Blizzard Entertainment 20-Year Anniversary
Blizzard Entertainment 20-Year Anniversary
Company News - posted by VentilatorOfDoom on Wed 9 March 2011, 11:59:45
Tags: Blizzard EntertainmentFirst of all, let's start with this Anniversary Retrospective Video.
Furthermore, Gamasutra interviews Blizzard COO Paul Sams about the company's 20-years history.
But while future expansions for World of Warcraft and StarCraft II are poised to move millions, and Diablo III already has enviable buzz, Blizzard now has to answer the question that its competitors have had to try to answer for the past six years: Can you beat World of Warcraft?
Blizzard plans on answering that question with its upcoming unannounced "Titan," the codenamed full MMO that will follow World of Warcraft's extraordinary success.
"I believe [it's] the most ambitious thing we've ever attempted," Sams said. "And I feel like we have set our company up to succeed on that. We have some of our most talented and most experienced developers on that team. Many of the people that built World of Warcraft are full time on that other team."
That expertise in working with the most successful MMORPG in the world for the past several years will prove vital for the success of the new MMO. Sams assured that World of Warcraft is still under the watch of experienced staff, even though key members are moving onto Titan.
"We've spent a lot of time over the last number of years transitioning those people off [of World of Warcraft], and having great people below them that were trained up by them to run World of Warcraft," Sams said. "Those people have been doing it for the last couple of years without the assistance of those people that created it."
"So, I think we've effectively protected that business as it relates to our development resources and capabilities," he added, "and at the same time taking some of those other folks that had all that experience and unleashed them on this new thing."
And there's another interview with Paul Sams over at VentureBeat.
I will tell you something. When you look at our brand, players support us and trust us. From our perspective, you get very few opportunities to build that trust, to keep that trust, and if you deliver a game that does not meet their expectations and it’s just okay, it’s acceptable, well then you breach that trust. We are very thankful to have the players that support us. They consistently vote with their pocket books that we are fulfilling their expectations and their wants and dreams as it relates to games. And we are very mindful about what those people feel about us, what they think about our games and whether or not we’ve addressed their wants and needs. We are very connected with them. We’ve got a few thousand customer service people. I think we have the largest service group of any video game company in the world.
What's wrong with this guy? Other developers don't give a fuck about *trust* or *meeting the expectations* of their fan base and are more concerned with reaching the players who play FarmVille or Modern Warfare because they're more numerous.
Furthermore, Gamasutra interviews Blizzard COO Paul Sams about the company's 20-years history.
But while future expansions for World of Warcraft and StarCraft II are poised to move millions, and Diablo III already has enviable buzz, Blizzard now has to answer the question that its competitors have had to try to answer for the past six years: Can you beat World of Warcraft?
Blizzard plans on answering that question with its upcoming unannounced "Titan," the codenamed full MMO that will follow World of Warcraft's extraordinary success.
"I believe [it's] the most ambitious thing we've ever attempted," Sams said. "And I feel like we have set our company up to succeed on that. We have some of our most talented and most experienced developers on that team. Many of the people that built World of Warcraft are full time on that other team."
That expertise in working with the most successful MMORPG in the world for the past several years will prove vital for the success of the new MMO. Sams assured that World of Warcraft is still under the watch of experienced staff, even though key members are moving onto Titan.
"We've spent a lot of time over the last number of years transitioning those people off [of World of Warcraft], and having great people below them that were trained up by them to run World of Warcraft," Sams said. "Those people have been doing it for the last couple of years without the assistance of those people that created it."
"So, I think we've effectively protected that business as it relates to our development resources and capabilities," he added, "and at the same time taking some of those other folks that had all that experience and unleashed them on this new thing."
I will tell you something. When you look at our brand, players support us and trust us. From our perspective, you get very few opportunities to build that trust, to keep that trust, and if you deliver a game that does not meet their expectations and it’s just okay, it’s acceptable, well then you breach that trust. We are very thankful to have the players that support us. They consistently vote with their pocket books that we are fulfilling their expectations and their wants and dreams as it relates to games. And we are very mindful about what those people feel about us, what they think about our games and whether or not we’ve addressed their wants and needs. We are very connected with them. We’ve got a few thousand customer service people. I think we have the largest service group of any video game company in the world.
There are 61 comments on Blizzard Entertainment 20-Year Anniversary
