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[BennyBlanco]

That is an insane ultimatum. Glad he left. Hope his new game turns out good.

Full interview with Lex Fridman




Summary:

Jeff Kaplan says the CFO at the time, Dennis Durkin, told him Overwatch had to make X amount of money in the next year, and every year after that, or they would have to lay off 1,000 people and it would be entirely on Kaplan. So he quit. This was in 2021.

 

[Salz01]

Who was the cfo?

 

[OmegaSupreme]

Jesus Christ

 

[kpopSuperstar]

That sounds rotten as hell. Kaplan was only in his 40's when he quit, so you could assume something was up.

 

[Baemono]

TL;DR: money

 

[An Corp]

Blizzard has fallen because of the people Jeff is talking about. The company is so far from the quality they once were known for.

Great interview btw, miss hearing from the passionate people that made Blizzard great in the old days.

 

[BennyBlanco]

Who was the cfo?

Dennis Durkin - On | LinkedIn

Experience: On · Education: Dartmouth College · Location: Santa Monica · 500+ connections on LinkedIn. View Dennis Durkin’s profile on LinkedIn, a professional community of 1 billion members.

www.linkedin.com

 

[VGA-Games]

Awful!!!

That's why I personally only would want to work for Nintendo in this Industry.

Nintendo is probably not perfect, but at Nintendo are still working People for over 30 Years so they must do something Right!!!

 

[Hudo]

Dennis Durkin - On | LinkedIn

Experience: On · Education: Dartmouth College · Location: Santa Monica · 500+ connections on LinkedIn. View Dennis Durkin’s profile on LinkedIn, a professional community of 1 billion members.

www.linkedin.com

Education: Dartmouth College

I am not surprised.

 

[LyricalShrike]

Is this any different from what is expected of upper management in other sectors? Executive bonuses are always tied to achievement of KPI. Good managers walk instead of accepting an unachievable KPI

 

[Topher]

Gotta love the culture of some corporations.

 

[DenchDeckard]

Idiot CFO. What a thing to say to someone. I would quit too.

 

[kikkis]

Giving it as ultimatum is stupid ofc and "on you", but if the cash flow was that way that if it didn't meet those expectations, they would need to fire 1000 people, I don't know if reality would have been any different even if it was presented in more sensible way.

 

[Drell]

That CFO sounds like a modern slave owner: "I've got the power so either you attain these impossible objectives I decided or there will be huge consequences.". That kind of person should get the taste of their own medicine, but I guess they're too big in our society to risk anything like that.

 

[winjer]

That CFO is a complete psychopath.

 

[Revolutionary]

I know they bleeped out financial details but I hope Microsoft Blizzard doesn't find some way to fuck him over for speaking about it

 

[Cyberpunkd]

Jesus Christ

Shocking, but only because the CFO put it in the open. Blame the AAA system. We see it all around - game is not successful, layoffs happen. The CFO is looking at it like a number:

X people at Y salary for Z years
Predicted ROI = A
Needs to do B to justify current hiring

It's what happens in every single company.

 

[Cyberpunkd]

Giving it as ultimatum is stupid ofc and "on you", but if the cash flow was that way that if it didn't meet those expectations, they would need to fire 1000 people, I don't know if reality would have been any different even if it was presented in more sensible way.

This guy gets it. The form was terrible, but the CFO is not wrong in principle.

 

[BennyBlanco]

Shocking, but only because the CFO put it in the open. Blame the AAA system. We see it all around - game is not successful, layoffs happen. The CFO is looking at it like a number:

X people at Y salary for Z years
Predicted ROI = A
Needs to do B to justify current hiring

It's what happens in every single company.

But then you see BF6 beating CoD and having its most popular entry in forever, and there was still a bunch of layoffs. AAA model is untenable.

 

[adamsapple]

"I'm gonna fire a thousand people and it's gonna be on you"

Is this a gaming CFO or a mafioso, lol.

 

[Ryseer]

Blizzard has fallen because of the people Jeff is talking about. The company is so far from the quality they once were known for.

Great interview btw, miss hearing from the passionate people that made Blizzard great in the old days.

Was a point in time when Blizz could do no wrong...how they have fallen.

 

[memoryman3]

But then you see BF6 beating CoD and having its most popular entry in forever, and there was still a bunch of layoffs. AAA model is untenable.

They hired based on the amount of recurring revenue and active players they anticipated…and didn't meet the targets. Plus you don't need to burn money on so much staff after the main production of the game ends.

 

[RoadHazard]

TLDW?

 

[corgiix3]

New plot for the next Mafia game leaked

 

[Hypereides]

That CFO is a complete psychopath.

"I'm gonna fire a thousand people and it's gonna be on you"

Is this a gaming CFO or a mafioso, lol.

Blizzard's culture and philosophy shifted for the worse once it got into Bobby's and Activision's hands. Similar thing happened to Infinity ward after CoD:MW took off.

 

[Smiggs]

TLDW?

Yeah, is there at least a transcript of the whole thing? I would love to read it.

 

[BennyBlanco]

TLDW?

The first clip with the relevant info is like 90 seconds long

 

[Truthtellers]

Fuck Blizzard. Good call Jeff.

 

[RoadHazard]

The first clip with the relevant info is like 90 seconds long

I'm at work, and anyway I think every news thread should at least have a written summary of what it's about.

 

[Loomy]

"I'm going to ruin peoples' lives and it's going to be on you"

Or

"The company needs your product to generate this amount. Let's talk about what we can do to help you and your team reach that goal"

Easy choice if you're not an asshole. Only reason the CFO has a job is because people like Kaplan and his team actually make things.

 

[Cyberpunkd]

But then you see BF6 beating CoD and having its most popular entry in forever, and there was still a bunch of layoffs. AAA model is untenable.

Yes, but it didn't beat // didn't perform enough to justify the headcount while accounting for predicted ROI. You either lay people off (less fixed cost), or you lower your ROI, which very, very few companies will do.

 

[Celcius]

TLDW?

Yeah, is there at least a transcript of the whole thing? I would love to read it.

"If Overwatch doesn't hit these numbers, I'm going to fire 1000 people and it's all going to be on you"
"Nah I'm out"

 

[Smiggs]

"I'm going to ruin peoples' lives and it's going to be on you"

Or

"The company needs your product to generate this amount. Let's talk about what we can do to help you and your team reach that goal"

Easy choice if you're not an asshole. Only reason the CFO has a job is because people like Kaplan and his team actually make things.

A lot of business people are the worst, especially upper management. Vast majority have absolutely zero experience creating anything, and the only capital they "generate" is by attaching their name to the hard work of people that actually get shit done, while often making hand over fist off the backs of the people with the real talent. All they can do is regurgitate corpo speak and talk about numbers they pulled from their ass.

I understand oversight is required and that's why we have the middle managers and C suite, but they're often so disjointed from reality and create insane demands. If you've never talked to someone like that, I implore you to whenever you get the opportunity (their favorite word!). Most of them come off as robots.

 

[Hari Seldon]

Shocking, but only because the CFO put it in the open. Blame the AAA system. We see it all around - game is not successful, layoffs happen. The CFO is looking at it like a number:

X people at Y salary for Z years
Predicted ROI = A
Needs to do B to justify current hiring

It's what happens in every single company.

The problem is that CFO wanted NFL money. There is delusional, and then there is thinking your nerd Hero Shooter can compete with the NFL. That is Hitler 1945 levels of delusional.

 

[Pedro Motta]

Who was the cfo?

Hermen Hulst

 

[BennyBlanco]

Yes, but it didn't beat // didn't perform enough to justify the headcount while accounting for predicted ROI. You either lay people off (less fixed cost), or you lower your ROI, which very, very few companies will do.

They hired based on the amount of recurring revenue and active players they anticipated…and didn't meet the targets. Plus you don't need to burn money on so much staff after the main production of the game ends.

What a shit industry to work in. Your game can be the best selling game of the year and beat records, and you still get laid off. No wonder big budget games have been ass lately. No job security. If you're talented go do something else with that talent, or make an indie game.

 

[DeepEnigma]

Blizzard is trash and a mere shell in name only of their former selves.

 

[Shubh_C63]

Its like when organizations get above a certain figure or employee count, they become more dehumanizing in nature.

AA teams is where its at. I am fine with not having larger than life games if OG developers creative willpower is being killed off and getting replaced by purple haired professors.

 

[Durin]

Sad to hear that was the expectation for him on Overwatch, and getting to have 1000 jobs lost put on you if you don't reach some ridiculous metric.

I still just look at Blizzard as this amazing band long past its prime, that kicked out half the founding members, and we're never gonna get another killer album again.

Every game launch from them used to be an event for me, Warcraft 2 got me to ask my parents for my first PC that could play games, and as someone who rarely dumps 100+ hours into a game...Starcraft 1 got 1000+ easily. They kinda made video games my main hobby, and now I still can't even bring myself to complete Diablo 4's campaign even once. Sucks I guess.

 

[P:axMagellanic]

Didn't he make a dogs dinner of Overwatch 2?

 

[uncreativename]

That sucks, but it seems like it's been the way that a lot of these companies operate for a long time, and not just in the games industry either, but throughout tech. Set unreasonable goals, and then regular employees have to pay the price when they fail.

I get the impression that it's different in Japan, or at least it used to be. There if you get in trouble with the company you get reassigned to work in a basement like the guy in Office Space lol, until you quit on your own.

 

[BloodFree]

Bahahaha.

Fortnite has 1400 people working on it and it's free to play. If you just hire 1400 people and make it free 2 play we'll make that money right ?

Perfectly encapsulates the delusion some of these executives are under, the reason for all the GaaS flops you see nowadays.

 

[RafterXL]

Gotta love the culture of some corporations.

It's all of them now.

What a shit industry to work in. Your game can be the best selling game of the year and beat records, and you still get laid off. No wonder big budget games have been ass lately. No job security. If you're talented go do something else with that talent, or make an indie game.

The gaming industry is just following the shit corporate culture of every other kind of business. As soon as the money people realized that gaming was the next big thing they turned it into another soulless business industry that cares more about profit than anything. The only way we get back to this is smaller teams, and privately owned development houses. Unfortunately, most developers these days aren't any more passionate than the suits so I don't think there are enough to go their own way and make a dent, so it's only going to get worse.

 

[Angry_Megalodon]

This is why you need passionate gamers in top exec positions, so no suits with zero gaming background impose their lunacy on the people who do the actual work.

I'm shocked that so many people think the opposite in the shawarma threads.

 

[uncreativename]

I feel like it is really unsual to hear someone who was so high up in game development talk about these things so openly, though. Hopefully Kaplan doesn't get in too much trouble.

 

[Three]

We had a thread on this yesterday

Thread 'Lex Fridman interviews Jeff Kaplan (World of Warcraft, Overwatch)'

Yesterday at 10:33 PM

Perhaps Jeff Kaplan can show us a light in these dark times...

• Men_in_Boxes
• Replies: 5
• Forum: Gaming Discussion

• 
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[March Climber]

Blizzard has fallen because of the people Jeff is talking about. The company is so far from the quality they once were known for.

Great interview btw, miss hearing from the passionate people that made Blizzard great in the old days.

The type of suits who just saw 'Fortnite makes money so we need a Fortnite' has seeped into almost every large AAA publisher.

Activision and EA were just the first ones to make it super obvious that they had started the chase. Sony and Ubi soon followed.

I feel like we can all trace it back to this moment:




It changed everything.

 

[Filben]

Can someone give a summary or at least link to a site that's not fucking Twitter?

 

[uncreativename]

Can someone give a summary or at least link to a site that's not fucking Twitter?

Why does it being Twitter matter? It's a video of an interview

 

[PeteBull]

All im gonna say, thats gaas games for u, true cancer of the industry, hopefully ppl stop wondering why at least sizeable chunk of veterans with gaming hobby despise them. Especially when it comes to big publishers and AAA projects, if some smaller studio/AA game is made as gaas i think majority of ppl would understand/dont mind so much, but big fricken corpos doing that? Pure scum of the earth.