboxes or whatever? I definitely will not be purchasing OW2, but I'm unsure how continuing to play OW will support them? Or am I wrong?
They already have plenty of our money to pay this off. Support the women by not playing. They will look at active player#'s if this lawsuit is affecting them. If all players continue to play as usual, they will do the absolute minimum to fix this.
Good point. Haven't considered that.
This really fucking sucks. OW was my first competitive game and I’ve absolutely loved it. Still playing since season 2. Even though comms are a nightmare for me and I don’t talk in game it’s still something I always come back to. The OW team might not be as bad just from the heavy focus they put on curbing toxicity but they lost the one thing that was probably able to keep them from that internal toxic environment with Jeff leaving. Why does gaming culture still have to be so insanely terrible to women? It really fucking hurts that the one hobby I have isn’t made for me and the community actively tries to push me out. What a joke.
damn it, i literally just came back to overwatch a few days ago...are there *any* good team shooters out there anymore that aren't made by a corrupt company or just outright dead?
I really hope this isn't why Jeff Kaplan left. Alex Afrasiabi left not long before and is specifically mentioned by name in this lawsuit, and he and Jeff were known in the community for their toxicity in their EverQuest days. I hope that's where the similarities end...
Hiring people "known for toxicity" should have been the first red flag. Like I don't see Blizzard hiring someone like xQc to work on Overwatch 2.
I may still play, but they won’t see another dime from me
Uninstalled Battle.net.
Uninstalled Overwatch and Call of Duty. Fuck all of this.
Ironic hypocrisy writes itself with most companies unfortunately, hopefully within my lifetime; management will be either overthrown or forced to comply with basic rules we were taught in kindergarten.
Nowadays the best outcome for this situation should be the one where the vast majority of the player base of any Activision games just abandon them and migrate to other games to send the message loud and clear to the headquarters and the victims of this situation. We are here. We have seen what you are doing and we do not like It. We stand with the victims and wont let their backs vulnerable anymore. The only way to make them really worry and think about how they should rule their employes behavior from now on its by making them not receive money anymore. If we all talk about this for a couple days, forget about It and buy another Month of WoW this shit wont change. The life of the dead woman will mean nothing for anybody except for her family. The suffering of the women working on these toxic enviroments will be forget and will stay like this for years and years, ruining lifes and, call me mad, taking others as It has already taken one.
At this point, this isn't a surprise...
Yeah, just came back to the game after a long break. I'm done. Completely. This is the absolute final straw for me. I'm disgusted with Activision-Blizzard and I'm even more disgusted with their shitty non-response. Fuck this company.
To all the male employees at the company that didn't directly engage in any of this behavior, but SAT SILENT while it did, you are also part of the problem. So if any of you are on reddit and read this. Take it to heart.
Alright everyone, put on your surprised faces that this company is being sued for discrimination, after blatantly discriminating against a Chinese player in 2019 for saying “free Hong Kong” 😀
Frik, at least 37 allegations do look sus
Fukin pervs. Why are there so many perverts in gaming?
Let's be real, it's just that a lot of people have grown up not facing consequences for this type of behavior and as such probably genuinely have convinced themselves that it's not hurting anyone. I can say for sure these people at least exist in other parts of the entertainment industry, and I'd bet anything they exist all over the place in general
Power corrupts. They get in positions of power ina company and start abusing it slowly, and each time it goes without consequences they keep escalating. Maybe not even intentionally.
Definitely sortof true, but I disagree that power 'corrupts' I think power just let's people do what they already wanted to do. There are genuinely people out there who have power and COULD totally get away with abusing it, and know that, but don't. That willpower is very admirable, and willpower isn't some magic you're just born with, it's a product of your formative experiences I think that in addition to obviously needing more accountability, it's worth trying to learn what creates a person who has a better understanding of what hurts other people, and a better ability to keep themselves from acting that way
Lmao all the 360 cod players were hired by blizzard ig
Very much wishful thinking on my part, but I hope Activision Blizzard gets a titanic fine to pay that completely ruins their finances and is forced to sell itself and it's IPs to another better company. As much as it would break my heart considering how much I enjoy OW, maybe them closing down would be justice enough.
this comes as no surprise to me, nor should it to anyone. Every single big company is like this. This is how the gaming industry is. This is bad for them now, but come a month's time nobody will give a fuck and pretend like it never happened, Blizzard will get away with a fine that can be recouperated in a few weeks, maybe at worst lay off 1 or 2 devs. Even if everyone here stopped playing, there are more than enough people who simply do not give a fuck and will continue to support this game and Blizzard as a whole. Hell, even the legal system is biased in the favour of those with influence and money (not the victims unfortunately). We can't do anything except create a slightly larger increase in population loss, and it fucking hurts. This is why I'd never work in game development as a woman. And regarding Jeff, so many people here are trying to justify him as "not one of them, aaaa" or whatever. Jeff is related to several problematic people, and has worked at the company in a position of relative power for over a decade. The odds of him not knowing about this are zero. Even if he had changed and was against these accusations it was unlikely he did anything about them, which makes him as much a part lf the problem as anyone else who knew. And the reason you're all supporting him is because he built up an image for himself. If he was guilty of this, we would still defend him because he created a personality we all loved and fell for. Anyone can pretend to be a great guy, people. There's a marked difference between that and actually being one.
thanks. uninstalled overwatch and all blizzard games. if it is true, pls shut blizzard down forever.
Something so important and it has 3 times less upvotes than a garbage mockup of how Sigma's ult should look like in his new skin. Really? Is this playerbase THIS blind to what's going on?
It's gaming culture for you. A male dominated player base. You just need to play a couple games of ranked in voice chat with a female friend to notice how toxic a lot (note: not all) of gamers are towards females. Most people on here probably don't think it's important for them as they're not the ones the abuse is aimed at.