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Activision Blizzard's CEO is a funpire

Kyle Horner — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 09:30:00 EST

Filed under: World of Warcraft, MMO industry, News items

Bobby Kotick isn't just the CEO of Activision Blizzard. He's also the CEO of Activision Blizzard who recently said, "You have studio heads who five years ago didn't know the difference between a balance sheet and a bed sheet who are now arguing allocations in our CFO's office pretty regularly," Then again, as Ars Technica has pointed out, his incentive program that, "rewards profit and nothing else." may have something to do with that.

That's not all Bobby Kotick recently said, however. He's also known for this uplifting little diddy, "We have a real culture of thrift. The goal that I had in bringing a lot of the packaged goods folks into Activision about 10 years ago was to take all the fun out of making video games." Now that quote may be out of context, but what kind of context can make that look... well, good or even mildly acceptable?

Something smacks of bad omens here. Sure, things are going good right now for the company that puts out Blizzard games and Call of Duty, but when a company's Chief Executive Officer is saying things like, "We are very good at keeping people focused on the deep depression," it may be time to double-check your neck for bite marks and then get the hell out of Irvine.

Activision Blizzard's CEO is a funpire originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 17 Sep 2009 09:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Gamer Interrupted: Are you a Funsucker?

Robin Torres — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 15:00:00 EST

Filed under: Culture, Opinion, Gamer Interrupted

Each week, Robin Torres contributes Gamer Interrupted, a column about balancing real life with MMOs. Well, it used to be each week... and then stuff happened -- lots of stuff that made things go out of balance. But that just means more stuff to write about here... weekly.

Recently, the Spousal Unit and I got into an argument over this article about Blizzard's Naming Policy enforcement. In this post, WoW Insider's Daniel Whitcomb asks why Blizzard must be informed of every instance of a name like "Longjohnson", before they will enforce their policy on each one. I say people who blatantly name themselves against the policy are ruining the game immersion and are sucking other people's fun. The Spousal Unit says that the real Funsucker is the person who reports the name, unless he or she plays on an RP server. He says people who name themselves after pornstars and genital euphemisms are just having fun and that people who talk about game immersion are taking themselves too seriously. I say that I play games to escape from the latest train wreck and don't want to see a version of her name on a Blood Elf Rogue when I'm bringing up an alt.

The problem here is a difference in opinion of what fun is. We play MMOs to have fun (and relieve stress and escape), but when we are playing with a massive number of other players, the many views of what fun is can and do clash. So the question is, should we care about other people's fun when we are having our own? In my opinion, your "right" to have fun, in-game or out, ends as soon as you start infringing on someone else's fun. But this rule can't be strictly applied because some people's fun may not fit into the scope of the game... or reality. I've tried to come up with some basic guidelines as to when we should worry about someone else's fun and when it's OK not to without being a Funsucker.

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Gamer Interrupted: Are you a Funsucker? originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 25 Mar 2008 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Gamer Interrupted: Gamers behaving badly

Robin Torres — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 08:30:00 EST

Filed under: World of Warcraft, City of Heroes, Opinion, Gamer Interrupted

Each week, Robin Torres contributes Gamer Interrupted, a column about balancing real life with MMOs.

Every time someone in the world does something horrible and is also a gamer, the media makes the most of it. I don't want to cite specific examples here because these acts don't need more press, nor do I want to point out the connections with gaming. I'll leave that to the always entertaining Jack Thompson, Virtual Ambulance Chaser.

I do think that it is natural for humans to try to find the "why" behind horrific crimes, it is just unfortunate that our hobby is the current scapegoat. We don't know what television shows the criminals watch, what books they read, what music they listen to (though all of these have been scapegoats in the past) -- but the media makes sure to mention if some kind of video game is involved. And that is another product of human nature: The Witch Hunt. When we think we've found the reason, we generalize it to every act we don't like. I haven't read that video games are responsible for global warming yet, but it's only a matter of time.

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Gamer Interrupted: Gamers behaving badly originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 28 Nov 2007 08:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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