Although the Diablo IV Early Access beta ended on March 20, another one will run from March 24-26. This window gives you access to the five classes, two of which, the Druid and the Necromancer, were initially unavailable. Although neither has anything in common, other than their propensity to kill evil shit, one thing you might have noticed if you jumped into Sanctuary last weekend is how unbalanced they were. According to Blizzard, that’s quite the point.

Learn more: Diablo IV is the perfect empty head, shitty game

Diablo IV is the fourth entry in Blizzard’s long-running isometric action-RPG. Following the events of Diablo III, this new game puts you in control of a baby angel-demon bent on putting a lid on the flaming bottle of Hell. He’s not totally reinventing the wheel. Instead, it’s the perfect podcast game, something you can skim through with your brain at the end of a long day. I enjoyed the handful of hours I put into the early access beta, and I’m thrilled with the progress I’ve made with what I’ve dubbed my Shadow Rogue to carry over to the open beta this weekend. But maybe the reason I had so much fun with Diablo IV was because of my class choice, and Blizzard seems to reaffirm that.

All that muscle and yet no power

In an interview with the British culture and entertainment site NME, Diablo General Manager Rod Fergusson said that not all classes in the game should be equal in power at the same time. Some are better than others, but not forever.

“There’s a lot of balance there, but the thing about balance is that it’s a balance in time, not a balance in the moment,” Fergusson said. “Not all level five classes should have the same power. Due to the enchantment specialization, wizards will have the most skills of all classes because [with] Barbarians having four weapons, they will have the most legendary slots of all classes. When you take this for each of them, there will be different moments in time [where] a barbarian is in some ways a bit underpowered compared to some of the other classes in, say, the first 10-20 levels. Phew. Ouch, even.

However, Fergusson’s comment makes some sense – “some” being the operative word here. There’s no reason for a wizard to feel as strong as, say, a druid in the early levels of the game. departure. Still, that the Barbarian is an idiot at the start of Diablo IV is a bummer, especially considering that the course starts with the strongest.

Muscles will get a buff, however

The community also seems to feel this, essentially noting that Barbs muscles are all for show. On the game subreddit there were people saying the barbarians for to feel weak, have trouble beating bossesAnd lack of mobility. Twitter gamers echoed the same sentiment, saying the class is “grossly malnourished.” It will not always be so. Fergusson clarified that when the Barbs reach the middle and end of the game, especially with the number of legendary weapons they can hold, the tanky class can begin to embody demons and fiends.

“But when you get to level 30-40 and legendaries drop a lot, barbarians can be super strong,” Fergusson said. “Then there are things around the skills gap, which I think are built into it. I think the agility and mobility of a rogue is harder to play than a necromancer who has 12 skeletons fighting alongside him that he can just dispatch and fight.

Learn more: Report: Diablo IV devs say June release date will lead to more crunch

And talk to GamesRadar+, game director Joe Shely reiterated Fergusson’s point, saying Barbs players will see a few tweaks that should make mid-to-late play less frustrating and more satisfying in the long run. Bless.

“We don’t want a player creating a Barbarian to feel weak at low levels,” Shely said. “So we have to balance the class so that their strength at the end of the game is realized in that they are powerful, but not make the game unfair at low levels. Of course, with a game like Diablo IV, the classes aren’t balanced so everyone has exactly the same power level 35, 36, 37 and beyond. Their set [power] need to be balanced against each other, and they need to be balanced, especially late game, midgame in general, and early game.

Learn more: Let’s talk about Diablo IV’s most controversial change

Kotaku has contacted Blizzard for comment.

There’s comfort in knowing that the class known for its strength should see some tweaking to prove that muscle doesn’t make up for something. Still, it sucks to know that players who opt for the Swole class will struggle in the early levels of Diablo IV. Sorry to all the Barbs out there.

Image: Blizzard

While Blizzard was preoccupied with effectively powering Overwatch 2 off and back on last night and accidentally did a third of his heroes temporarily unplayable In an effort to fix issues that only affect two, players have taken umbrage with another part of the struggling hero shooter: the disabling of aim aids for console players in cross-matches with other on PC.

Back in June 2021, Blizzard has announced that Overwatch is going crossplay, allowing PC, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch and Xbox players to play together. While its implementation did some good by allowing players to bundle the payload across platforms, a Redditor noted that there was a major downside to the cross-play experience for console players. . Yesterday, Redditor KellySweetHeart posted a message on the r/Overwatch subreddit highlighting how crossplay disables aim aids for console players during matches with PC players, leading to a “significant decrease in their aiming consistency” and spoiling the fun for everyone involved.

Read more: Overwatch 2 Is More Buggy Than Blizzard Admits [Update: Entire Characters Pulled ATM]

“For some it’s just a hindrance, but others just find it less fun to play being disadvantaged in this way,” KellySweetHeart said in the post. “It’s a total disappointment because PC gamers are already performing better on average, so it hits like a double whammy.”

KellySweatheart told Kotaku that this has been a problem for gamers since crossplay was implemented in 2021, but is now causing renewed frustration as interest in the game increased again following the release of OW2. .

“People don’t understand that disabling aim assist for some players makes them totally useless in the PC pool and that directly reflects in their game stats when they play,” he told Kotaku.

While the reasoning behind disabling auto-aim could be dismissed as a way to make competitive play fair between console and PC players, other Redditors chimed in, saying it shouldn’t matter because the modes competitive games cannot be played in crossplay. In any event. This gave credence to many Redditors responding to KellySweetHeart’s post to make the case that aim aids should be enabled during fast-paced games of OW2, since people there only play for fun in first place.

“If they don’t, at least let console gamers plug an M&K into their consoles and just match through an input device. (Other games do this very well)”, a Redditor wrote.

“Imagine playing any shooter, but instead of a mouse, you’re given a flight simulator joystick to use to try aiming. That’s what it’s like to play on a controller without any aiming aid. another said.

“I had no idea this was something going on in PC lobbies and now it explains why the characters I play always feel ‘off’ when I play with my PC friends”, wrote another Redditor.

Image: Blizzard

Some people on Twitter have also expressed their annoyance with the disabling of auto-aim for console players in crossplay.

“Overwatch 2 having crossplay enabled by default but controller players not getting any aim assist, that’s fucked lol,” a Twitter user said.

“I just realized that with Overwatch 2, if you play cross-platform, it punishes console players by disabling aim assist for them in PC lobbies. Usually it’s the other way around lmao , ” wrote another Twitter user.

“The biggest issue I have with #Overwatch2 is the lack of aim assist when playing PC lobbies. I finished playing with my friends on PC after today. I really love the crossplay in this game, so much fun,” another Twitter user said, ending his tweet with this emoji →?‍.

It would be economically disconnected, to say the least, to suggest that gamers with this problem simply buy a PC. Nonetheless, KellySweetHeart, apparently anticipating that some readers might suggest this, nipped the line in the bud in an edit to his post, saying the reason he and his friends aren’t buying PCs is because they can’t. not afford it.

“The hundreds or thousands of dollars they would need to invest in a rig capable of running OW2 versus the MSRP-rated PS5 would be the difference of months of bills,” KellySweetHeart said.

He added that not being able to buy a PC doesn’t mean it doesn’t deserve to play OW2 with friends, and that players shouldn’t be “segregated based on the price of their hardware.”

And for those who might think that aim assist would be an overpowered perk for console players if implemented in crossmatches, KellySweetHeart thinks otherwise. “As for the aim assist, mechanically speaking it works very well. [in Overwatch 2] and is much more subtle compared to other games with crossplay enabled and I think it gives the game a more competitive grit,” he told Kotaku.

Kotaku has contacted Blizzard for comment.

Image: Activision Blizzard

Today, Activision Blizzard fulfilled its daily oopsie quota by blogging about how the publisher’s affiliates apparently used a special tool to help develop more “diverse” characters. He apparently thinks he can accomplish this without, I don’t know, talking or hiring marginalized developers. Why rely on pesky, fallible humans when we have powerful data to tell us we’ve reached enough diversity points to start a new video game culture war? The numbers don’t lie. I mean, look at this. It’s obvious, isn’t it? The well-designed graphic says it all, clearly and calmly.

Damn, I’m glad that technology allows us to solve racism, sexism, ableism and all the other problems facing video games. Who knew it was so easy? When former Overwatch director Jeff Kaplan said he “would hate for diversity to ever feel flattering, like we just had this spreadsheet with a bunch of checkboxes,” Activision Blizzard really took that to heart. Alright, not really.

I’m being sarcastic, but in many ways it’s hard to contain how maddening it is. It’s not just that anyone thought such a complex problem could be solved with a glorified Dungeons & Dragons character sheet that makes no sense. And it’s not just that Blizzard is in the midst of a slew of ostensible “diversity” disasters right now, including allegations of sexual harassmentinability to recruit or retain marginalized talentand persistent union tensions.

But a number of people probably not only built this thing, but also wrote the blog, got interviewed for it, and then signed it off to share it with everyone. The reaction on the internet to the post and the tool it describes has been utter disbelief, and rightly so. Consider the fact that no one there saw this coming, amidst all the other complete PR disasters. What does this say about Activision’s real ability to address the endemic issues that have come under public scrutiny over the past year and that the publisher has repeatedly pledged to to resolve ? Right now, it looks like no one in charge is really capable of that, if that’s what they’re offering.

And make no mistake, this is a public relations disaster. I’m not just saying this because I disagree with the basic premise that you can, as the blog post states, use a handy, practical tool to magically “dissect their own assumptions” and quickly, avoiding “token characters” and achieving “true representation” by identifying “more diverse character narratives” that go beyond “mere appearance”. Humans struggle with these things not because we We’re mere mortals who can’t understand the primitive logic of 1s and 0s, but because getting to a better world is a painful process. You can’t speed it up. The moment you try to take a shortcut is the when you are no longer engaging with the real problem.

While addressing these issues may involve tools, Activision Blizzard has proven time and time again that it’s at the stage where it needs more education, guidance, and mentorship from real people with skills. non-technical to help establish a basic understanding of what diversity means before you can even think. on creating a tool like this. When a company like this it takes years to introduce a black woman in a video gameI cannot believe in good faith that he has the ability to “measure” what diversity is or means, let alone implement it well.

But even if we take the thing in itself, it makes no sense. Can you look at any of the visualizations shared in the blog post and tell me what they might mean?

Screenshot: Activision Blizzard

I guess there’s some logic to this, maybe logic that’s only explained and known to people who regularly use the tool, but even suggesting that you can list something like “capacity” is completely silly. What is ability 0? What does it mean when the image in the blog post says someone has “sexual orientation: 0.357”?

How can you put that in front of someone and not feel weird about what you did or what you say?

While hardly significant, the use case examples cited in the blog post will not be compelling to the average person. There’s Call of Duty Vanguard, a game that Activision not only tried to distance himself from, but the one that friends actively hate because it has diversity. Then his other example is Overwatch 2, a game that almost everyone asks, “Why does this exist?“Are these just reasons to set something aside? No, certainly not. But they add to the top of an already crappy pile. Nobody’s gonna say “Ooo, they used that to the Call of Duty that disappointed everyoneAgain, the levels of marketing failure here are unfathomable.

So yeah, it’s not the most compelling way to package what’s already a tough sell for people who want change but don’t think it can be achieved through representation alone. Nor for those other people who think just putting a woman in a video game is inherently too political.

But maybe it was inevitable. Technology is in many ways the most extreme manifestation of whiteness and capitalism, structures that actively invest in defining, codifying and ranking markers of identity in order to maintain power and profit. The marginalized are seen only when useful, and then only in the most degrading terms, for shitty ends. Identity is key to achieving these goals. After all, if you can develop a system for, say, defining things like gender or race, you can use that information to “inform” broader choices, like making sure your character designs are diverse from more complex way.

In reality, more often than not, such data is used to monitor, imprison and monitor identities that are put under the microscope, often by people outside their own communities. In this case, whether the entities collecting the data realize it or not, its most direct effect will be to better equip them to deflect criticism from the very parties they claim to want to hold accountable. It’s funny how it works.

Why hire more people of color when you have software that already tells you what to consider, or worse, that might make you think you already know what is what? Do you really have to think about your biases if the character you created spits out a 3, 4, and 5 on the computer’s diversity scale? Those are some pretty good numbers, man! Now that we’ve sorted that out, it’s time to spend some quality time develop realistic horse balls. Polish is king.

“The traits and metrics are applicable to broader entertainment verticals, including TV, film and literature,” the blog post read. “The only change required if used in these verticals would be the base traits, which would need to be calibrated to be relevant to the genre and universe in which each character exists.”

Activision Blizzard’s blog post ends by saying that ultimately it’s just a tool, and ultimately it’s always up to the people behind the wheel to make the choices. But not before betraying a more grandiose vision of a world that lives under the influence of its tool, and therefore of its master logic.

Image: Blizzard

Overwatch had an untraditional approach to scoring. Typically, competitive shooters like Apex Legends and PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds keep a running list of kills, points, and team standings on a shared dashboard. Overwatch, instead, used a less specific system that awarded individual gold, silver, and bronze medals based on objective kills, objective time, damage done, and healing done.

If you weren’t a fan of the medal system, you’ll be happy to hear that Blizzard has completely revamped the score ladder for Overwatch 2 beta testing (which, by the way, you can still access looking at the Overwatch League opening weekend) by implementing a more typical scoreboard. Let’s go over everything you need to know about the change so you never have to hunker down in a corner crying over how little you know about the Overwatch 2 dashboard. We’ve all been there.

What am I looking at here?

I hope you weren’t attached to the little personal trophies that flicker on your screen at the end of a match, because medals have been completely eliminated. They left. Goodbye, shiny medals visible only to me. While we commit murder, Overwatch’s fire system – a meter that would fill based on activity and reward your character by framing their icon in Gatorade blue flames – was also found dead on the street.

According to Blizzard patch notes released April 28, there’s no longer a need for shot and medal systems as the new dashboard features “real-time key stats for all players in the game, including kills and deaths”. The scoreboard also “intentionally mirrors other games and competitive sports”, which is even visible in its current design: it’s a tilting rectangular layout with sleek navy, pink and white categories all spilling out. details of your team’s performance and enemy team’s performance.

So I can’t die 4,500 times in peace anymore?

No you can not. The new dashboard allows everyone on both teams to see each other’s enemy kills, assists, deaths, damage and healing, although there is still some level of individualized breakdown that shows the your character’s weapon accuracy, defensive assists, and kill streaks.

Ultimately, according to these patch notes, Blizzard says the main goal of the change is to provide “a more accurate and easier to read view of data related to each player’s performance.” Notably, Blizzard also writes that it plans to “revisit the Fire system in the future”, and since we’re still very much in beta, you can probably expect changes to the finer details of the board.

Will my significant other leave me because now they can see that I’m a bad support player?

God, I hope not. In fact, I hope they will. Looks like you’re better off without them. Either way, this brings up an important conversation players are having about the scoreboard and the quality of their Overwatch 2 experience.

Again, since we’re still in beta, this is mostly hypothetical, but some players are worried that the very public dashboard will encourage aggression in chat. Of course, the current state of Overwatch’s voice chat wasn’t an idyllic gamer garden either.

Women know how frustrating and predatory chat rooms are may beand no matter who you are, online strangers will not hesitate to scold you in the ground. Competitive shooters like League of Legends are notorious to breed ill will even within your own team – a disappointing side effect of living in a world where people sometimes care more about winning than having fun.

Personally, I think it’s possible that the scoreboard could have a negative impact on Overwatch 2 chat rooms, although the existing hostility in competitive games tells me that the issue goes much deeper than whether the number of statistics is public or private. As a gameplay mechanic, however, the scoreboard is incredibly useful for players who want to more accurately gauge their performance. Most beta testers seemed to find the board a beneficial and welcome overhaul, but there’s still time for everyone to provide feedback to Blizzard.

Image: Blizzard

Blizzard’s 2021 has been a year marked by low spots, with the company plagued by toxic workplace allegations and shaken by the departures (and layoffs) of several key personnel. Now, with a new year and likely a new owner as well, President Mike Ybarra outlined Blizzard’s plan to “rebuild your confidence.”

In a message posted on company website, says Ybarra, “2021 has been a challenge for all of us.” He continued: “As individuals, we care about treating everyone around us with respect and dignity. As professionals, we care deeply about our jobs and want to work in the most supportive and safe environment possible. Our top priority, now and in the future, is the work we do to rebuild your trust in Blizzard.

“I was also encouraged to read forums, social media posts, and emails from people inside and outside of Blizzard, to stand up for what is right, and to give us your advice.” , he adds. “I want you all to know that we are listening and committed to change.”

To that effect, he says Blizzard is implementing a number of new policies and personnel changes, including bringing executive compensation closer to “improving the culture” and instituting an “upward feedback program.” so workers can “have confidence in management’s assessment.”

We measure our leadership and management teams directly against culture improvement. This means that their success and compensation (and mine) will directly depend on our overall success in creating a safe, inclusive, and creative work environment at Blizzard. We are devoting more full-time roles and resources to improving our culture. Too often, this important effort falls to employee resource groups, made up of people who are already in full-time jobs. Here are some of the leadership positions we’ve created for this new team: a culture manager who will help us retain the best aspects of what we have today, and change and evolve as needed to ensure that everyone brings their best to Blizzard, a new organizational human resources leader who will build trust, empower our teams and help foster a safe and positive work environment for all, a diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DE&I) uniquely focused on our progress across multiple efforts in this area. We are committed to staffing these teams as a priority. We tripled the size of our compliance and investigation teams and defined clear accountability for unacceptable behavior. This applies to all Blizzard employees, including management and management. We shared representation data internally with our teams and set targets for improving these metrics. We have implemented an upward feedback program so that employees have confidence in management’s assessment. , and we will use it to measure the quality and effectiveness of our managers.

Beyond Blizzard’s workplace issues, Ybarra also says, “We know we need to deliver content to our players on a more regular basis and innovate both within and beyond our existing games. We have exciting things to announce, and I’ll tell you more next week.

These are certainly steps forward, but they will also be meaningless unless they translate into tangible improvements in the workplace itself, which we (and employees) will have to judge in due course. . It is also important to note that for all the changes described above, none of them include requests made by ABK Workers’ Alliance for things like pay transparency or, more importantly, independent audits (all of Ybarra’s points above relate to internal solutions).

And who knows what Microsoft’s purchase will do to those plans and positions, once the new ownership takes effect..

Photo: FREDERIC J. BROWN (Getty Images)

Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Blizzard was new capital today, both in terms of the magnitude of the case and its shock value. But we shouldn’t be too surprised. It was inevitable. A handful of companies have always wanted to own it all, and nothing will stop them.

The proposed sale – the technicalities dictate that I must remind you that it has yet to be approved – involves some shocking numbers. $70 billion is counterfeit money, a fictitious sum normally reserved for national budgets and defense agreements. The union of these two companies, with all these properties and all these games, alongside a home console and a massively popular subscription service, instantly changed the entire shape of the video game industry.

But a deal like this was always going to happen sooner or later, and if it wasn’t Microsoft and Activision, it would have been Sony and EA, or Tencent and Ubisoft, or someone else buying something else. Because that’s how it works. Video games are trapped in the same hellish systems as everything else on this planet, and are subject to the same cruelly unfair, almost dystopian rules.

It’s all about money. All. It’s all about steady growth, rising stock prices and dividends, while everything for us as people who love to play games gets worse, from exploitative microtransactions to shoddy launches in going through the looming threat of NFTs.

It’s like Microsoft just can’t help it, despite the fact that they’re already literally the second richest company on the planet, a company that already makes video game consoles, was already a publisher of games, already owned game studios and had already made some of the biggest games on the planet. They couldn’t help it because there is no rest for the rich. Corporate inertia means that there is no satisfaction in being big enough, or powerful enough, or rich enough, when there is always the possibility – and shareholder demand – of having more.

It’s almost comical that Microsoft spent $70 billion on a company called Activision Blizzard King, the result of mergers between three previously independent (and hugely successful in their own right!) companies coming together just to make money for some investors. , only for this company. eventually redeemed. There is always a bigger fish!

Remember that this is not a normal purchase. There is simply no precedent for a sale of this magnitude in the video game industry. Biggest previous acquisition before this one was the $12 billion paid by Take-Two for Zynga… earlier this month. The biggest before that was the $8 billion Tencent paid for Supercell. Microsoft’s purchase of Activision Blizzard is in a whole different stratosphere.

To put it into perspective, both financially and culturally, it’s a “Disney buys Pixar and Star Wars and Marvel” storyline. Disney’s monolithic domination of popular culture over the past decade has been absolute, and it sucks. He was there for all to see for all these years, screwed up everything from the rest of the film industry to the theaters and that’s the kind of large-scale deal that’s now happening for games as well video, like this grim reaper meme going door to door.

Look at the ongoing consolidation in other industries. Amazon is devouring every store in America and crushing entire cities under its feet. Google and Apple know everything about you, sell all the ads on the planet, and kill the media along the way. Almost anything you buy at a grocery store owned by only ten companies.

It’s boring and it’s dangerous (monopolies are ironically terrible for a free and open market), but even gloomier than the economic realities is the fact that in a system where only the pursuit of profit matters, there is no there is no room for justice. Bobby Kotick deserved to be kicked out of Activision with nothing. Instead, he’s going to leave at sunset with more money than we could ever hope to spend – for on top of the obscene sums he’s already made– and will not suffer any repercussions for his role in promoting and protecting a company-wide culture of harassment that lasted for decades.

What really pissed me off today, however, wasn’t this deal itself – as I said, it was happening, regardless of who was involved – but what it means. It’s not a shock one-time purchase, where every other company involved in video games just sits back and thinks, wow, that’s bad news for us, but we’re just going to carry on as if nothing happened and hope for the best. No, because this system is sick and deranged and the only impetus left for competition is to do the same, consider this:

It’s the future. There’s no way boardrooms everywhere from EA to Ubisoft to Sony won’t be full this week with panicked executives talking about their options for something similar, because their only instinct will be to match that. To keep up, make the stock price go up, until there are only 2 or 3 companies left at the top of the food chain, and things get a little worse for the rest of them. ‘between us. Because they don’t know anything else.

Photo: Kevork Djansezian (Getty Images)

In November, Xbox director Phil Spencer told staff he was “evaluating all aspects” of Microsoft’s gaming division’s relationship with Call of Duty publisher Activision Blizzard following a The Wall Street Journal’s explosive report workplace misconduct and cover-ups at the big publisher. Pressed to explain exactly what that meant in a new interview today with The New York Times, Spencer said he was not interested in another company’s “shame virtue”.

Spencer wrote in November email to Xbox teams that he was “disturbed and deeply disturbed by the horrific events and actions” recently highlighted in the Wall Street Journal report, a sentiment he reiterated today in an interview with tech reporter Kara Swisher on his Sway podcast.

“I always feel the people who work in any team, my own teams, other teams,” Spencer said when asked about Activision Blizzard’s ongoing calculation. with reports of widespread sexual harassment and discrimination. “I think people should feel safe and included in whatever workplace they are in. I’ve been in this industry long enough to perhaps feel more responsible for what’s going on in the video game space. And I am saddened and sickened when I hear of work environments that cause so much distress and destruction to individuals and teams.

When Swisher asked in a follow-up how reports on Activision Blizzard had changed Microsoft’s long-standing partnership with the giant video game publisher, Spencer said he couldn’t speak publicly about it.

“We’ve changed the way we do certain things with them, and they realize that,” he said. “But me too, for us as Xbox it’s not about shaming other companies. Xbox’s history is not without blemish.

As an example of Xbox’s problematic past, Spencer referred to a now infamous GDC 2016 party Microsoft has hosted women in schoolgirl outfits dancing on platforms. Spencer apologized for it at the time, and did it again in an interview with Axios. last november. Of them former senior Xbox employees were mentioned in last year’s reports of malpractice at Activision Blizzard, but Microsoft has so far declined to comment.

Spencer has been asked several times by Swisher about ways Xbox would “punish” Activision Blizzard for past incidents at the company, but he remained vague:

Swisher: I don’t mean to be rude, but what’s wrong with punishing them for that? Like, we don’t want to do business with you unless you’ve cleaned up. Now, again, these issues were also back several years ago, but under the same leadership, Bobby Kotick, who is the longtime CEO of Activision.

Spencer: I think in terms of interactions with other companies, the things we choose to do with our brand and our platform, in coordination or not with other companies, is the avenue we need to have. an impact. I would say that when it comes to people in leadership positions in other companies, obviously it’s not up to us to judge who the CEOs are. Like, CEOs are chosen by shareholders and boards of directors. At Xbox, I know who I’m responsible for here in terms of business and operations. These are my teams here, my management chain. And that’s the thing we keep focusing on is trying to grow taller. And whether it’s about sharing, once again, the experiences we have with other partners, if we can help them on their own journey or on things that are happening in our own teams.

Following the Wall Street Journal investigation last November, thousands of Activision Blizzard employees called for the resignation of CEO Bobby Kotick. A group of workers called the ABK Workers Alliance announced soon after that it was distribute union cards members, while a small group of developers officially went on strike following the announcement of layoffs at Call of Duty: Warzone studio Raven Software.

Brian Bulatao attending a House of Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing on September 16, 2020 Photo: Pool (Getty Images)

With Activision Blizzard employees more organized than ever in the wake of society several prosecutions for sexual harassment and layoffs in quality assurance, a senior executive apparently felt the time had come to send an alarmist email warning workers of the vague “consequences” of unionization.

The author of the email, Brian Bulatao, is a buddy of Donald Trump Activision Blizzard has been appointed COO. earlier this year. During his time in politics, Bulatao is said to have acted at one point as the “attack dog” of former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. “Intimidation” of former Inspector General Steve Linick as Linick investigated the Trump administration’s 2019 $ 8 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia.

Here’s what Bulatao had to tell Activision Blizzard employees in a company-wide email this morning (emphasis added), Courtesy of Organizer and Senior Test Analyst Jessica Gonzalez:

Everyone,

At Activision Blizzard, we work hard to create a more inclusive, supportive and rewarding environment, and thanks to your contribution, we are making progress.

Over the past few months, we have announced that we are converting nearly 500 temporary workers to full-time employees at Activision Publishing studios, and we have increased wages for a large portion of temporary workers and added benefits for paid time off. . We have introduced a zero tolerance policy on harassment and have waived the arbitration required for complaints of sexual harassment and discrimination. We have made significant commitments to increase gender diversity and are dedicating $ 250 million to accelerate opportunities for diverse talent in the industry. We have more to do and we believe that direct dialogue between management and employees is essential to the success of Activision Blizzard.

As you may have seen yesterday, there was a communication supported by the Communications Workers of America (CWA) that required employees to sign and submit union authorization cards. Let me be clear on this: the management of Activision Blizzard supports your right, under the [sic] National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), to make your own decision about whether or not to join a union.

As you make this decision for your future, we only ask that you take the time to consider the consequences of your signing on the binding legal document presented to you by CWA. Once you have signed this document, you will have ceded to CWA the exclusive right to “represent [you] for the purposes of collective bargaining regarding all conditions of employment. This means that your ability to negotiate all of your own working conditions will be entrusted to CWA, as the document says.

Achieving our cultural aspirations in the workplace will best require an active and transparent dialogue between managers and employees on which we can act quickly. This is the best solution than simply signing an electronic form offered to you by CWA or waiting for the outcome of a legally mandated and regulated negotiation process in the future.

If we fail to meet the goals we set for ourselves in the workplace, if we fail to do the things we are committed to doing, then of course you will still have the right to commit and to vote for CWA. But we are confident that we will make the progress we previously pledged to make and work with you to create a workplace we can all be proud of.

As always, we welcome communication with concerns or ideas to help make improvements, and there are multiple channels of internal dialogue, both direct and anonymous.

Brian

Bulatao’s email smacks of desperation, yet another attempt by Activision Blizzard management, who had previously hired an anti-union law firm, to subdue the company’s besieged workforce before employees realize the power they hold. The memo’s message is explicitly inspired by decades of rhetoric launched by predatory bosses terrified of collective action. The only thing missing is a reference to Activision Blizzard as a family, although it is clear that management would prefer the organization’s many issues to be addressed internally, away from public scrutiny when their decisions inevitably harm workers and benefit managers.

Since yesterday, the defense group ABK Workers Alliance raised over $ 235,000 in the strike funds of employees of Raven Software, a subsidiary of Activision Blizzard, who entered this morning in the fifth day of their walkout in response to recent layoffs in the quality assurance department. While organizing has been underway at Activision Blizzard for months, a worker told Kotaku that the situation at Raven Software provided a “spark” to move forward openly with organizational efforts.

“There is still a long way to go,” said Valentine Powell, World of Warcraft organizer and senior user interface engineer. recently explained via Twitter, “But we want to support our colleagues through [Activision Blizzard King] to finally have a real voice in the management of our companies, because in recent months and years, we have seen our leadership continue to ignore the needs of its employees. Thousands of ABK employees have put their careers and safety on the line for years trying to make our businesses better and safer places to work. We exhausted as many avenues as we could before we turned to organizing. “

Read more: Inside the revolt that led to the historic push to organize workers at Activision Blizzard

In the United States, with workers openly expressing their displeasure at the country’s largely obnoxious labor practices – in part thanks to the covid-19 pandemic exacerbating existing problems – it was only a matter of time before the labor organization does not take root in the video game industry. And now that that momentum is building up, it’s hard to see it ending any time soon, whether bosses like it or not.

Image: The rewards of the game

Like Geoff Keighley’s annual Prize giving of the game entering his eighth year, the creator and animator told the Washington Post today that he’s still considering how to “navigate” Activision Blizzard’s involvement in the ceremony following the latest reports of sexual misconduct at the publisher.

“We want to support employees and developers,” Keighley said in an interview on what to expect at the 2021 Game Awards, which takes place on December 9.[Keighley] He added that he supported the people presenting their stories, but also didn’t want to diminish the opportunities for developers to showcase their games, ”The Washington Post reported.

“We have to think very carefully about how to do this here,” he said in the interview. Despite being one of the most prominent figures in the video game industry, Keighley has so far refrained from speaking out against years of reported abuse at one of the world’s largest game companies. .

Keighley and The Game Awards did not respond to a request for comment.

Activision Blizzard, which faces a lawsuit by California regulators alleging years of widespread sex discrimination, harassment and other forms of abuse, is one of the few companies on the Game Awards advisory board. In addition to Activision Chairman Rob Kostich, the board also includes executives from Nintendo, Microsoft, Sony and many other gaming industry giants.

Image: The rewards of the game

The executives of these console makers in particular were some of the few voices that have spoken recently, albeit internally rather than publicly, in the wake of an explosive Wall Street Journal investigation about misconduct at Activision Blizzard that involved its CEO, Bobby Kotick.

While thousands of publisher employees called on Kotick to resign, Nintendo of America President Doug Bowser, PlayStation boss Jim Ryan, and Xbox Chief Phil Spencer, each emailed their respective staff to express their disgust and concern over the allegations, although none have announced specific changes in their business relationship with Activision Blizzard.

In addition to recognizing the hard work and artistic achievements of game developers, the Game Awards are also a giant marketing platform for game companies to advertise their upcoming games. Last year, Activision took advantage of the event to show the first season Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War post-launch Warzone content.

Read more: Games created under difficult conditions do not deserve the “best direction” awards

In the Last episode From Inside the Game Awards, a podcast series promoting the show, Keighley confirmed that the new game announcements and trailers are by far the most popular part of the event and the main reason for which most viewers connect to. He also spoke at length about the work and collaboration with video game companies who organize the selection of trailers each year. Keighley confirmed to the Washington Post that the 2021 show will not include anything about Blizzard’s recently delayed Diablo IV and Overwatch 2, but did not mention if any other Activision Blizzard games may appear.

However, accusations of misconduct and abuse are not unique to Activision Blizzard. In addition to the growing mountain of crunch reporting in many studios often nominated for Game Awards, other members of its advisory board have also been criticized. Sony’s PlayStation division was recently sued by a former employee allegation of discrimination on the basis of sex. Microsoft has faced a number of accusations of discrimination more the years. Reports a culture of sexism at Riot Games ultimately resulted in a giant settlement. And Ubisoft, which faced its own massive #MeToo account last year, continues to be accused by current and former employees of not having take complaints of misconduct seriously.

Update: 12/04/21, 8:21 am ET: Keighley explained Activision Blizzard’s involvement in this year’s Game Awards in a Twitter feed posted late last night. The host confirmed that the publisher does not appear outside of the categories for which its games are nominated (nominations and winners are voted on by the media), and added that “there is no room. for abuse, harassment or predatory practices in any business or community. . “

Keighley continued:

I also realize that we have a great platform that can accelerate and inspire change. We are committed to it, but we must all work together to create a better and more inclusive environment so that everyone feels safe to create the best games in the world.

We are all responsible for this standard. Amazing games – and the talented developers who create them – are the ones we want to celebrate. We will see each other Thursday.

We are writing to ask you to immediately request the resignation of Robert A. “Bobby” Kotick from his tenure as a director on the board of directors of The Coca-Cola Company, and that he be removed as a candidate for reappointment. mandate at the 2022 annual meeting of Shareholders. If Mr. Kotick refuses to voluntarily step down as a director, we ask you to call a special meeting of directors to remove him.

The National Legal and Policy Center promotes ethics in public life, sponsors the Corporate Integrity Project and is a shareholder of The Coca-Cola Company. We are sponsoring a resolution for the 2022 Annual Meeting of Shareholders to implement a policy to make the Chairman of the Board a separate role from the CEO.

Over the past several months (and even years), it has emerged that Mr. Kotick, as CEO of Activision Blizzard, Inc., has run his business in a way that challenges his judgment, character and its transparency vis-à-vis the Board of Directors.

On November 16, 2021, the Wall Street Journal published a detailed report on years of misconduct – and even alleged crimes – that occurred at Activision Blizzard under the supervision of Mr. Kotick, in which he was so accused. credible to have minimized, ignored and / or covered up to illegal behavior. The article followed revelations earlier this year that reported investigations into Activision Blizzard and Mr. Kotick’s role by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission and the California Dept. of Fair Employment and Housing.

The Journal’s November article cites internal company sources, documents, communications and interviews with former employees and people close to the company as the basis for its reporting. The newspaper reported:

They show that [Mr. Kotick] were aware of allegations of employee misconduct in many areas of the company. He did not brief the board on everything he knew, as interviews and documents show, even after regulators began investigating the incidents in 2018. Some departing employees accused of misconduct were congratulated on the exit, while their colleagues were asked to remain silent on these matters.

The Journal added that a California Dept. of Fair Employment and Housing alleges that “the company ignored numerous employee complaints of harassment, discrimination and retaliation, citing what it called its ‘frat boy’ culture.”

Allegations of sexual misconduct within the company include an accusation of rape by an employee against a supervisor. In another incident, an employee allegedly committed suicide after a photo of her genitals was circulated at a company party. And just two months ago, after just a month in her new leadership role, longtime employee Jennifer Oneal resigned and told a member of the firm’s legal team that “I have been symbolized, marginalized and discriminated against ”.

In recent months, Activision Blizzard has seen several senior executives and design talent leave. Mr. Kotick also appears to have lost the trust and support of a significant percentage of his employees, as many staged a walkout in July to show their disgust at the company’s response to allegations of sexual misconduct. Following the November Journal report, employees staged another walkout and more than 1,800 (up from 800 in mid-November) signed a petition calling for Mr. Kotick’s resignation.

Influential investor groups in Activision Blizzard have also called for Mr Kotick’s resignation. The Wall Street Journal reported on Nov. 22 that Mr. Kotick had told his senior company executives that he would consider leaving the company if the “culture issues” were not corrected “quickly.”

Mr. Kotick’s leadership at Activision Blizzard is clearly under siege, and with good reason. At best, he has major issues in his own business that require his full attention. At worst, he is partially – if not totally – guilty of the work environment that was first established by Activision, then Activision Blizzard, during his 30 years in office.

In contrast, The Coca-Cola Company, in the recent past, has boasted of how it empowers and empowers women entrepreneurs. And the company’s “Equal Opportunities and Affirmative Action Policy” explicitly prohibits harassment, intimidation, retaliation, threats and coercion based on several factors, including gender.

Mr. Quincey, you have not hesitated to involve the Company in controversial public policy issues, even when a significant portion of our customers, shareholders and business partners disagreed with your point of view.

For example, you made inflammatory and inflammatory allegations about Georgia’s governor and legislature for passing the Election Integrity Act of 2021. You called the new law “unacceptable”.

Sexual harassment in the workplace is unacceptable. There is no constituency in favor of sexual harassment, except perhaps among business leaders who cover up for each other.

It’s time for you to confront Bobby Kotick’s continued membership on the Coca-Cola Board of Directors.

Under your leadership, the Coca-Cola brand has been diminished as you have criticized this country and its institutions, while remaining silent on the genocide in China and human rights violations in dozens of countries where Coca-Cola products are sold.

Your hypocrisy has not gone unnoticed. Signs of virtue and complacency towards the loudest political activists are no substitute for real leadership.

Here is an opportunity to do the right thing. Keeping Mr. Kotick on the Coca-Cola board is unacceptable. Now is the time for you to act.