Blizzard and Activision Announce $18.8bn Merger

Ebon Praetor writes "The BBC reports that Blizzard and Activision have announced an $18.8bn merger. Activision's CEO, Bobby Kotick, will become the head of the joint company, while Vivendi, Blizzard's current parent company, will become the largest single investor in the new group. Even with the size of the merger, the combined company will still be smaller than the industry giant EA. 'As part of the merger plan, Blizzard will invest $2bn in the new company, while Activision is putting up $1bn. The merged business will be called Activision Blizzard ... Vivendi will be the biggest shareholder in the group.'"

Comments

A dupe in itself?

[hysma]

Not too often the summary itself IS the dupe...

Re:A dupe in itself?

[Ebon Praetor]

I blame the editor for quoting the story when I had already bothered to summarize it.

Also, more coverage from the Guardian.

World Of Warcraft

[tsj5j]

How is the WoW community going to take it?

I think it really matters whether the game developers are going to be replaced by Activision or not, as a decrease in quality might spark some anger.
Especially since their number of players are ... alot.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[bigstrat2003]

Not just the WoW community. There are many people who are fans of Blizzard games in general, and I, for one, will be not too happy if the excellent quality of their games goes down because of this. Will they have the balls, for example, under their new management, to cancel mostly-finished games just cause they aren't happy with how it's turning out? I doubt it, but we'll see.

Color me skeptical on this one. Almost as skeptical as I am about the BioWare/EA deal.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Anonymous Coward]

great, billions of dollars spent, and bnet is still hosted on a single pII box..

Re:World Of Warcraft

[DurendalMac]

I doubt they're going to mess with Blizzard. It's going to be more like the Disney-Pixar buyout. Disney was at least smart enough not to mess with what Pixar was doing, because it was damned obvious that they were doing something right. If Activision has any shred of intelligence, they'll let Blizzard keep doing what they're doing with minimal interference, because Blizzard is making over $100m a month off of WoW.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Anonymous Coward]

If they weren't going to change something why would they but it?

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, obviously they bought Blizzard out so that they could nerf warriors; it had nothing to do with the money.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Cathoderoytube]

It's not gonna happen. Blizzard's not about to take their baby and throw it to the wolves just because they had a merger.

It's like one day they'll just go to the WOW dev team 'Hey gang, we've had a good run but you're all fired. Get the hell out right now. Your personal belongings will be burned, and security has been authorized to tazer you if you try to say goodbye to any of your former co-workers. Activision is bringing in a gaggle of hillbillies to take over the project, I hope you all rot in hell'

Re:World Of Warcraft

[SL Baur]

How is the WoW community going to take it? I think that depends on when and how the Wrath of the Lich King comes out. As of patch 2.3, they've trashed most of the sport of WoW (leveling to 60), so I'm sure I'm not the only one anxiously awaiting the new expansion.

Give me my World of Warcraft (as I've experienced it for the last year or so) and I don't particularly care what they do corporate-wise.

I'm not sure why I love that game more than Nethack/Rogue, but I do.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[icedcool]

Sure,
On the plus side what if Activision's management is replaced with Blizzard's. Blizzard's process obviously works. This could be the start of us seeing a lot of much higher quality games.

Hopefully.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Lord of Hyphens]

How many of the original devs that did WoW are still on WoW?

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Pluvius]

Hello, Blizzard fanboys!

Rob

Re:World Of Warcraft

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Actually, if you look at the Gamasutra summary, it's Blizzard (well, Vivendi) buying out Activision. Vivendi gets 52% of the stock of the merged company and 6 of 11 seats on the board.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[ZombieRoboNinja]

Erm, which I suppose I should link.

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=16457

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh you weren't modded down for your opinion of Blizzard. You were modded down for signing your posts on the Internet.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Jeian]

The same way we take everything else, with a high degree of scorn.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[buffer-overflowed]

Not many, I believe most of them left/were reassigned after the game went gold, and a new team took over expansion/maintenance. Those original guys were working on the thing for a few years, so yea, I know I'd be glad to move on to another project.

The designers are probably still there though.

I wouldn't be surprised at all if Blizzard has a gradual dev churn in place to prevent burnout.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Anonymous Coward]

Activision's CEO is tired of being "pwned by crazy leet zons" in Diablo 2. Since Blizzard has ceased development on Diablo 2 patches, the only way to remedy the situation was to buy out Blizzard and start development on the next patch.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Jarik_Tentsu]

Indeed. Every game Blizzard has made has been a huge success.

WoW - Biggest MMORPG in the world...has changed the gaming industry so much, other publishers are accusing Blizzard of destroying the market.
Starcraft - Still has the biggest professional gaming industry (South Korea) which has more money in it than all other professional gaming industries put together.

Diablo series - While not nearly as successful as the other two, proved itself as a popular RPG almost all gamers have had a go at.
Warcraft series - Still proves itself as one of the most popular RTSs. Warcraft III especially was played in many professional levels and the modification game, DotA is probably the most popular game to play at LAN parties and cafes.

So yeah, unlike EA, they make few games, but each game is a hit. They put out quality games with few bugs and support them well. They look at the needs of the gamers and do well in producing something they would like.

I only hope Starcraft II will be as good as the first one, and I think that will be largely based on whether they plan to aim towards the South Korean needs of the game (Who want something perfectly balanced, simple, hard to play well, but can be put into a professional league and is competitive that can last in proleagues for years), or towards the more mainstream market (Who want an RTS with fancy graphics, to play the campaign once, play a couple of multiplayer games which involve just massing units for one big attack, then forget it a couple of months later).

But yeah, hopefully Activision won't come and say "Let's start pumping out 3 new games a year!" or something stupid like that.

~Jarik

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Tony Hoyle]

Since 2.3 half the quests have degenerated into 'hunt the questionmark' and it's insanely easy to level.. in fact it's more of a task to *not* level before half your unfinished quests go grey.

Preparation for Activision perhaps? They're big in consoles and the relative complexity of a PC game wouldn't go down well on the average Wii.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[bigman2003]

It seems like there are Blizzard fans here who are not familiar with the type of stuff that Activison is putting out.

Call of Duty and Guitar Hero are two of the highest rated game series being made right now- and two of the best.

Personally, I hope Blizzard doesn't try to put trolls into the next installation of Call of Duty.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Starayo]

You're absolutely right, because it makes perfect sense that they would meddle with established series and place utterly ridiculous elements of one of their own in there.

I applaud you on spotting this absolute affront to gamers everywhere. Bravo!

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Snaller]

Of course they will. Because they can improve the product.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Ghaan]

...while Vivendi, Blizzard's current parent company, will become the largest single investor in the new group. I doubt they are going to mess with Blizzard. I think it's Blizzard who's going to teach Activision how to do business...

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Grimbleton]

Whoooosh!

Re:World Of Warcraft

[SL Baur]

Since 2.3 half the quests have degenerated into 'hunt the questionmark' and it's insanely easy to level.. in fact it's more of a task to *not* level before half your unfinished quests go grey. Yeah, that's what I meant. Besides that, they've also cut the "armor repairs tax" in half because you now get a 20% discount from vendors where you're exalted. (I like that change a lot more than I like the Azeroth nerfing).

It's not all bad. There's no reason whatsoever to pay someone to "powerlevel" your character and with the revered and exalted additional discounts + decreased time at low levels, it's easier to save up mount money so there's less reason to pay for gold, less reason to pay exorbitant prices for epic drops below level 60 and much, much harder to keep a twinkie. And really, is it that much fun to have to squint, search hard, resort to things like Thottbot to find quest givers and quest items on the ground? Those are all desired features for me, your mileage may vary.

I bought the game because a) it was available on Macintosh (and hence Linux); b) it was very popular and I've kept playing because I find it most entertaining. So long as the Blizzard spirit I've come to know and enjoy remains intact, I'll continue supporting them by being a loyal customer.

Preparation for Activision perhaps? They're big in consoles and the relative complexity of a PC game wouldn't go down well on the average Wii. I don't like consoles in general and especially Xbox/MS-Windows-only games. I hope that's not the direction they're headed.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, yes... Vivendi bought Activision, but as part of the deal, Vivendi is giving Blizzard to them. The former head of Activision is going to be the new head of "Activision Blizzard." It doesn't really seem like something that's going to go well for Blizzard fans.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Starayo]

What, I'm not allowed to be cynical about things that stupid?

Re:World Of Warcraft

[monsted]

You mean like the stupid "supernazis" in Medal of Honor: Airborne? After clearing the bridge of gas mask wearing, rocket launcher wielding "tanks", i quit the game and haven't played it since.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[FirstNoel]

Not warriors...Hunters!

After the last 2.3 patch Activision was so pissed off about how overpowered hunters are they had to take matters into their own hands.

Their company pre-form must have gotten owned in Warsong by a bunch of twinked hunters.

Sean D.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[bigman2003]

Well, I cancelled my pre-order on that one. Saw the crappy reviews.

BUT- 'Super Nazis' can work!

Don't forget about these guys from Return to Castle Wolfenstein.

At at the risk of sounding like an insufferable asshat (Starayo) - Medal of Honor is an EA game. I'm sure you know, but I just don't want anyone to think it is associated with Activision.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Grimbleton]

Well... since you asked... Nope! :D

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Anonymous Coward]

As I've started playing WoW I've actually found Blizzard to be extremely insightful in what they do with the game. So about nerfing lower levels. It's actually not a bad idea in my opinion. I mean if you've tried more than 5 characters on either side you are repeating the same stuff you already did (boring). With the first expansion they pushed content that was 60+. With the next expansion they'll push 70+. Most of your customer base already has characters in this higher end, and does not need to be punished for starting a new character. Likewise anyone new to the game will probably soon want to get towards the higher end where everyone else is, so benefiting anyone willing to pick up the game now may also be a plus.

One thing I can attest to is that just making a game of this nature and just leaving everything static is a formula for disaster. I got into Everquest late and recall people paying 30 platnum at low levels for garbage when I had barley managed (and worked at it too) to accumulate 2. Leveling ended up screwed up. The economy ended up screwed up. Releasing "look new shiny expansion" and not accommodating the old system just aggregates the problem. Blizzard didn't just make a good game, they're keeping it a good game. As the player base evolves, the game evolves. At some point Blizzard will end up over extended with how much they move away from the base game, but they're doing a good job with it right now.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[monsted]

I know that it's not a blizzivision product and i agree that supernazis (Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's Supernazi!) work very well in Wolf3D. However, MOH:A is just a stunningly beautiful and realisticly feeling WW2 shooter, and the mood is completely ruined by them.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[moranar]

It took them a while before their process solidified. While I liked them, games such as Blackthorne, Rock n'Roll Racing, and Lost Vikings were not huge successes by any stretch of immagination. Lately, I agree, they've been doing only good stuff.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[ajs]

They have claimed, on the community forums, that not a single change will occur as a result in any way that will affect WoW.

That said, Blizzard is currently hiring for "next-Gen MMO" developers....

Re:World Of Warcraft

[SL Baur]

As I've started playing WoW I've actually found Blizzard to be extremely insightful in what they do with the game. ...
Blizzard didn't just make a good game, they're keeping it a good game. As the player base evolves, the game evolves. (Email me with your slashdot login name so I can add you to my fans list.)

I agree and the more I play it, the more I appreciate their insight into balancing the game. However much I hated the elite murlocs in the Vile Reef in STV, I've done quests there before and after patch 2.3 and Blizzard's original judgment was correct, however much I used to hate those murlocs. The 2.3 changes to ranged weapons was the correct thing to do, too.

I'm a noob at gaming sorts of things, but I've made my career out of trouble shooting large programs, often without full access to source. The program itself seems fairly sound.

Half of me wants to read the source, just because reading source code to programs I like is enjoyable and the other half says "never mind, just go out and kill as many Blood Elves as you can".

Re:World Of Warcraft

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

Yeah, that's what I meant. Besides that, they've also cut the "armor repairs tax" in half because you now get a 20% discount from vendors where you're exalted. (I like that change a lot more than I like the Azeroth nerfing).

I think that was long overdue, wasn't there an old pvp system discount for the major cities that you no longer can get due to not letting people update their titles?

Also was a pain to only repair in major cities with so many repair guys everywhere, so this will be nice. No more being hit hard for repairing inside BT/Hyjal.

Speaking of raiding.. It's kind of funny that the day you hit 70 you can be dragged through SSC/TK but can't run karazhan until you go through the attunement. I'll never understand why they completely removed t5 attunement but left t6 and t4.

Really overall they made the game easier to get into. Pretty much every raid boss has been nerfed considerably, leveling speed increased, 'welfare epics'(bg, arena, heroic badges, etc), rep grinds lowered, and overall its now easier to get to the top of the game. All changes I like, except that they're made now after I and many others went through all the hard effort that now is not needed. I'm not saying they shouldn't have done it, but it's pretty depressing that blizzard's MO is "release really hard content, let people struggle on it, then nerf it so everyone else can play too". Really removes the incentive to want to try in any new content (sunwell, WotLK) because you know you could just wait 5 months and do it when it doesnt take as much work.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[mrbooze]

Having been on both sides of about 10 corporate acquisitions, both being the buyer and the buyee, I can guarantee you, *every single acquisition* gets told this. And in every single case, it is a complete lie.

What it really means in every case is "we won't change much for about a year, then we swallow you whole".

The fact that Activision's CEO is the new CEO is the most telling. If you ever want to know which company is the alpha male in a merger, simply look to see who the CEO is.

Also, they messed up with the new company name. I would totally have named it Blizz-O-Vision.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Some_Llama]

"Call of Duty"

The same game that spans four versions with only upgrades to models and textures.. bravo! basically the same game play from 2 on.. don't get me wrong i like the COD series but the originality dropped off after the first sequel and have just been money makers from then on.

"Guitar hero"

Is it just me or has anyone else noticed that GH 3 sucks balls compared to 1-2? i don't like the new HUD, i don't like "battle mode' where you intentionally mess up other players.. and the notes don't seem to correctly correspond to the timing of the song nor how you would normally play it on a guitar.

One of the biggest reason GH is such a blast (imho) is that the notes are displayed similar to how you would actually play them on a guitar.. chords for chords, up the fret for higher notes, etc.. and they are timed so that if you know the color you don't have to watch the screen to play.. you could do it by ear. GH3 seems to put notes just to make it harder for each level (easy, med, high, expert).

With GH3, most of what i loved has been tweaked by activision's studio into a somewhat different product.. the only redeeming quality are song's that i wanted to play.. but then when i go to play them i'm disappointed.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[ajs]

Having been on both sides of about 10 corporate acquisitions, both being the buyer and the buyee, I can guarantee you, *every single acquisition* gets told this. And in every single case, it is a complete lie. Well, now hold on. I didn't say that this was going to have no impact on the company, and I think that it's clear it will. What they've said is that they're not changing WoW's staff or its goals. That's probably true. After all, WoW is their cash cow. What they want to do is replicate that success in other games and build even larger player bases. How they'll do that is another question.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Starayo]

In hindsight it would have been better for me if I had just replied with "Whoooosh!".

Re:World Of Warcraft

[bigman2003]

I'll give you Guitar Hero III- not as good as II...except that the song selection was pretty darn good. And yes, the boss battle thing was pretty stupid. But at the heart of it (You know you rocked out on Barracuda!) it is still a pretty fun game.

But I don't agree with you at all on Call of Duty.

Call of Duty 2 was a fantastic game. The single play was a lot of fun, and multiplayer was fantastic, especially for a console launch title. Yes, it took a while to get the bugs out, but they DID get the bugs out, rather than telling us, "We'll fix that in the next version."

Call of Duty 3 was okay. Not as good as 2...almost like they phoned it in.

But Call of Duty 4- man, if you really want to say that is the same game, then you are just saying, "I've seen the screen shots, and it looks similar." Because it is a HUGE step forward in online shooters.

What about the challenges, and the progression of your 'character'? Leveling up, gaining new weapons, etc etc? Some of it has been done- Rainbow Six Vegas - but it has never been done so well in a shooter.

Take a look at Game Informer's review.

Most people here won't read that, but let me give you the last line:

Infinity Ward has delivered on every front, and there is no question in my mind that this is the best action shooter that I have ever played.


Sure, you don't like Game Informer...but read the other reviews out there. This is NOT just more of the same.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[SL Baur]

All changes I like, except that they're made now after I and many others went through all the hard effort that now is not needed. Yeah, I understand that, and I especially feel for the guys who bought epic ground mounts before the price was nerfed.

They should at least give a title or something to distinguish between characters who did it the hard way ,like my level 70 hunter, or the easier way, like my very soon to be level 70 rogue who somewhat (2.3 patch came when he was mid 40s) did it the easier way.

Really removes the incentive to want to try in any new content (sunwell, WotLK) because you know you could just wait 5 months and do it when it doesnt take as much work. I'm not so sure of that. If WotLK is going to be released soon, I don't have much incentive to do the endgame content of the Outlands, but I do have incentive to get to level 70 so I can level up quick and do the new endgame content. I started late and so have many, many others who are current subscribers. It wouldn't surprise me if the Blizzard developers go on holiday to some tropical island paradise for a month after getting WotLK ready before releasing it just to allow people more time to level up. I don't think that would be wrong, actually.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Some_Llama]

currently i have only played the single player of the game, and for all of them that is mainly what i was talking about. 4 was set in "modern" times but it was the same exact game, same game play (although the AC130 gunship mission stood out) and such.

Maybe the multiplayer is good, i couldn't say unfortunately, but it wasn't really what i was talking about. Maybe the multiplayer does make all the difference and could make my point less poignant, so i'll capitulate to you on that.

But activision really fucked up GH3, so there :P

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Akaihiryuu]

They DO give a title to the people who have completed the Eye attunement quests since the attunement was removed. The quests are still in-game, you just don't have to do them anymore to enter the raid. The title is "Champion of the Naaru", and you can still complete those quests now and get that title if you wish.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[bigstrat2003]

I disagree. GH3 is easily the best in the series, Neversoft managed to really pick up the torch on that one. Yes, it's too hard. Yes, the boss battles are dumb and don't add anything. The core gameplay, however, is the same, the graphics are better, and the song selection is about a billion times better than GH2 (I couldn't stand about half the songs in that game).

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Some_Llama]

"The core gameplay, however, is the same, the graphics are better, and the song selection is about a billion times better than GH2 (I couldn't stand about half the songs in that game)."

The song notes don't match up like they did in the previous 2 versions (notes don't hit at the same time they play, note placement has very little correlation to how a real guitar would play them), the graphics are actually worse (pixelated, genericified, very bland), and other than agreeing on a very nice song selection i can't for the life of me see how you can say this version is any better.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[bigstrat2003]

notes don't hit at the same time they play I haven't had this problem.

placement has very little correlation to how a real guitar would play them That doesn't matter to me in the least.

the graphics are actually worse (pixelated, genericified, very bland) Uh... are you playing the PS2 version or something? I have the PS3 version, and the graphics aren't pixelated at all. They're anything but generic or bland in any version, for that matter. The bright colors and lighting are a huge step up from GH/Rock Band's understated art style. The graphics aren't Crysis, but they're definitely the best graphics the series has seen, BY FAR.

And like I said (and you agreed), song selection. This is a game about music, song selection accounts for about 75% of my enjoyment.

Re:World Of Warcraft

[Some_Llama]

"I haven't had this problem."

Maybe i play it more than you, i dunno.. maybe you just don't notice it.

"That doesn't matter to me in the least."

I think this says a lot.. i mean the whole reason the game is so fun (to me) and why i think it has been such a hit (for most people) is the satisfaction of playing the game like you would a real guitar.. i mean it's guitar hero .. trying to make you feel like a guitar playing rock star.. not strum along hero. when you nail solos the crowd cheers, when you miss notes you hear them being missed and the crowd jeers.. without the correlation of notes to a real guitar OR the actual notes you would be playing for the song.. it's boiled down to button mashing, fun?

"Uh... are you playing the PS2 version or something? I have the PS3 version, and the graphics aren't pixelated at all. They're anything but generic or bland in any version, for that matter. The bright colors and lighting"

yes i do play the PS2 version, but i have played the 360 and ps3 versions and it's basically the same exact graphics, it's the art style i'm talking about, not the brightness of the colors.. the point counter are pixelated lines (and the x multiplier) ?

"This is a game about music, song selection accounts for about 75% of my enjoyment."

and it's about 25% of mine.. i have a great music collection that i can play air guitar to any time i want.. that's basically what GH3 is now, with the added fun (sarcasm) of button mashing and having to "battle". I mean event he battle.. if it was just about nailing solo's no biggie.. but now you have to purposely try and mess up the other player/bot.. it's a new feeling to the game i think it could definitely have done without meh.

Makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

Both companies do little else other than release sequel after sequel for once popular series. Most of their original titles were released in the 90s.

Re:Makes sense

[bigstrat2003]

I hate to be the one to break this to you, buddy, but Blizzard's franchises are STILL popular. Warcraft III was highly acclaimed when it came out, and widely enjoyed. Starcraft is still, of course, rabidly played in Korea and other places, as will Starcraft II, I imagine. World of Warcraft (the last game Blizzard released for a while) doesn't even count as a sequel to Warcraft in any way, considering that it isn't an RTS. So yeah, I don't know where you get your ideas, but it isn't reality.

Re:Makes sense

[Trintech]

I wonder how this will effect the free servers that games like Diablo II, etc are played on?

Obviously WoW servers wont be changed one bit but I can see Blizzard and Activision possibly combining server farms to cut overhead costs. This could have an interesting effect on people who still play Diablo II on Bizzard's servers so they dont have to put up with all the hacks, etc on "personal" servers.

Re:Makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

There are still plenty of hacks that work on Blizzard's servers. Not to mention the fact that bots have never been stopped and fairly quickly produce "legit" items, not dupes. Dueling, "balance," and the D2 economy are jokes. Everything is just a rush/grind fest within a month of a ladder reset. Shut it down already, it's embarrassing to call it a game.

Re:Makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah. I recently started playing D2 again after about a year hiatus, and you're exactly right. Every public game has at least one spam advertising bot join, spam and leave within 30 seconds of being created. On top of that, *nobody* seems to actually play the game. Nobody even does magic find runs anymore. Everybody gets rushed and then sits in games (run by bots) doing to level.

A large percentage of the very high level characters (above 95, maybe) aren't even run by people. Of those that are, 99% of the characters are cookie cutter builds from guides on the internet.

Re:Makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, you cant blame them for the builds. Once you get to hell, almost nothing but a handful of builds are relevant.

I personally wish i could use whatever build i wanted and still be useful.

Re:Makes sense

[osu-neko]

World of Warcraft (the last game Blizzard released for a while) doesn't even count as a sequel to Warcraft in any way, considering that it isn't an RTS. So yeah, I don't know where you get your ideas, but it isn't reality.

Apparently the people at Blizzard are out of touch with reality by your definitions. For a very long time during its development, Warcraft III wasn't considered an RTS (they eventually morphed it back into one when they decided their ideas weren't working out). By your definition, had they stayed the course on that one and not turned it back into an RTS, Warcraft III would not have been a sequel to Warcraft in any way. One wonders, then, why at Blizzard they were calling it Warcraft III if it wasn't in any way a sequel.

Of course, it was a sequel. It just didn't happen to be an RTS.

The many of the ideas that they tried, then removed from Warcraft III (some of which were originally from a cancelled product called Warcraft Adventures, an RPG sequel to Warcraft II) eventually spawned World of Warcraft.

Saying World of Warcraft isn't a sequel to Warcraft in any way is patently absurd.

Re:Makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

it isn't reality THIS IS SPARTA

Re:Makes sense

[darthflo]

Being a sequel to Warcraft III would imply WoW's game mechanics to be somewhat similar to WC III's which they aren't. What would you think about calling it a part of the Warcraft franchise?

Re:Makes sense

[MrNaz]

It wasn't really Blizzard and Activision that did that, more the corporatisation of gaming in general. Gone are the days when small companies like Bullfrog and the Looking Glass of yore could do something totally new like Syndicate or System Shock 1 and not have to worry about risk associated with deviating from the known-good formula because there was no known-good formula back then. Now, shareholders interests need to be looked after, and that means lowering risk by copying the last successful game and making it different enough that idiots^H^H^H^H the average consumer doesn't notice.

The sad fact of capitalism is that anyone on the right hand side of the IQ bell curve will not have their needs met by the market, as profit is not maximised by catering to any market segment other than the plebeian majority.

Re:Makes sense

[ukyoCE]

What matters isn't whether a game is a "franchise", but whether the game is developed and sold as a franchise, or if the game involves original gameplay direction. Or at least significantly enhanced gameplay direction, if you want to argue that every single game evar is a total ripoff of some previous game.

Take World of Warcraft for instance. It's the Warcraft franchise. But the gameplay itself is much more "Diablo 3D" than "Warcraft 4" or "Everquest 3". The game is a giant leap from any previous Blizzard game, franchise or not.

The problem with franchises is when they consist of the same engine, same story, and same gameplay, released to make a quick buck with very low development costs. And even that is OK as long as you take it for what it is - an add-on pack for people who want more of the same.

Re:Makes sense

[xoff00]

One wonders, then, why at Blizzard they were calling it Warcraft III if it wasn't in any way a sequel.

Two words: Final Fantasy.

I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Seumas]

I can't wait to start buying their games and various swag -- all emblazoned with the new Blactavision logos!

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[shystershep]

I prefer the Actalizzard, myself.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Yvan256]

Seriously that's the dumbest name I've ever heard.

Activizzard, on the other hand...

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why you gotta be such a racist and hate on Blactavision? Shut yo mouff!

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[gEvil (beta)]

I'm kinda partial to Blizzavision.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Anonymous Coward]

Shut yo mouff!

I'm just talking about Blactavision!

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Gunslinger47]

Actiblizz! Like Squeenix, it'll likely be unofficial, but it'll be cute and fit nicely into a headline.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[flyingsquid]

I'm kinda partial to Blizzavision.

No, that's what causes me to hit on ugly chicks after six drinks.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[tighr]

A good name for the new company would be Activard, I think. My hope is that this move doesn't impact things like Starcraft II negatively. That is a game that millions of gamers have been waiting for since the original Starcraft won Game of the Year in 1998, as evidenced by the fact that people are still playing it 10 years later. It has big shoes to fill, and bureaucracy is generally not good for games (the already mentioned EA Sports, with its monopoly on NFL games and other sports franchises that are a dime a dozen, yet cost $50 each). Well, its good to know that Slashdot dupes are begining to appear in the summary itself now, mentioning twice who the CEO would be and which company will have the largest stake in the company!

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[gad_zuki!]

>all emblazoned with the new Blactavision logos!

I just heard an ad for their next game, it goes like this:

Who's the black private dick
That's a sex machine to all the chicks?

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[BorgCopyeditor]

You shouldn't complain about something that pushes your chances of getting laid up into the single digits. :-o

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[TomHandy]

I can dig it.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[the unbeliever]

No, that's Blitzavision.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[macz]

How about just "Blizzard" since Activision is the one that needs Blizzard's credibility to prop it up?

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Kris_J]

Actiblizz is no Squeenix. I think Blizzact is more likely. At least the "a" overlaps.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Anonymous Coward]

AcTard.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[S. Traaken]

Activizzard

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[LuNa7ic]

So when can we expect Tony Hawks Pro Starcraft?

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Anonymous Coward]

I for one welcome our new Blactavision overlords.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think I will go with Actard.

Re:I can't wait until I can buy their games.

[Chyeld]

No, no, wait!! I've got it.... Atari?

New MMORPG

[Valacosa]

World of Command and Conquer?

Re:New MMORPG

[Valacosa]

Damn - upon further research, I find that it was EA that bought Westwood, not Activision. Now I feel really stupid.

It's too bad too. Imagine how awesome it would be to have a game where orcs could be pwned by an Obelisk of Light.

Re:New MMORPG

[White Shade]

A command and conquer MMORPG would be kinda cool actually ... I dunno how it'd be possible, it might end up being kinda lame like C&C Renegade, but a sorta world-wide warfare would be sweet, especially if the world actually changed and there were tangible results from blowing stuff up and taking places over....

alas, it'll never happen :(

Re:New MMORPG

[Dunbal]

Command and Conquer?

      You better not let EA hear you say that. They're the ones that own Westwood now no? Anyway they suck, all the good people left. Petroglyph ftw.

Re:New MMORPG

[Dunbal]

Join the army and get yourself a job flying UAVs... sounds like that would be your bag.

Re:New MMORPG

[rpillala]

I might pay good money for World of XCom

Re:New MMORPG

[Grail]

To be honest, the first thing I thought of was "World of Battlezone", but that didn't have quite the right ring to it.

Night Elf Druid, meet Biometal Hovertank with Stab 3 upgrade...

Re:New MMORPG

[jmoriarty]

Damn - upon further research... There are certain things regular Slashdot readers come to expect from this site, and researched posts or comments is not one of them. Please don't let it happen again.

Re:New MMORPG

[vuffi_raa]

or conquer and craft- like a super smash brothers rts

Re:New MMORPG

[Lord Kano]

That's not an impossible idea. How about "Land of Nod"?

Re:New MMORPG

[imbroken3a]

Considering how every company EA buys turns to shit, it wouldn't be awesome at all.

Re:New MMORPG

[dwlovell]

WoW sort of has a battlefield-style PvP game called "Alterac Valley" which is one of their "Battlegrounds". It is essentially like a RTS battlefield where you play one of the myriad of players on your side. There is resource-collection, battles, taking out objectives, etc. There have been mixed results, but probably the best adaptation of RTS to MMO so far.

-David

Re:New MMORPG

[obeythefist]

There was an FPS called C&C Renegade, which, much like WoW, alters the format of the popular RTS.

In Renegade, it was mostly PvP deathmatches (NOD vs GDI) with a single player campaign. You could spend points to buy vehicles or infantry types. You had to defend your base (if they destroy your armory you can't build tanks etc). You could likewise assault the enemy base and destroy their buildings to prevent them from obtaining upgrades.

Much in the same way that WoW is an RPG based on the Warcraft RTS, where again the buildings are the same models from the ones in the RTS, only huge!

Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Jon.Laslow]

http://blizzard.com/press/activision-faq.shtml

Provides some details. From their front page:

Blizzard to Join Forces With Activision
We're pleased to announce that along with the other companies that make up Vivendi Games, we are merging with Activision to form a new global entertainment organization called Activision Blizzard (pending shareholder and regulatory approval). Similar to our previous arrangement, Blizzard Entertainment will now operate as a division of this new organization.

There will be no changes to our games, our websites, our personnel, or our day-to-day operations as a result of the deal. However, this combining of resources will benefit all of the companies involved and will further strengthen Blizzard's ability to continue delivering high-quality content for our players around the world for many years to come.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[TubeSteak]

However, this combining of resources will benefit all of the companies involved and will further strengthen Blizzard's ability to continue delivering high-quality content for our players around the world for many years to come. I would have thought Activision was the one that needed to strengthen their ability to deliver high quality content.

They routinely rush studios to push out complete and utter crap under the Activision Value title. Even the decent games still come with serious flaws due to the rushed timetables.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Jugalator]

There will be no changes to our games, our websites, our personnel, or our day-to-day operations as a result of the deal. That's what they always say first.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Minupla]

There will be no changes to our games, our websites, our personnel, or our day-to-day operations as a result of the deal. if this is true, how can:

... combining of resources will benefit all of the companies involved and will further strengthen Blizzard's ability to continue delivering high-quality content Also be true? Either nothing is changing or something is, you can't have it both ways. The reason for mergers and aquisitions is generally that the companies involved believe that through the merger some gains can be made. The way that history proves works is through reductions is redundancy. (call these layoffs, retrenchments, rightsizing, as your personal tastes dictate) The other not-so-successful-historically model is the "merge two companies with no redundancies, run them together and lose money" model (ref: AOL-Time-Warner among others)

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[prencher]

They are good at letting established studios do their thing (unlike EA, who ruined westwood and countless others): Look at Infinity Ward and Call of Duty 4, for example.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[king-manic]

There will be no changes to our games, our websites, our personnel, or our day-to-day operations as a result of the deal.
if this is true, how can: ... combining of resources will benefit all of the companies involved and will further strengthen Blizzard's ability to continue delivering high-quality content
Also be true? Either nothing is changing or something is, you can't have it both ways. The reason for mergers and aquisitions is generally that the companies involved believe that through the merger some gains can be made. The way that history proves works is through reductions is redundancy. (call these layoffs, retrenchments, rightsizing, as your personal tastes dictate) The other not-so-successful-historically model is the "merge two companies with no redundancies, run them together and lose money" model (ref: AOL-Time-Warner among others) They now have ~twice the advertising clout and a bigger stick to negotiate with retailers. ie. Stock or we will only have limited quantities of SC2 and COD5 for you.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[samkass]

Well... at least it wasn't Microsoft that bought Blizzard.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Ghubi]

Or maybe... 1bn + 2bn = 18.8bn.

The way I see it, Activision must have had some super cool idea for the next major online cash cow err game. But, Activision must have determined that they lacked the resources to complete this epic production on their own. So, they carefully weigh their options of ways to raise the extra 2bn they estimate is needed to complete the project. Stock offering, venture capitalists... apparently they decided that their best option was to merge with another larger gaming company.

There's no reason why this new 3bn project should interfere with the day to day operations of the other 15.8bn of whatever makes up the total merger. I can't wait to find out exactly what this new 3bn project is.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[slyn]

Even the decent games still come with serious flaws due to the rushed timetables.

Guitar Hero 3 would be a great example of that. When the game came out the online was workable, as in it wasn't bad, but was far from good. The quickmatch selections simply don't work, but if you choose a custom match or create your own you have a decent chance of getting matched with someone.

If you used the unlock all songs or unlock all everything cheats to check out the content when the game first came out, the game would still save, so you would continue to have everything unlocked even though you might not have the cheat on. As a result if you used either of the unlock cheats you ended up with a bunch of achievements. TBH, theirs no way Activision/Neversoft could have made that mistake if they tested the cheats more than once.

There's a bug that can allow you to cheat in online play, but you can end up being the one using it on accident.

If you go to the career store and look to shop for DLC, it clears all your existing DLC scores. Buying DLC through the online menu or at the XBL dashboard will not.

And on top of those the game freezes every once in a while for no reason. If you do voice chatting with someone, it freezes way more often. If you do voice chatting while doing online play (like if you were playing with a friend over and over), it's hard to make it through more than one or two matches without either of your games freezing.

All of these are issues that shouldn't have happened because they are just normal use scenarios. But they did. So Activision/Neversoft has issued a patch, right? Not yet, but they will release one Soon®. The game has been out for a month now, and it seems like its been forever without a patch, but for all I know that could be on par with how long the Orange Box cake... errr patch took to be released.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Nocturnal Deviant]

here let me fix this quote

There will be no changes to our games, our websites, our personnel, or our day-to-day operations as a result of the deal. However, this combining of resources will benefit all of the companies involved and will further strengthen Blizzard's ability to continue delivering high-quality content for our players around the world of warcraft for many years to come.

there is no spoon. -the matrix

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Jon.Laslow]

Heh, for a second I thought, "Did he change anything"? It looked so real!

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Nocturnal Deviant]

hehe that was the idea

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[eharvill]

Also be true? Either nothing is changing or something is, you can't have it both ways. The reason for mergers and aquisitions is generally that the companies involved believe that through the merger some gains can be made. The way that history proves works is through reductions is redundancy. (call these layoffs, retrenchments, rightsizing, as your personal tastes dictate) The other not-so-successful-historically model is the "merge two companies with no redundancies, run them together and lose money" model (ref: AOL-Time-Warner among others) EMC and VMWare seem to have done this successfully. As a parent-company/subsidiary aspect I don't know if these are set up the same way or not however.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[Tony Hoyle]

They managed to ship the Wii version of GH3 in Mono, which means it never went through any testing at all (or very little, like 'it boots, ship it!'), since in a music game that would be the first thing you'd notice.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[vuffi_raa]

actually, it kind of makes sense, blizzard has gotten too big for it's little britches with WOW and activision is kind of bloated and out of touch- they could fill in each others' holes

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[p0tat03]

They routinely rush studios to push out complete and utter crap under the Activision Value title. Even the decent games still come with serious flaws due to the rushed timetables.

At least they have a "value" line. With EA *every* one of their titles is part of EA Value :P

Activision does good work. Yeah, they pump out their share of crap through their Activision Value department, but when they run across a high profile developer that is good (e.g. Infinity Ward), they know when to take a hands-off approach.

I'd rather have Activision be the industry juggernaut than EA.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[SvnLyrBrto]

Yeah....

And I'm sure that every formerly-awesome game studio that got gobbled up by EA spat out a press release saying basically the same thing. And so did Bungie when they were assimilated by the beast of redmond.

I guess I can just hope that Blizzard gets Starcraft 2 out before everything goes to shit there.

cya,
john

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[The Analog Kid]

Microsoft's gaming division isn't that terrible, the areas that they actually face competition they actually strive to do well, and there are always going to be game development companies, as the entry cost isn't as high as other software areas.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[samkass]

Still, I'd hate to see another great cross-platform game developer consumed by the Microsoft mediocrity as happened with Bungie.

Re:Here's an FAQ from Blizzard

[omfglearntoplay]

You are getting at the point but said bluntly...let's not forget that sometimes when they say merger, they don't mean merger at all. They mean buyout, and that could mean big changes to Blizzard... and that'd be damn scary. No amount of propaganda would prove it one way or the other... we simply have to see how it plays out. But given the past buyout, we may actually be semi-safe. The biggest problem with blizzard is the fact that WOW took over so much of their time long after the creative and fun juices stopped flowing. Will starcraft 2 ever come out, and will it be catered to the masses or have the balance of serious play value with enough newbie stuff to get everybody to buy.

My gosh

[guardiangod]

Activision and Blizzard have said they will form "the world's most profitable games business"

I screamed.

Re:My gosh

[ashamanq]

It really saddens me when game companies make good business decisions that, to me, seem like they will hurt gamers in the long run. But, it just occurred to me... does this mean we're guaranteed to get Diablo 3? Suddenly I'm less pessimistic...

Re:My gosh

[OakLEE]

I'll tackle this in two parts,

It really saddens me when game companies make good business decisions...

Well, like you said, both Blizzard and Activision are businesses, and businesses exist to make money that they can return to their owners and shareholders. Both Blizzard and Activision don't make games just because it's fun to. They make games because people will pay money for them.

...that, to me, seem like they will hurt gamers in the long run

I actually think this will help gamers. First off, Vivendi will basically retain control of Activision Blizzard by bieng the majority shareholder and having the majority of seats on the board. This will allow them to protect Blizzard's independent operation status, something it has always had as a subsidiary of Vivendi, and something that has clearly worked in past given the quality and profitability of the titles and franchises Blizzard has created. Blizzard is probably set for the longterm with this deal.

Activision fans also benefit, at least in the short term, because it will get access to Universal Music Groups song catalog through Vivendi. This will translate into more, and better Guitar Hero sequels, which will benefit Guitar Hero fans. Of course, the problem with Guitar Hero is that it is an inherently faddish game, ala DDR, and its novelty will probably wear off in a year. Then Activision will have to depend on its Call of Duty, Tony Hawk, and Quake franchises, all of which are oversaturated. However, that would have happened to Activision regardless of the merger, so I fail to see how gamers are hurt by this merger.

Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Crock23A]

How long until I can play some crazy rhythm-based RTS with my guitar hero controller?

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[rootofevil]

Thrall Pro Skater 2: grinding in dalaran

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[david.given]

How long until I can play some crazy rhythm-based RTS with my guitar hero controller?

You know, that might actually be quite fun. Did you ever play Loom? That was a point-and-click adventure game where all your actions were done by playing short phrases of music.

Update it to the present day, and you have your character roaming the wilderness blowing monsters away with your sw33t r1ffs. The more powerful the spell, the harder it is to play, so your character's skills are directly related to your skills. If you could solve the lag issue, you could even have the ability to team up with other players and jam together for extra power.

Hmm. Different character classes would map to different types of music quite well. Healer == psychedelic 60s. Tank == 80s power ballad. Fighter == rock. Necromancer == death metal...

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[WIAKywbfatw]

Now that you mention it, WOW is crying out for a Bard class...

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[alexgieg]

You mean, something like this or this?

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Memroid]

This sounds like something that could be done with the 'Tenacious D' name on it...

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[siegesama]

I'd sure as hell play it

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Anonymous Coward]

Wizard = Techno.

Sandstorm is the highest-level spell.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Anonymous Coward]

I cannot begin to tell you how many hours I spent playing Loom. Fascinating story, interesting game, I loved it.

But, please, god, no. It would be more painful than playing WoW with a Wii controller.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[talis9]

I remember Loom from back in the day. Was a lot of fun for the time.

On your idea of a modern day update, there was an issue of the Grimjack comic published back around 91-92 that had this theme. In one of the Dimensions that Cynosure interfaced with irregularly, sound was used as a weapon and Grimjacks signature power riff was one of the most powerful. Grimjack and a group of others had to protect the Heart of rock and Roll from the attack of the bad 80's hair bands.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not sure how well it'd work, but you could also make different character classes map to different instruments. In multi-player games the different instruments could form a band.

I suppose it would complicate things controller wise, but IMO it'd make more sense for multi-player.

Of the top of my head, lag could be "solved" by sending MIDI or some other description of the sound instead of the actual sound. The client would just play the MIDI, or decode the description and play the actual sound file.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Psiven]

Yeah I really like this idea.

I'd like to see each character with a different instrument, so as to work better in multiplayer. The better the classes complement each other the better they play in concert, ie percussion, brass, strings.

Maybe different levels would introduce different musical themes/styles.

Great idea, mate.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[n3r0.m4dski11z]

Loom was so fucking gay dude. My like aunt baught that for me in like 1993. complete piece of shit. Im weaving music? someones high on something

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[TheLongshot]

Hey, we could use a game version of Alan Dean Foster's Spellsinger series...

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Anonymous Coward]

Reminds me of that crazy magic guitar Dante got in DMC 3. You could base a whole game around it.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[DdJ]

Forget rhythm-based RTS. Give me a rhythm-based RPG, where I can play it with the guitar controller.

Maybe... I don't know... "The Bard's Tale"?

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Anonymous Coward]

Every game is better with Bards.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Seraphim_72]

Isn't it bad enough that they have to have some half dressed elf dancing on every table top in very bar in the game, but now you want them to be able to play '70s porn music to it as well? Chicka-bow-wow. Ugh.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Snaller]

" The more powerful the spell, the harder it is to play, so your character's skills are directly related to your skills."

If I had any skills i wouldn't be playing computer games!

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[cosinezero]

Sorry, gonna have to go with Spinal Tap FTW here...

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Internalist]

Reminds me of this, which was a great series of books...well, the first 3, anyway.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[Rinikusu]

I... would play a Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure game based on this. Yes. Yes I would.

Re:Guitarcraft: Lords of Music

[dushkin]

And let's not mention Thrall Pro Skater 3: Lolnub in Da Hood

$18.8bn?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why are the amounts quoted in Barbadian dollars?

Re:$18.8bn?

[Anonymous Coward]

...bn = billion.

Starcraft

[snl2587]

As long as Starcraft 2 is still going to be released, this is fine with me.

Re:Starcraft

[Petahpie]

Well, if it's released, and it's still awesome, it's fine. If it sucks.. I'll be pretty pissed.

*jacks it to SC2 gameplay videos*

Re:Starcraft

[wizardforce]

I think you mean
As long as Starcraft 2 is still going to be released finished, this is fine with me. Let us hope that they don't rush SC2 out the door half-done and utter garbage shall we?

(Shudder...)

[DoofusOfDeath]

No one makes games with great replay value like Blizzard does. Blizzard's strategy of not releasing a game until its ready is almost unheard of in this industry. I seriously hope that the new overlords don't mess with this - I'd hate to stop benefiting from Blizzard's good work.

Re:(Shudder...)

[Iceman_B]

Excuse me? Are you telling me that WoW was finished when they released it? You so funny xD Seriously, they release the game when big chucks of gameplay wasn't finished and were added latet through huge patches. How is that "releasing a game until its ready " ._.?

Re:(Shudder...)

[Anonymous Coward]

what else do you expect out of a fanboi?

Re:(Shudder...)

[Hexedian]

By MMO standards, World of Warcraft was a finished product. You only need to look at other games, like Anarchy Online, or, more recently, Tabula Rasa (Which was so incomplete upon release that they thought it a good idea to start numbering their patch from 0.1 onward), to see that a game that is fully HALF complete really IS a good deal.

Re:(Shudder...)

[cdomigan]

I seriously hope that the new overlords don't mess with this Not the end of the world if they do - you can always SPAWN MORE OVERLORDS

Re:(Shudder...)

[KingKaneOfNod]

Blizzard's strategy of not releasing a game until its ready is almost unheard of in this industry. Ever heard of Duke Nukem Forever? Yeahhhhhhh ...

Re:(Shudder...)

[OakLEE]

The deal is structured so that Vivendi basically controls the new company. My bet is that they keep the same hands off approach with Blizzard that they have always had. Given Blizzard's immense profitability (projected 2007 revenue of $1.1b; $510m operating profit; 40% operating margins), they have earned that level of independence, and it would be stupid to mess with it.

Re:(Shudder...)

[rush2049]

Pixar does this strategy, not releasing a movie until it is completely finished, and so do a lot of other sucessful companies. I would love to stop having all these terrible games released and just have a couple really killer games.

Re:(Shudder...)

[Anonymous Coward]

Blizzard's strategy of not releasing a game until its ready is almost unheard of in this industry.

In comparison to the rest of the industry's policy of not releasing a game until it's almost ready.

Re:(Shudder...)

[absoluteflatness]

Pixar does this strategy, not releasing a movie until it is completely finished

I always hate when I'm watching a movie and the projector crashes right after the opening credits. Stupid muliplexes always forget to apply the latest patches.

Re:(Shudder...)

[Anonymous Coward]

SPAWN MORE OVERLORDS.

Re:(Shudder...)

[Anonymous Coward]

[insert witty Duke Nukem Forever reference here]

Re:(Shudder...)

[Travis Mansbridge]

The overlords stay the same. It's just some new underlings ;) It would seem that Blizzard Entertainment, as it is proposed, "...a division of Activision Blizzard.." will remain just as it is now. Hopefully.

Re:(Shudder...)

[GammaKitsune]

Miyamoto, Will Wright, and the Duke Nukem people would like to have a word with you. A very, very long word, that makes thousands of fans very sad.

some questions

[gEvil (beta)]

So, does anyone know who's going to be put in charge of the new company? And what about Vivendi? I thought they owned part of Blizzard. Any word on them?

Re:some questions

[Faylone]

You can't even read the summary? "Vivendi will be the biggest shareholder in the group."

Re:some questions

[Anonymous Coward]

*ZoomZoom* (much better than whoosh)

Re:some questions

[AikonMGB]

I think you need to grow a few feet, because that one completely missed your head.

Aikon-

Re:some questions

[Travis Mansbridge]

Vivendi owns Blizzard, though Blizzard has some kind of "don't fuck with our development" clause that basically allows them free reign on their own projects. The new company will be owned in majority by Vivendi, as major shareholder.

R.I.P.

[Colin Smith]

Innovation, imagination etc. All that will be left is "The Sure Thing".

Re:R.I.P.

[jjohnson]

Don't be too worried. Mergers and acquisitions happen because the merged/acquired is either very strong or very weak. The weak get ingested, stripped of individuality in a spreadsheet driven attempt to 'improve efficiencies' and such. The strong get bought just because they're strong--it's worth having them as is, and beyond some HR and Finance integration, there's very little desire to screw up a good thing.

A lot of merged/acquired/grown by purchasing companies are little more than feudal arrangements where divisions operate by themselves and pay tribute to head office. As an example, EMC bought VMWare a couple years ago, and there's still almost zero integration--they're an independent fiefdom within EMC, and no one's going to hobble EMC's hottest property with an ill-conceived attempt to 'familize' them.

Re:R.I.P.

[Kohath]

What was the big innovation in World of Warcraft again?

Gamers have made it clear that they'll buy secondhand ideas if the games are put together with a high enough level of quality and polish. Quality outsells originality -- mostly because the objective of gamers is to have fun, and a lot of the old ideas are very fun when executed well.

WOW I only see POSITIVES coming from this merger!

[phildawg]

I have always liked Activision as a game company since Battlezone. I enjoy playing their games quite a lot and I have the distinct feeling that Blizzard will remain the same as always (one of, if not the best pc game house) and this stands to help further Activision and develop them as a higher quality company.

I'm very excited about this and think we will only see the PC industry be enhanced by such a merger. With Blizzards track record of releasing quality games when they feel they are ready, this model could easily translate to Activision and enhance their final products. I feel there maybe a trend of quality in the future of PC Gaming. When people look at Blizz, their profit margin on games, and the fact they rarely release them in time for the particular holiday season that corporate companies would force the game out... I think companies will realize, especially in the PC market, we want finished products, not products ready to be delivered under the Christmas Tree or released at the appropriate timing with the fiscal quarter or year, etc.

Commentary

[hibiki_r]

It's not Blizzard that is merging: They've been part of Vivendi universal for years. Their parent company has many developers other developers outside of Blizzard. WoW is their cash cow though.

That said, it doesn't seem like their different developer studios have a lot of synergy though: The end result is a company that has very diverse offerings, and will be difficult to market as a single entity. It's not like either company needed the other for stability purposes though: Both WoW and Guitar Hero are the kind of franchises that allow a company to have a nice R&D budget and take risks with new franchises.

So I guess the merger will just mean they'll be able to push retailers around more easily, and make their revenue even more predictable.

Re:Commentary

[alexhmit01]

That said, it doesn't seem like their different developer studios have a lot of synergy though: The end result is a company that has very diverse offerings, and will be difficult to market as a single entity. It's not like either company needed the other for stability purposes though: Both WoW and Guitar Hero are the kind of franchises that allow a company to have a nice R&D budget and take risks with new franchises.

I wouldn't assume synergies in the development teams, high performance complex software suites requires a tight knit group. The synergies will be back office, the easy integration (accounting, payroll, human resources) that are the only thing that actually does pan outs in mergers, plus marketing, distribution, etc.

Creating a game is "easy" and I put it in quotes because only a few companies do it well, but there is a lot to getting a successful game out. Distribution is a BIG part of the profits, and being bigger means avoiding middlemen. Marketing, PR, etc., there is a lot on the other side of the game business.

EA being huge gives them the ability to bully competition in the marketplace. Also, when you deal with Consoles, there is a desire to only deal with big publishers because of all the security of the systems, so being big helps here as well.

Re:Commentary

[jd]

The Ghost of Infocom cries out in the wind.
The Ghost of Infocom moves north.
The Ghost of Infocom enters.
The Ghost of Infocom hits Blizzard with the long sword.

Re:Commentary

[splutty]

The Ghost of Infocom has been eaten by a Grue.

hmm

[Deadfyre_Deadsoul]

I for one would like to welcome our new gaming overlords. Some of the forums I visited listed this, but I figured it was a farce until I saw it here, now, I may go back to bed. Most of the gaming devs in various other games and genres would learn alot of blizzard. I loathe playing pay to play beta's for half finished games. Not that the release of WoW was not a pay to play beta. EA on the other hand, doesnt seem to care for their customers concerns, and just releases the games any way. World of Duty, Call of Warcraft. Me, I wanna play Medal of Homer.

Re:hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

mmmmm.... pixelated donuts.

Finally!

[Anonymous Coward]

a chance for a classic to be reborn!

world of pitfall anyone?

Re:Finally!

[CrazyJim1]

As long as I can play an alligator or scorpion, I'll play.

COD5: Azeroth Edition

[Anonymous Coward]

Call of Duty 5, Azeroth Edition-

"{crackle} SGT Hulka, bring up your platoon of Orcs and get a crossfire on those Dwarves STAT!"

Re:COD5: Azeroth Edition

[Neuticle]

As funny as that is, it raises an interesting prospect: The Warcraft lore and brand are immensely popular and well developed. At the same time, everyone got tired of seeing *yet.another.WWII.shooter* but the "modern" war shooters aren't fundamentally that different.

If they could work together to make some sort of Warcraft themed massively multi-player FPS, I'd be on that like stink on poo. Different classes that are *actually* different, instead of just one guy having a bigger gun and more ammo. It would be hard to balance since it would probably play quite differently than the current WWII formula, but it would be sweet.

Re:COD5: Azeroth Edition

[Anonymous Coward]

I for one will welcome our Gnome FPS overlords. Poor Taurens will have no where to hide.

Re:COD5: Azeroth Edition

[slycrel]

You mean basically a fantasy themed Team fortress 2?

Re:COD5: Azeroth Edition

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, something like that, but even though TF2 has some awesome roles, classes would play even more differently than TF2, and it would be massive like PlanteSide and WWII online, but better

To be honest, if somebody just made a TF2 Warcraft mod, I'd probably wet myself.

Makes sense

[Dunbal]

No wonder their stock has been climbing lately. I have made so much money day-trading them. I guess it's time to go short now that all the sheeple will want some... I'll sell you some on Monday afternoon.

Yo!

[bennomatic]

Activizza in da hizza!

"Blactavision" makes me think of "Blacula". But silly as that (and my suggestion) sounds, it's better than "Activision Blizzard". What were they thinking? They may as well have called themselves "No Imagination Games Corp."

-Keeping Activision (on its own) would have been cool for the nostalgia factor.
-Keeping Blizzard (on its own) would have been cool for the currently-successful factor
-If they couldn't decide, they should have just gotten a new name altogether. Maybe they could have sold themselves as a bridge between the gaming industry and general media distributors and called themselves gPod. Or maybe Gune...

Simple.

[Kortalh]

To make money.

Half this summary is redundant

[shine-shine]

"Activision's CEO, Bobby Kotick, will become the head of the joint company"
"its chief executive will be Activision's current CEO Bobby Kotick"

"Vivendi, Blizzard's current parent company, will become the largest single investor in the new group"
"Vivendi will be the biggest shareholder in the group"

Short stories work just as well. No need to repeat everything.

I have a solution...

[theorem4]

Put Blizzard employees in all management spots. Call me naive, but I think with them in charge it would keep a certain level of quality in the company that us fans like so much.

Re:I have a solution...

[sycomonkey]

You can have all the good managers in the world, but if the coders in the trenches are incompetent, you end up with a Spiderman 3 or something.

Re:I have a solution...

[Anonymous Coward]

that us fans like so much.

Who gives a shit what you "fans" want. Our real customers are our shareholders.

Fuck you sincerely,
-- the mgmt.

Eighteen billion?

[Fantastic Lad]

How does that work? Do they add up the estimated values of both companies and dish out a number? But when one of the companies is putting 1 billion into the deal, and the other company 2 billion, doesn't that only equal 3 billion? Or are they just spending that on lawyers, donuts and hotel accommodations for the merger meeting? I don't get it. Either way, a billion dollars sure doesn't buy what it used to.

-FL

Re:Eighteen billion?

[Anonymous Coward]

18.8 billion would probably be the market capitalization for the new company. Considering WoW pulls in a billion a year, that's actually a low Price/Earnings ratio.

Re:Eighteen billion?

[Jellybob]

How does that work?

It's kinda like a card trick. "Pick a number, any number"

Sierra Games

[Anonymous Coward]

I wouldnt be surprised if this wasn't partly a way to realign the failing sierra games (also owned by Vivendi) and to rebrand it with more popular Activision/Blizzard logos.

Sure Activision wants to ride on the coattails of blizzard's quality reputation, and vivendi probably drools over activisions distribution channels and platforms, but Viv has to be re-orging some studios for this....and it ain't blizzard's.

EA is no longer alone at the top.

[6350']

Many news-sites are actually reporting this as a merger between Vivendi and Activision (perhaps more of a semantic distinction, but it does serve to remind that Blizzard is owned by someone, and is not an independant self-owned development studio, in the strictly on-paper sense).

This is a fascinating move for one very important reason: EA. This merger combines a hugely profitable juggernaut of game-making (Blizzard) with what is probably the largest publisher out there (Activision). Electronic Arts suddenly got not only competition, but may have just dropped into second place, all in one fell swoop.

This is a great move for Blizzard: there is no other development company that is such a proven success, having long passed the point of "one hit wonder" or "a lucky run," and they now have access to, in light of how bankable they are, absolutely vast wodges of capital for their future plans. This is an awesome move for Activision: a publisher (with some developer in there too) that has quietly grown over the last decade to become one of the largest now has pretty much the ultimate triple-A development juggernaut at its core. This last bit is a key point, as it reflects EA. EA is large publisher wrapped around a large and important development house. Vivendi and Activision have now stepped up to that level and type of operation, and can be expected to give EA a run for its money.

What particularly pleases me is how this could be seen as providing a "good guys" team to stand against EA's often-percieved "bad guys" team, which should be an interesting public dynamic to watch :P

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[Kohath]

EA was already 2nd to Activision.

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[fm6]

Many news-sites are actually reporting this as a merger between Vivendi and Activision (perhaps more of a semantic distinction

That's like saying there's a "semantic" distinction between fruit and fruit trees. Vivendi owns several media and telecom businesses. (In fact, they used to be a major player in the media world, with movie studios, cable networks, and more. But that's another story.) Not only will this new company be a small part of Vivendi's operation, but Vivendi will share ownership with Activision's former stockholders.

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[xero314]

By what possible measurement? Activision's annual revenue is 1.4 Billion (USD) while EA's just under 3 which is over twice that of Activision. Vivendi is are 1.2 Billion, leaving the new combined company to still be nearly .5 Billion behind EA.

On a consumer experience level the both suck, but EA at least try's while Activision doesn't seem to give rats as as long as they are getting their fat check at the end of the year. Personally I think I have purchased my last Blizzard game since there is no way Activision is getting another dime of my money.

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[Kohath]

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=14803

But you're right. I should read these a little closer. This was only for part of one year.

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[ScrewMaster]

What particularly pleases me is how this could be seen as providing a "good guys" team to stand against EA's often-percieved "bad guys" team, which should be an interesting public dynamic to watch :P

Given the way Blizzard's lawyers treated the bnetd developers, I have to question the "good guy" stance you're attributing to them. They are not good guys, any more than any other major corporation out to protect its "intellectual property".

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[adburke]

What particularly pleases me is how this could be seen as providing a "good guys" team to stand against EA's often-percieved "bad guys" team, which should be an interesting public dynamic to watch :P Activision are hardly the good guys. It's really a case of "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss." Activision hasn't published a single non-licensed game or a game that isn't a sequel this year.

The "EA Spouse" thing is also pretty outdated. Conditions have changed a lot since then, and now by most accounts EA is probably the best videogame company to work for. In addition to that, EA has published a couple of really good original titles this year (Crysis and Rock Band). They also published The Orange Box for Valve which gets them some cool points.

I'm not saying they've turned over a new leaf or anything, but they're definitely not exclusively publishing licensed shovelware and yearly sequels like they were a few years ago, and they certainly aren't an exceptional publisher when it comes to publishing lots of mediocre games.

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[6350']

Click the link. I'm thinking in terms of Blizzard as a generaly well-thought-of company in the eyes of the average gamer, vs. EA (of the ea-spouse fame, my link in the post) as increasingly being percieved as mean, tough, and evil. I suspect EA might be hitting that point where they have been too big for too long, which the public has an odd aversion to - sometimes, we seem not not like it when someone does too well, for too long, when mixed with some mean-ness (ie, the ea-spouse thing).

That Blizzard is a large company, and sometimes does nasty large company things, certainly no-one would dispute. But I think the public has a softer impression of them at present, as opposed to EA, which could open up an interesting hearts-and-minds/public-perception opportunity for them (such as Google was able to achieve in spades, for example). On the other hand, of course, MMO's are legendary for making pretty much any sainted developer look like an evil bastard over time (due, I think, to the rough and tumble necessities of running an MMO and failing the often impossible task of bridging reality and player's desires).

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[TubeSteak]

This merger combines a hugely profitable juggernaut of game-making (Blizzard) with what is probably the largest publisher out there (Activision). Electronic Arts suddenly got not only competition, but may have just dropped into second place, all in one fell swoop. RTFS:
Even with the size of the merger, the combined company will still be smaller than the industry giant EA

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[6350']

Even with the size of the merger, the combined company will still be smaller than the industry giant EA
/me shrugs
Dice it up how you will. The New York times, for example, notes that:

The two companies said that their combined revenue for 2007 would be $3.8 billion. The combined company will challenge Electronic Arts, with projected 2007 revenue of about $3.7 billion...

I'll stick with my original comment that in particular, EA "may have" just dropped into second place, and as well stick with the spirit of my post in general: that EA now has company, so to speak.

Re:EA is no longer alone at the top.

[kieran]

Dear God, if that wasn't written by someone in the Activision/Blizzard marketing department, then I have no idea how I would spot a comment that was.

Who needs to purchase games from conglomerates

[Anonymous Coward]

such as Activision Blizzard when you can download games for free? The Activision Blizzard merger is just making them more of a monopoly in the non-free areana so please download free games which are legal instead of supporting the conglomerates.

Re:Who needs to purchase games from conglomerates

[tepples]

such as Activision Blizzard when you can download games for free? I live in the United States. Can I download games for free that are designed to be played on a 32 inch SDTV? (Most stand-alone PC games nowadays are designed for an XGA or WXGA monitor.) Can I download games for free and play them on a handheld device that doesn't lock me into a 24-month telephone service commitment? (I already have a phone; I don't want another.)

Re:Who needs to purchase games from conglomerates

[Anonymous Coward]

I live in the United States. Can I download games for free that are designed to be played on a 32 inch SDTV? (Most stand-alone PC games nowadays are designed for an XGA or WXGA monitor.) Can I download games for free and play them on a handheld device that doesn't lock me into a 24-month telephone service commitment? (I already have a phone; I don't want another.) Google is your Friend

Activision Blizzard

[bcharr2]

Activision Blizzard? That's the best name they could come up with?

If they wanted to depend on brand name recognition, they should have simply called themselves "The Creators of WOW & Call of Duty".

Re:Activision Blizzard

[Taleron]

& Call of Duty Juuust the publisher. The developer was Infinity Ward.

Starcraft II ramifications

[AngelKurisu]

Blizzard has long been a 'Release it when its done' company--and the resulting products have almost always been very polished. Activision(at least in the past 15 years), has been willing to push crap out to market. With Activision's CEO taking over the merged company, can we expect anything -but- a quality drop in Blizzard's future products?

Re:Starcraft II ramifications

[Cyberllama]

I can afford the karma hit so I'm gonna say it like it is:

Blizzard hasn't been a "release it only when it's done" company since Warcraft 3: TFT. I've Participated in the last 4 Blizzard betas, and there was a remarkable shift from Warcraft 3: RoC to Warcraft 3: TFT -- you almost couldn't even call TFT a beta test by comparison. It lasted maybe 2 months total? The game came out very incomplete -- missing an entire single player campaign from what had been promised -- but was slowly added in over the course of several balance patches (the game as also a joke of balance when it came out). Blizzard, to their credit, did do a good job with the final product -- it just took them a couple months worth of patches after release to get the job done.

I hate to be the one to break the bad news to you, but Blizzard has been a "patch it till it's done" company for a few years now, just like everyone else.

This actually works out well enough in the MMORPG setting since often they are able to patch in missing content and polish/fix other content before players even get to it -- since it takes players some time to burn though the lower-end content which tends to be the most polished/playtested.

I do give them credit for actually delaying TBC (thus causing it to miss it's initial November 30th release date which would have meant massive Christmas sales) and spending more time with it -- but they almost didn't have a choice there -- there was literally no content above level 67 at the time and 3 out of the 7 zones weren't even populated/open/quested/etc, not to mention none of the raid content was implemented yet.

Re:Starcraft II ramifications

[CronoCloud]

"Release it when it's done" sounds great, until you realize that there's developers out there that can put out ouput equal in quality and polish to what Blizzard has done and do it twice as often.

Re:Starcraft II ramifications

[AngelKurisu]

Those developers are certainly not Activision.

Re:Starcraft II ramifications

[CronoCloud]

Is it just me who remembers when the name "Activision" wasn't a curse word? They date back to the Atari days you know, though they're really just a publisher now. I'm just hoping they'll crack the whip on Blizzard to up their dev speed (and perhaps do some console games too) Blizzard should have ported Diablo II to the PS2, but they left the action RPG market on the consoles to Snowblind/SOE and all those games that used their engine.

Re:Starcraft II ramifications

[Orcish_Rodent]

I was also in the Warcraft3: RoC and TFT betas. I agree that the multiplayer for TFT was released to soon and had major balance problems. However the single player was great and full of polish. On the half orc campaign I thought they with held what they had because it kind of sucked. I fell they only released the rest of the orc campaign later for the fans of the story not of the game play. So on release they had the single player done sans for a idea that didn't work and multiplayer that worked but wasn't balanced. Sounds a lot like Starcraft... remember operation CWAL

Re:Starcraft II ramifications

[CaptPungent]

TBC still came out badly. And their patches since have been a disappointment. I've quit WoW since 2.3, I'm tired of everything being random drops, class/spec specific drops no one can use, the whole "pvp/pve spec" ideal is retarded too. The problem is they tied each style of playing a class to being "PvP/PvE", so that you are forced to play a specific style of a class in order to be viable for one of them. Maybe I want to PvP as a dual-wield warrior? Or do anything as a destruction lock or enhancement shaman? They shot themselves in the foot by tying those two together. Plus the community is full of retards who would be more at home playing CounterStrike. There's no "RP" in that RPG.

Guitar Hero

[Kohath]

I think this is the real news:

Vivendi, owner of the Universal Music Group -- world's largest music publisher, buys a controlling stake in Activision, maker of Guitar Hero -- the world's most popular music-based game franchise.

Re:Guitar Hero

[bennomatic]

What... do you think they'll try to make players pay a fee for every time they hear a song? Sue players for having more people in the room than they've bought controllers for?

It'd be my hope that this means that the entire UMG library will be available for GH players to use, but I'm afraid of what they're actually likely to do.

Re:Guitar Hero

[One Childish N00b]

It's Vivendi that owns UMG, not UMG that owns Vivendi. Basically, that means Vivendi will do whatever makes the most money. Guitar Hero is massively popular, and selling tracks a-la iTunes-for-GH is likely to be far more profitable than suing people for anything they can think of. Picture the scene:

-
You're with your friends, having a few beers and some laughs on Guitar Hero.
- After the fifth beer, male bravado is starting to kick in. You and your buddies all start to think you're guitar Gods.
- "I bet you can't play Track X", says one of your buddies. You, of course, accept the challenge, and purchase Track X from the GH online store.
- Once you're done murdering that, you turn and you say to your equally bravado-fuelled friend, "oh yeah, I bet you can't play Track Y better than me", and off you trot, once again, to the online store to purchase Track Y.
- Repeat until you're all too drunk to work a controller.

I'm betting this would happen a *lot*, because one or two quid/bucks is nothing when you're having a laugh with your friends, which is where GH gets most of it's play.

I prefer Active Blizzard for the name

[spineboy]

has a nice energy to it. I can only imagine how long the suits argued about the name of the new company.

I think there is something afoot.

[Anachragnome]

I have been keeping an eye on the hiring page for Blizzard for awhile and they have been hiring for a "top secret" project(their words)for quite some time. http://www.blizzard.com/jobopp/
(Look on the upper right side of page)

I have been making potshot guesses regarding what they are up to.

This changes those guesses. It may boil down to simple licensing issues. Activison has something Blizzard needs and is willing to pay for it? A merger here would put a lot of those licensing issues out of the purview of most people, allowing them to do so without blowing their cover. Thats a wild guess though.

The thing that puzzles me the most is that ACTIVISIONS current CEO will be running the ship. Granted, that may have been a concession on the part of Vivendi, but it sure looks to me like Blizzard/Vivendi has the majority of the chips on the table. Which, again, leads me to believe that Vivendi wants something from Activision and that was the only way to get it.

Well here is your new strength !

[aepervius]

/devil advocate

Blizzard (or at least the worker there) as far as I can tell has always tried to not rush, and make sure all major bug are out before getting a title out. Which is how they got their reputation. But on a short term point of view, this is a loss for the share holder, since more money is spent whereas they could already release the title at an earlier point. So now blizzard get strengthened by activision dev cycle : rush everything out. Spend less money on title. Churn them quicker. Customer might lose a bit on the change, but share holder on the short term might not.

/devil advocate

Merger FAQ

[indonaught]

A FAQ has been posted on Blizzard's web site detailing the effects of this merger on Blizzard's development efforts. Pasted below: http://www.blizzard.com/press/activision-faq.shtml Q: What are the details of the deal? A: Under the terms of an agreement with Vivendi, Blizzard and the other companies that make up Vivendi Games will combine with Activision to form a new public company called Activision Blizzard. We do not anticipate any difference in Blizzard's operations as a result of the combination. Joining forces with Activision will create a stronger and more diversified company that we anticipate will benefit and strengthen both brands. Q: What will happen to the Blizzard brand name? A: The Blizzard brand name will stay the same as it's always been: Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. Q: What will change with regard to the day-to-day operations at Blizzard? A: There will be no changes in the way Blizzard operates. All of the people, processes, and philosophies that have made Blizzard so successful will be preserved. Blizzard will benefit from all-star sales and distribution teams to service our products. In addition, the combined company will be stronger financially, managerially, and operationally. Q: How will this impact Blizzard's games? A: This will not impact Blizzard's games. We remain committed to providing the same high-quality game content and support that we always have. Development on Wrath of the Lich King and StarCraft II, as well as on our unannounced games, is continuing as normal. Q: Will there be any visible differences in Blizzard's logo or packaging/marketing materials as a result of this deal? A: No, there won't be any changes to our company name, logo, packaging/marketing materials, or anything else along those lines. Q: Will there be any management changes at Blizzard as a result of this deal? A: No, there won't be any management changes at Blizzard as a result of the combination. Q: Will Activision and Blizzard now share development teams? A: No, both of our companies will continue to operate as they have previously with regard to game development. Q: Will the release schedules for any Blizzard games be impacted? A: No, the transaction will not have any impact on our games, our day-to-day operations, or our release timelines. Q: Will any of Blizzard's offices close as a result of the deal? Or, will any new offices open? A: No, all of our offices will continue to function as they have, and we don't foresee the need to open any new offices for the time being. Q: Will any employees move to different offices as a result of the deal? A: We don't anticipate making any such moves as a result of the deal. Q: Does this deal include Activision's and Blizzard's international offices? A: Yes, every part of our companies in the U.S. and abroad is involved in this deal. Q: If Activision Blizzard is a public company, does that mean I'll now be able to buy stock in Blizzard? A: Activision will be renamed Activision Blizzard, Inc and will continue to be a publicly listed company traded on NASDAQ. You will be able to buy stock in the combined company. Q: When will the transaction be complete? A: The transaction is subject to approval of Activision shareholders, customary closing conditions, and regulatory approvals. Pending approval, the companies expect the transaction to be completed by mid 2008.

Re:Merger FAQ

[deftcoder]

A large block of undecipherable text has been posted on Slashdot...

Re:Merger FAQ

[Cyberllama]

"All of the people, processes, and philosophies that have made Blizzard so successful will be preserved. Blizzard will benefit from all-star sales and distribution teams to service our products. In addition, the combined company will be stronger financially, managerially, and operationally"

What?

"We'll do everything exactly the same way as always with exactly the same people and everything will be exactly the same -- except totally better somehow!!!"

Antitrust?

[dgg3565]

It wasn't that long ago that $18.8 billion would have been a figure for the industry's total revenue. With all the mergers lately (this one coming just a short while after the Bioware/EA merger), I'm wondering when or if we're going to see some antitrust rumblings out of the Feds.

Comic authors have psychic powers

[Anonymous Coward]

The story makes this Penny Arcade comic seem oddly prophetic.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2007/11/09

Re:Comic authors have psychic powers

[Anonymous Coward]

More like they were tipped and made a cute profit off the shares they purchased.

Uptime improvements? How many 8's of uptime?

[myowntrueself]

If Blizzard is doing something right its not uptime.

Most people who deliver online services like to measure their uptime in 'nines'.

Blizzard measure theirs in 'eights'.

Re:Uptime improvements? How many 8's of uptime?

[Anonymous Coward]

1/8, 2/8, etc.

Re:Uptime improvements? How many 8's of uptime?

[Anonymous Coward]

Notice to people retards with mod points:

Commenting on Blizzard's business practices in an article ABOUT Blizzard's business hardly counts as off-topic.

Seriously- you get 5 precious mod points and you blow one on this?

Re:Uptime improvements? How many 8's of uptime?

[StevisF]

Most downtime is scheduled and well off peak local playing hours. I think my server (first Frostwolf, currently Uldaman) has only been down outside the schedule a few times in the 2 years I've played. Granted, I only play about 10 hours a week and my characters live on a low population server. Generally Blizzard offers free character transfers for queued servers if that's the sort of trouble you're talking about.

Though I guess it would be possible, clustering an online game would probably be rather difficult, of questionable value, and significantly increase complexity. The failover time would probably cause most people to quit their session anyway. At the very least, it would be a noticeable interruption to game play and would probably cause many of the people on the failed server to end up dead. The only way to prevent that would be to stop gameplay for everyone on the cluster until the failover is complete which doesn't seem like a great option either.

Re:Uptime improvements? How many 8's of uptime?

[myowntrueself]

*cough*thanksgiving weekend*cough*

Re:Uptime improvements? How many 8's of uptime?

[StevisF]

I only played briefly one night over Thanksgiving weekend. I think it's likely many people played little or not at all. I don't think one holiday weekend is really indicative of a pattern of poor up time.

Re:Uptime improvements? How many 8's of uptime?

[PastaLover]

There were a couple of months last year where the servers went down every other week. Both in the US and Europe. There were a bunch of stories about it at the time. Since then they've apparently learned that "emergency downtime" isn't supposed to happen every two weeks in a service business.

These days they go down now and then but never very long and usually separately (e.g. one or two, not entire groups or all of them).

Re:END MODERATOR ABUSE

[Anonymous Coward]

being a level 5 grand master haxx0r i have to agree with you.

Massively Multiplayer Pitfall!

[tachyonflow]

As someone who mostly associates the name "Activision" with old titles, the first thing that popped in my head when I read this was... "Massively Multiplayer Pitfall!"

Another American company owned by France

[smchris]

They say it'll be a buyer's market with the dollar tanking over the next year.

Fixed

[G-News.ch]

"Blizzard will invest $2bn worth of monthly WoW fees in the new company" fixed that for you

Dear Zonk

[cralewyth]

Dear Zonk,

You shouldn't repeat yourself in your summary, it makes the summary redundant. It's like when you say something twice and it becomes redundant.

Re:Dear Zonk

[Anonymous Coward]

Dear Ass,

Slashdot Editors to not always write summaries. They just accept stuff from the firehose. Maybe he could have edited it down, but don't act like he wrote it.

Re:Dear Zonk

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah? Well if Editors don't edit, what are they meant to do?

Its all about the Benjamins

[Anonymous Coward]

This moves Blizzard's earnings from Vivendi with its Price/Earnings ratio of 11 to Activision with a P/E of 45, effectively quadrupling the market value of Blizzard overnight.

Oh, thank the FSM...

[Dirtside]

Finally, I'll be able to stop playing WoW! It's so addictive now, but I'm sure Activision will somehow find a way to fuck it up so that it won't be fun, and I'll finally be able to quit.

Thanks, Activision! (Thactivision.)

Re:Oh, thank the FSM...

[OakLEE]

It's been said a couple of times, but I'll reiterate it. With the deal, Blizzard retains its operating independence. Source.

WTF? I thought the older company name was kept

[Anonymous Coward]

So the tradition of keeping name recognition by retaining the older, more known company name is being thrown out the window? No wonder they are merging.

Activision Blizzard? WTF is that a Taiwanese company?

Activision + Blizzard = 'Snowblind'

[Anonymous Coward]

I prefer 'Snowblind'. That's what happens when you lose your 'vision in a Blizzard.

Seriously, 'Snowblind' would be a really cool name for a game company. Guess that's why we'll never see it :-P

Buying Notes

[rpgSE]

I wonder if we can now trade our Warcraft Gold for new Songs for Guitar Hero III on sites like mmoExchange.com or GamerTex.com

World of THIS

[tepples]

World of Command and Conquer? Nope, that's EA. But will I see World of River Raid?

BINO

[tepples]

I have always liked Activision as a game company since Battlezone. I thought Battlezone was an Atari product and Atari hated Activision for making unlicensed games for Atari 2600. You must be talking about Activision's Battezone In Name Only.

Re:BINO

[phildawg]

This is exactly what I'm talking about. Battlezone, the re-release by Activision, is a game my dad and I have many great memories and one of the first real multiplayer games we played online. I loved it, I liked Battlezone II also, but it wasn't as great as the original.

Wild World of Pitfall

[tepples]

world of pitfall anyone? Try going to some people's Animal Crossing towns and see if you can't avoid falling into a pitfall trap.

Didnt the creators of Blizzard already leave...

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

Great, two big faceless companies are merging... Blizzard barely makes games, and Activision is a void of good ideas as well...

So Good luck with that company.

Re:Didnt the creators of Blizzard already leave...

[Anonymous Coward]

The creators of Diablo left BLizzard. The founders of Blizzard are still running the company. Whatever makes Blizzard games great did not leave with the Diablo team either. Just look at Hellgate: London. Would have thought that they would learn something from their years at Blizzard.

Unlicensed?

[tepples]

Activision hasn't published a single non-licensed game There's a reason for that. Activision started in 1979 as a developer and publisher of unlicensed games for Atari 2600. Most video game consoles since then use lockout chips to prevent publishers from releasing anything without paying the console maker.

Re:Unlicensed?

[MBGMorden]

By unlicensed I'm 99% sure he meant IP-licensed. You make a Star Trek game, you pay a for the license from Paramount. You make a Spiderman game, you pay for a license from Marvel. You make an NFL game you pay for a license from the NFL.

So by saying that they haven't made any unlicensed games, he's attacking their lack of originality, not their willingness to engage in the production of bootleg Playstation discs . . .

Re:Starcraft - Stroggcraft

[myrh]

No, they'll have to retool it to Stroggcraft now.

I dug up a pitfall seed!

[tepples]

As someone who mostly associates the name "Activision" with old titles, the first thing that popped in my head when I read this was... "Massively Multiplayer Pitfall!" I believe multiplayer pitfall is called Animal Crossing: Wild World.

Might as well sell Bliz to McDonalds

[billcopc]

I hate to say it, but Blizzard has officially become a big faceless game shop. Activision has been a big faceless publisher for decades now. It's a match made in corporate heaven, as both companies have the same goals and low standards to make it work.

For me at least, Activision has become synonymous with "sell-out". They buy all the cool game houses, then push inferior games out at a ludicrous pace. The Activision brand has never meant anything to gamers, they're just the Wal-Mart of video games.

Blizzard, *chuckles* they let WoW's success go to their head. Where the hell is Starcraft 2 or Warcraft 4 ? Diablo 3 ? They have all these massive franchises that are sitting around getting old, and now they even have Bill Shatner trying to sell their 3 year old MMO. I've played the damn game, I've seen what there was to see. Give me WoW 2 already!

Two bullshit companies merging to form one big bullshit. Woop-tee-doo!

WoW, for consoles?

[amrust]

Any chance the Activision involvement could lead to World of Warcraft ported to next-gen consoles?

Re:WoW, for consoles?

[k8to]

Not sure why it would; though wow should really work fine on consoles if they have enough ram, and you hook up a keyboard and mouse. I suspect the sell rate would be low for that reason. Without a keyboard wow is kind of futile. Quick - choose one of your 40 actions with a d-pad, while also moving your character!

Re:WoW, for consoles?

[Avatar8]

That's my suspicion. I don't expect consoles to be able to run and connect to the current live version of WoW; I wouldn't want them, too, anyway. There are enough juvenile-minded jerks as it is (just my experience with console players).

What I can see happening are the creation of console versions of WoW and WoW servers dedicated to console players. The PC and console versions would never meet. The interface could be dumbed down for limited controllers, but the general gameplay would likely stay the same. The artwork could stay the same as well and not have to be reduced for console limitations.

Re:WoW, for consoles?

[amrust]

I could see console-specific version of WoW being developed. I think it would definetly be a buy for many console gamers, more than people realize.

You gotta love corporate sh@t

[unity100]

isnt it just pathetic when they try to put a thin veil on their moves out of pure greed :

Joining forces with Activision will create a stronger and more diversified company that we anticipate will benefit and strengthen both brands bullshit. checking on the q&a, one would think that there are totally NO reason for this shit to happen, since no actual physical merger of houses is going to happen, no combined work no other crap. so you are doing this move out of pure greed, nothing else.

How's WoW gonna take it?

[Cryacin]

Well, I for one will simply love killing those pesky Night Elves with my shiny new Timberwolf! :D:D:D

How's it feel to strapped into an 85 ton walking nuke reactor at 6am?

A hell of a lot less chafing than being strapped into a saddle. Not to mention the smell...

Count your blessings

[PhrostyMcByte]

They could have been bought by EA instead. Count your blessings.

Let Blizzard continue to support Mac please

[theurge14]

Please Activision do not cut us out. We like Blizzard and they seem to like us.

Re:Let Blizzard continue to support Mac please

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not sure about the Mac, but I'm quite sure about you: you suck. what the hell is up with the "us" thing?

Re:Let Blizzard continue to support Mac please

[theurge14]

"Us" being me and the other people who own a Mac. Hope this helps.

I saw that, but it's an odd claim

[Trepidity]

They're of comparable sizes, and which is bigger depends on the measure. They have similar revenues (~$3.8 billion), market capitalizations (~$19 billion), and employees (~7000). EA might be bigger by whatever measure the article writers prefer, but it isn't by a big margin even if so.

Re:WoW--Upcoming changes

[vandelais]

The player begins each game with 2,000 points. Along the way, they pick up four different treasures (eight of each) which bring different point values:

        * Newspaper: 5 points
        * Money bags: 2000 points
        * Silver bars: 3000 points
        * Gold bars: 4000 points
        * Diamond rings: 5000 points

There are also two ways of losing points:

        * Falling in a hole: -100 points
        * Running into rolling logs: total loss depends on how long Harry is in contact with the log. All WOW characters are now named Harry.

Contact with all other hazards (as mentioned above) results in loss of turn.

A perfect score by collecting 32 treasures without any contact with hazards is 114,000.

Finally, the game will be ported to the Nintendo Wii, which will change the game acronym to WoWii.

blizzard games under wine

[MrKaos]

maybe activision can learn something from blizzard. blizzards games seem to work pretty good under wine on linux

starcraft ghost?

[Double_Daniel]

does this mean that starcraft ghost will be developed by activision and maybe use the call of duty engine?

interesting potential

[Anonymous Coward]

Starcraft FPS developed by Infinity Ward, please.

Objections to your Google queries

[tepples]

Google "PC to SDTV" or "PC to TV" I've tried that, and I've managed to get it working wonderfully with StepMania. But in too many games for Windows, I need a separate monitor and usually a separate PC for each player because the game doesn't understand the concept of showing the whole arena at once like in Bomberman or Super Smash Bros., or splitting the screen like in Tetris. Worse, text looks blurry because it's drawn too small to be visible in standard definition.

Google free phone games Do free phone games work on phones provided by U.S. prepaid carriers, or do I need a 24-month contract to get a phone that works with free phone games? Specifically, why does the Google query free phone games audiovox 8610 virgin appear not to return anything relevant?

Google gp2x If GP2X is so good, why haven't I seen it sold in stores within 16 km (10 miles) of my home?

Obligatory WebComic

[HaikuMastah]

http://zapalley.com/comic/2007/12/03/mergers-and-acquisitions/

Oh look!

[jon287]

That guy is jumping over a shark!

i worked at vivendi for years

[glassmusic]

theyre bad news. they turn everything they touch into shit. vivendi is the company for buyouts of small companies (Sierra being the best example), and the KING of crappy movie licenses. anyone remember their awsome X-Files game? Eragon PSP? World of Conflict (which i was fortunate enough to work on; check the credits for Ernest Devaney) is the best thing to ever run through their greasy fingers. oh wait, they had nothing to do with the development of that game. right.

World of Pitfall

[Anonymous Coward]

I cant wait for the new MMORG based on Pitfall Harry and Swinging on Vines over Crocodiles and jumping Scorpions to get the $ Bag.

Re:WTF? I thought the older company name was kept

[splutty]

The older company here would actually be Activision... So I'm not sure what your rant is about.

WoW

[kevgaxxana]

maybe now they will cancel online fees

Re:END MODERATOR ABUSE

[EmperorKagato]

To save everyone from the endless chain, here's the original post the OP is complaining about:

Good grief. Let's dissect this post: 1) misspelling of ridiculous. I don't know why, but when someone spells it rediculous, I lose respect for them. Still hooked on phonics or something? Of all the typos, that's one of the "Hey, everybody! look, I'm a moron" ones. 2) Groupthink. Not a single original thought. Hey everybody, did you know that M$ uses vaporware to dissuade competition? I'll bet you didn't! Hey, I knew a guy who read Microserfs! 3) Wrong application of said groupthink. This is not a case of vaporware. It's just some guy working for MSFT who has yet another lame idea. Those are nothing new from Redmond. 4) even your sig, "My Karma ran over your dogma."...geez, see any other interesting bumper stickers lately? Like I said, no original though, nothing. And you got modded +4. Shame on you, mods.

You were modded troll for a reason: List item 1 proves it.
I suggest you stop posting this nonsense and move on. There are better battles to fight (and win) than this one.

Excellent news!

[Anonymous Coward]

Finally Blizzard games for the Atari 2600!

Re:New WoW Class

[Trent Hawkins]

I just thought of this new class for WoW: Bard.

You plug in your Guitar and cast spells/do attacks by playing a riff.
Can't wait to roll up Lemmy the Orc Bard... or maybe an undead Eddie.

What does IP mean to you, without and/or?

[tepples]

By unlicensed I'm 99% sure he meant IP-licensed. Please define "intellectual property". Using a phrase that roughly amounts to "copyright and/or patent and/or trademark and/or trade secret" doesn't help people understand what you mean, as there are significant differences in scope among those four areas of exclusive rights. If you mean "copyright", say "copyright". If you mean "patent", say "patent". If you mean "trademark", say "trademark".

Re:What does IP mean to you, without and/or?

[MBGMorden]

Actually, in the context I used it it could mean any and/or all of the above, so I didn't "mean" any particular one of them. I was simply reinforcing the idea that it's the content being licensed, not the ability to play on the system. Indeed, the ambiguity you are looking to eliminate doesn't exist. I for one, refuse the rule of our new grammar Nazi overlords.

Could be worse

[Moraelin]

It could be worse.

For example, take "Square Enix". It always just made me wonder what other shapes of Enixes are out there. Is there a round Enix too, for example?

ETA?

[skis]

Is there a release date set for Jun Lee's Pro Gold Farmer?

One word to describe fucktards like you.

[Anonymous Coward]

Baaaa

C&C Renegade

[DRAGONWEEZEL]

Just to note my experience.

Playing renegade was GREAT. Looking at my screen while playing renegade sucked horribly.

Thanks