Blizzard Announces 600 Layoffs, WoW Team Not Impacted

Earlier today Blizzard announced that it had laid off 900 employees from various departments. Blizzard then clarified by saying “Constant evaluation of teams and processes is necessary for the long-term health of any business. Over the last several years, we’ve grown our organization tremendously and made large investments in our infrastructure in order to better serve our global community. However, as Blizzard and the industry have evolved we’ve also had to make some difficult decisions in order to address the changing needs of our company,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “Knowing that, it still does not make letting go of some of our team members any easier. We’re grateful to have had the opportunity to work with the people impacted by today’s announcement, we’re proud of the contributions they made here at Blizzard, and we wish them well as they move forward.”

They then made it very clear that the company anticipates approximately 90% of the affected employees will come from departments not related to game development. The World of Warcraft development team will not be impacted. I repeat: “The World of Warcraft development team will not be impacted!”