Blizzard Entertainment Reviews

Cons

none that i can think of atm

Cons

As with all companies, growth has been challenging to manage.

Cons

Seems like a small company pretending to be big (even though they are big). Really poor HR policies (were there any?). Quite shambolic when it came to managing international operations, seems to be every territory for itself which leads to some unhealthy fiefdoms. Depends on the management for your territory and can I only say I had the worst boss in my entire career there and didn't appear to be any recourse for his actions.

Cons

Long work hours could suck

Cons

it was too short (temporary job)

Cons

Lack of Work/Life Balance, Long Hours, Activision

Cons

Teams are very siloed - it can be difficult to get anything done across teams. Very immature company in many ways and no one seems to care enough to change. Advancement is shrouded in mystery.

Cons

- deeply rooted "old-school" mentality
- recent organizational changes lowered company morale
- old blizzard was considered 'magical', turning into a more corporate work structure lowering the innate spark of employees

Cons

Blizzard was changing before Mike left. It had already become corporate. If Blizzard had succeeded as a developer in current times the way it had in the early 2ks Activision would have left the company alone. But over the last decade, under qualified, entrenched management has eroded the organizations ability to produce industry leading games. Overwatch was a lucrative recovery salvaged from the ashes of another game which went through development turmoil for nearly seven years. It’s the last new IP they’ve been able to push through and likely will be for some time.

Developers here are underpaid, it can’t be said enough. Orange County is one of the most expensive markets in the country and the ‘industry standard’ salary Blizzard pays is not enough to afford this area. Only Managers and Senior Software Engineers II and above receive stock.

Yes, there’s stock.

The Blizzard name gets used to attract top talent and that talent is used, cleverly, until the artists gain enough experience to realize competing companies will compensate them more. Many other companies are not the utopia Blizzard makes itself out to be and they use that to compel their devs to stay.

Cons

While the game development side of the business is very strong, the support functions (for instance the marketing/publishing, business development, product & technology organization, etc.) are nowhere near the level that we see in game development side. The capabilities of these departments are passable, but not where you would expect to go sharpen your craft and work with industry leading professionals. The absence of strong leadership and lack of investment to attract and retention strong talent is noticeable. It’s rare that we attract and retain talent from outside companies that know how to execute in these areas. This leaves us feeling like our functions are unimportant and there is no opportunity for us to grow and develop unless we look to leave the company. Very consistent with what I’ve seen to historically be the case at Activision.