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

by Jason Schreier

Alen Lapidis, an artist on World of Warcraft, was called into a meeting with the company’s human resources representatives and told he was being let go. “It was really shocking, considering the success of the game and how it had become such a force,” Lapidis said. Maxx Marshall, who had left Blizzard for Fugitive in 1999 and then returned in 2003 to help finish World of Warcraft, was surprised when he and several other veterans lost their jobs. “There was a feeling about the layoffs that all they were doing was firing people for money,” Marshall said. His hypothesis seemed to be proven true a few weeks later, when he got an email asking if he’d be interested in returning to Blizzard for about $15,000 per year less than he had been making before. Blizzard had just created one of the biggest games of all time—one critic described it as “a stunning achievement that will make you feel privileged to be a game player”—and yet the company was operating like a cash-strapped startup.

This may be counterintuitive, but makes total sense in the "buy low, sell high" kind of way.