Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future Of Blizzard Entertainment

by Jason Schreier

After the offsite, Morhaime wrote a lengthy email to Kotick, shared with several other executives, declaring that Blizzard had reached a tipping point. “I believe that preserving Blizzard’s culture and magic is a necessity for preserving Activision Blizzard’s advantage of having an organization that can attract and retain the best creative talent in the world and that can consistently produce the highest quality games and experiences,” he wrote. “With the new direction that ABK is having, as well as its increased involvement in the operations of Blizzard… it has been increasingly hard for me to provide Blizzard leadership and staff confidence that Blizzard has a stable future as a values-driven organization, where both Blizzard culture and brand identity can be protected. “We need to get clarity and stability around the boundaries between Activision Blizzard and Blizzard,” he added. By the summer of 2018, even ground-level Blizzard employees were accepting a reality that had long been shielded from them: Activision was all over the company.