Episode 141: New Boss, Same B.S.

[00:00:00] Wording This program contains strong language, auditory violence and mental nudity. It

[00:00:07] is intended only for mature audiences. Listener discretion is advised.

[00:00:16] So imagine that you wake up on any given day. Just another day, another day that ends

[00:00:26] in why. Shake the dust out of your eyes and maybe hit the restroom, maybe you see your

[00:00:36] spouse, your child, and start to get ready for your day. As you're taking a shower, as

[00:00:42] you're getting dressed, as you're brushing your teeth, thinking about all the things

[00:00:47] that you've got to take care of that day. You've got this responsibility or that, or

[00:00:52] you've got to call somebody about the roof or you've got to make a dentist appointment

[00:00:56] or you've got to stop by the pharmacy to pick something up that you forgot the other

[00:01:00] day. All the million things that go through your mind as you're ready for your day. Imagine

[00:01:07] then that you got ready and you get in your vehicle and you're driving to work and

[00:01:14] you've recently been recalled into the office after years of teleworking, a model that

[00:01:21] works great for you and you loved it and your team loved it and they thrived and now

[00:01:24] you've had a recent return to office protocol that nobody really likes, but you're doing

[00:01:30] it anyway because you have to do it and what other choice do you have. As you sit through

[00:01:34] traffic and listen to the usual morning news, you think about all the meetings of the day

[00:01:39] and stuff that you've got to take care of. When you're driving, you notice that your phone

[00:01:45] is just blowing up and it's clear that someone's trying to get a hold of you, but you're

[00:01:50] trying to be good. You're trying not to look at your phone and you don't want to be texting

[00:01:54] and driving because it's dangerous. So make your way to work as soon as you get there,

[00:02:00] you'll check your messages and you pull into the parking lot of your office building.

[00:02:05] It's first thing in the morning and you notice right away that something is wrong. Something

[00:02:14] looks wrong, feels wrong. There's more people outside than there should be or there's

[00:02:20] some sort of disruption to the rhythm, to the flow of the day that you know as you pull

[00:02:26] in, you park and you pull up your phone and it's friends from the office, people on

[00:02:33] your team and everybody blowing you up because you've just received notice in your office,

[00:02:42] and every office you know is now faced with an imminent layoff that day. So if you've

[00:02:52] ever been in that situation, you know what I'm talking about. And if you haven't just

[00:03:00] imagine that that's the situation that faced nearly 2,000 Microsoft gaming employees including

[00:03:07] our beloved Blizzard Entertainment. So let's talk about it.

[00:03:37] After a year of building Goodwill, Blizzard has once again kicked itself in the dick.

[00:04:07] And down the bullshit road we go once again. Welcome back for episode 141, if you're

[00:04:14] un-sensored home for World of Warcraft news and opinions, unshackled fury. I'm your host

[00:04:20] Presurker and with me once again is the one man British invasion known as Mr. Jez

[00:04:27] Horden. Welcome back again, good sir. Hey man, that was a very somber intro that you conducted

[00:04:36] there. It made me feel sad but it's a sad week. You know, it's ultimately incredibly appropriate.

[00:04:46] It is awful. 2,000 people laid off. It's big news of the week in the Microsoft gaming arena

[00:04:55] and I suppose most of the point for us is a lot of these layoffs, maybe even the bulk

[00:05:02] of them were directed at Blizzard Entertainment. And we don't have like a chart or a graph that

[00:05:10] breaks down exactly how many staff will lay it off in each place and each segment within

[00:05:16] Microsoft gaming. That also includes the Dynamics media who makes Starfield and Fallout and Elder Scrolls

[00:05:22] but it also includes some of the core Microsoft studios and core Microsoft operations from

[00:05:27] the gaming space. You know Xbox games studios, you know people like Halo Studios and stuff like that

[00:05:34] but yeah the vast majority of them seem to have hit Blizzard and I suppose we're going to get

[00:05:41] into the what is this happened and first of all I think above all else, above anything else,

[00:05:48] it just if you are someone who's been impacted by these awful layoffs, brutal layoffs probably after

[00:05:55] weeks, months of wondering what would happen to your job in a post-bobby-cotic post-activision world

[00:06:02] following the acquisition. You know my heart goes out to you and I think XPFU as well. Yeah.

[00:06:11] Yeah, absolutely. Everyone in the Blizzard fandom is failing that pain right now. But yeah.

[00:06:19] Yeah it's it's been I think again we keep every once in a while we find these these new lows and

[00:06:30] unless you've been living under a rock or you've been out in the wilderness somewhere.

[00:06:35] That is the big news of this past week is Thursday morning, Memo and in our office Memo was sent out by

[00:06:44] Phil Spencer who is what's this what's this title he's in charge of Microsoft gaming. The CEO of

[00:06:51] Microsoft Gaming. CEO of Microsoft. Chief executive officer Microsoft Gaming. So sent out a memo to folks

[00:06:57] internally letting them know that 1900 rolls out of 22,000 were going to be let go and that came

[00:07:03] out sounds like approximately 7 30 AM West Coast time on Thursday and it sounds like the morning

[00:07:12] unfolded in such a way that people were called in or advised. And so everybody was sitting around

[00:07:18] waiting to see what was going to happen to them. And folks that have listened to this show know

[00:07:27] that I have been through a layoff in 2009 when the economy was going to shit and I used to work at

[00:07:36] an insurance company with the homie Rammel. That's how we met. We both got laid off on the same day he

[00:07:40] got called first I got called second and that feeling those feelings that just earth shifting moment

[00:07:53] is unlike any that I have experienced and seeing the folks having to go through that.

[00:08:06] You know, I don't experience a lot of I guess what you would call PTSD in my life but that is

[00:08:12] certainly one area where it pops up where for myself I remember we came into the office that day

[00:08:19] and we noticed that there were a lot of extra security up by the front desk. And we just thought

[00:08:25] well maybe it was some sort of a training or there was something going on and then we had one

[00:08:30] gal over this guy Kevin and Kevin after I don't know almost been like nine o'clock in the morning

[00:08:35] starts running around from sort of cubicle area to cubicle area going they're doing layoffs

[00:08:41] they're doing any any's freaking us out and they're like no, no, they're not doing that.

[00:08:45] Sure, I should minutes later my entire unit gets called into an office conference room where our

[00:08:55] manager of however many years told us that the company was doing layoffs that we were going to be

[00:09:01] called in individually and now we had to go back to our desks and wait to see if we got one of those

[00:09:09] phone calls. And of course everybody gets out starts texting going crazy and like oh shit what am I

[00:09:16] gonna do? You know, I have a wife who's a type one diabetic and let me tell you that needs regular

[00:09:22] care and insurance let alone what happened to me years later where I also need regular health

[00:09:29] benefits and we sat and we waited and the pit that's in your stomach I can't describe it to you if

[00:09:38] you've never been there. But getting that phone call watching my desk ring and knowing that it was

[00:09:43] you and that's that moment and my boss called me in and the first thing I told him I said he's

[00:09:48] son of a bitch how can he do this to me? Because I thought we were cool I thought we were friendly I

[00:09:53] thought that he was on my side and businesses business and that is always going to be true

[00:10:02] especially when you have stakeholders and shareholders more specifically. Yeah and I'll never forget

[00:10:11] going back to my desk boxing my stuff up and driving home and talking to my wife saying I don't know

[00:10:16] what we're gonna do. We didn't have my child thankfully at that point and we didn't have a mortgage

[00:10:20] yet either thankfully but that feeling of not knowing what you were going to be doing and how you were

[00:10:27] going to make ends meet and how there was no preparation for this it was instantaneous it is

[00:10:35] awful gut wrenching heart-rending stuff and I was fortunate enough where after a year of being

[00:10:44] unemployed because that's how long it took me to find a job again. I ended up in a career field

[00:10:50] that I'm in now and it's all worked out for the best but that's not the road for a lot of folks

[00:10:57] and so to see that happen to watch that unfold Thursday morning it brought back a lot of feelings

[00:11:02] and I was texting um Romulo about it and you know we both remember those times well and to watch

[00:11:09] that happened so close to our sort of digital home was just awful on our personal level so to echo

[00:11:17] your comment anyone who's affected here's this my heart goes out to you as well because it is

[00:11:24] it is unmooring in a way that you just don't know unless you've been there and then to watch. Go ahead

[00:11:34] I was going to say it's like it's kind of compounded as well because I'm like I'm British right

[00:11:42] so and when you say things like it was instantaneous and then you talk about the medication and stuff

[00:11:49] like that Europeans don't generally have to deal with anything like that because there's like

[00:11:54] there's like consultation period by law they can't just lay people off straight away there has to be

[00:12:00] like this sort of holding period where they have to they have to keep paying you for a certain amount

[00:12:05] of time and also the government has to be informed and and also you know national health care

[00:12:11] don't have to worry about you know diabetes meds and stuff like that and um so it's this sort

[00:12:17] of extra layer of fear that I don't think a lot of Europeans appreciate when it comes to laughs and

[00:12:22] I've seen some really like hardest comments like oh it's not big deal it's not big deal and then

[00:12:26] they just don't know what it's like in America when he comes to this stuff it's wrong it's wrong

[00:12:30] it's wrong it's wrong it's wrong it's wrong it's wrong it's wrong it's wrong it's wrong it's

[00:12:33] like something I've learned in the job you know working with Americans and stuff like that so um

[00:12:38] it's absolutely brutal brutal yeah it's it's pretty cutthroat in that way and you know so to see

[00:12:48] that happen with our folks not really knowing how that was going to unfold because now we're right

[00:12:53] we're you and I being stepbrothers now we're part of this larger family this Microsoft family and

[00:12:58] what does that look like you know what it what that 1900 that whatever there's a there's a

[00:13:04] percentage of that here um what is that 8% 11% 11% who's that gonna be what does that look like we

[00:13:12] don't know and I think right off the top the first thing that caught my high out of the blizzard camp

[00:13:20] was that the survival game that you and I have talked about before and that you know it was long

[00:13:27] teased and we thought maybe this blizzcon we'd see it or whatever else it looks like that entire team

[00:13:33] got let go and the game has been cancelled outright pretty much I mean they um it's weird because

[00:13:42] Matt Booty said in Matt Booty is um blizzard blizzard fans always smirk at this I'm used to this by

[00:13:49] now having covered mocks off her look at there but Matt Booty is is in charge of all Microsoft gaming

[00:13:57] corporations so like Phil spent obviously is the whole business aspect of it but Matt Booty is in

[00:14:02] charge of all the gaming studios and all the you know the each gaming studio's answer answers through

[00:14:09] to him each gaming department so to speak um and he said in his email that the the survival game team

[00:14:16] have been or at least part of the survival game team have been offered other positions but he

[00:14:19] just doesn't seem to be true like there haven't seen any no I haven't seen a single I haven't seen

[00:14:25] any like I haven't seen a single person from survival game team sort of hinted at the fact that

[00:14:32] they survived the call you know and that doesn't mean there hasn't been you know like I say we don't

[00:14:37] have we don't have a full full granular breakdown of each studio that was impacted and um

[00:14:45] you know to what extent all we have really that we can go and he's sort of the sort of I don't know

[00:14:52] what you call it the sort of anecdotal evidence that we see on Twitter and LinkedIn and um yeah

[00:14:58] you know the volume of comments and questions and then the analysis that some other people have

[00:15:04] done and stuff like that but it does seem that the line share of the laughs were within Blizzard

[00:15:10] and it's and it's a various teams you know you got team one two three fours stuff like that

[00:15:15] and also you've got like um Zenimax also called a bunch of laughs with this whole cycle

[00:15:22] some marks after quite Zenimax a few years ago for I think was seven point eight billion dollars

[00:15:28] off the top of my head and they've lost a lot of administrative staff and publishing staff

[00:15:37] and and stuff like this in this sort of way but Blizzard's like Blizzard lost a lot of devs

[00:15:43] but also like they shut down the entire community service team so expect your game masters in

[00:15:50] World of Warcraft to be significantly worse because they are outsourcing all of that to I've heard

[00:15:57] Egypt and um and uh some other countries which um you know not to not to denigrate the people that

[00:16:06] you know just doing a job but they've been employed because they can be paid less so they're being

[00:16:12] you know exploited basically yeah and um the Microsoft's gonna automate the rest so like I've already

[00:16:18] seen people on Reddit on the Warcraft Reddit say was this GM response generated by artificial

[00:16:24] intelligence very simplistic very all you know that there was a back in the day like Blizzard

[00:16:30] jams were like unique amongst gaming sort of customer service like they yeah no they were fun

[00:16:38] you know they were part of the games identity they were very much so they were seeing one in game

[00:16:43] was like a highlight like oh shit there's a GM in game yeah they were fun to GM island thing and stuff

[00:16:50] like that back in the day yes um so it's it's been crazy like watching this all unfold

[00:16:56] and a huge part of it is um yeah Blizzard Activision Blizzard um staff with a large amount of

[00:17:06] community managers will let go huge amount of community manager let go Microsoft shut down the teams

[00:17:12] at Activision and Zenimax responsible for publishing physical discs um and getting the games into retail

[00:17:19] so expect retail offerings to be potentially worse as well down the line because Microsoft's gonna do

[00:17:24] all that in house now you know with less people than than there were before so don't know what

[00:17:30] that's gonna look like but you know they're not just doing this for the sake of doing this

[00:17:36] there are like there are real um you know financial reasons why they've done this and we can get

[00:17:45] more deeply into the analysis of that in a minute but you know it's it's of no comfort you know

[00:17:50] it there's there's this is also it's not isolated to Microsoft there's been a huge amount of laughs

[00:17:55] across the whole industry yeah unity's layered a ton of people off so business inside business

[00:18:00] inside that you know the media laying off eight percent of its workforce riot laid off a ton of

[00:18:05] devs too yeah um some riot projects I've been told have been cancelled as well stuff that hasn't been

[00:18:11] announced so you know there's and then it obviously embrace a group um they make games like

[00:18:19] dark sideers what loads of games these days they're they own crystal dynamics they're tomb raider

[00:18:24] they own iDOS or they own DSX like that they're on a ton of games they're laying off and showing down

[00:18:29] studios left-right center studio that make gothics be shut down it's crazy it's it's it's a little bit

[00:18:36] out there and it's it's probably only gonna get worse you know as um and there's a huge amount

[00:18:42] of there's a variety of reasons for that but yeah it's something that we've seen like any of us

[00:18:50] around right we play games are interested in sort of how the sausage is made which

[00:18:55] it's so different you know growing up i don't know who made mega-man two i don't know who made

[00:19:00] legend of Zelda like i just played this stuff and it was fun and we never really knew who was behind

[00:19:05] no who were the humans behind it as we didn't really know and so we're so much more invested

[00:19:10] and engaged in the lives and the well-being of the of the human being the individuals who are

[00:19:18] responsible for all of these great activities that we get to enjoy these great games that we get

[00:19:23] to enjoy and as we've watched these other ones happen you mentioned riot right that was a huge

[00:19:28] one that happened and you know you kind of wonder well blizzard 2018 had a big layoff and a whole bunch

[00:19:37] of trouble there and that's when this show started watching the financials more closely i became

[00:19:42] a blizzard shareholder at that point because i wanted to get the meeting materials and only have

[00:19:49] this stuff so i can watch it and see how that stuff happened and now to see that once again you know

[00:19:56] blizzard's not special in this way and granted it's part of Microsoft now so it's going to have

[00:20:00] to do whatever Microsoft does but we always felt like blizzard was kind of a part that it was better

[00:20:05] than or it was it was it had some insulation in a way that it's not true it just does not exist and so

[00:20:17] if you like i had any illusions that somehow they were going to be different this pretty much shatters

[00:20:22] whatever is left of that and so looking at kind of break it down a little bit and maybe to start

[00:20:30] back with the survival game when we go back a little bit was erred had probably you know the

[00:20:39] Titan you know project Titan back on cancel and eventually turned into overwatch and there's a

[00:20:44] you know story about that that people know and it's a shame i would have loved and i think a lot of

[00:20:49] us would have loved to actually seen what Titan looked like just i don't know for sure the giggles

[00:20:54] to see it but with project Odyssey with this this recent survival game that got cancelled you have

[00:21:02] talked about how you got to see it you had hands on at one point you even described sort of what

[00:21:07] that looked like and so for those of us on the outside it very much felt like there was progress

[00:21:13] the things were coming along i was a little worried when samwise did he retired because i thought he

[00:21:20] was part of that team and so that being that kind of did put a little hum in my brain but

[00:21:26] everything that we'd heard was it was coming along and it's this and that and there were no signs

[00:21:32] of trouble now since then it does sound like because you had mentioned the engine that this had run on

[00:21:37] it does sound like that may have been a sticking pointer was part of the problem

[00:21:42] but can you maybe shed a little light on why maybe this game was cancelled and

[00:21:51] to as harsh as it sounds to put feelings aside in this matter

[00:21:56] was that maybe the right call or not well you know just to just to clarify like what

[00:22:03] what i saw and i never actually played it myself but i was i was shown you know pre alpha footage

[00:22:09] essentially right what i saw is like part of an internal presentation i think where they

[00:22:15] they actually showed it off to some Blizzard staff and internally in california

[00:22:23] and um they uh you know it looked great like it looked like it looked to me it looked like it was on

[00:22:29] the overwatch engine it had that sort of pixarish art style and it was from a first person perspective

[00:22:35] and the character out of bone arrow i immediately thought of hands off from overwatch and in my head it

[00:22:41] was like okay so they're building this on the overwatch engine or something and then um

[00:22:46] and uh you know it had this great fairy talastec it kind of reminded me a little bit of like

[00:22:50] pixar fable or maybe even like pixel movie reponsal you know if i don't know if you've seen that but

[00:22:57] um yes of course yeah it really did give me that sort of it's not quite it's not warcraft style

[00:23:05] you know because it lent leaning really hard into the sort of fairy tal aspect rather than like

[00:23:11] warcraft sort of mashup of genres like warcraft is almost almost steampunk at times

[00:23:16] it's weird yeah um with the goblin stuff and you know but this was like pure fantasy fairy tale

[00:23:23] and um you know they kind of looked to me like i sort of sort of hints at the build in mechanics

[00:23:29] and it really did remind me of fallout 76 i don't know if people might freak out of that comparison

[00:23:35] but fallout 76 has evolved into a very popular game with a very passionate fanbase

[00:23:40] and um you know i saw a base building with you know something to that to me look like a player made

[00:23:48] potionshop for example and um according to bloomberg who had an expose on what was going on what

[00:23:55] went wrong with the game potentially they were saying like um they were saying that they were

[00:24:00] trying to build it the game for mobile so it sounded to me like they were trying to make this sort of

[00:24:06] genshin impact like engine that would run across devices you know so like genshin impact is built on

[00:24:14] unity and unity is kind of known for its you know cross platform compatibility so like again

[00:24:20] the same client for genshin impact runs across pc runs across mobile devices android ios

[00:24:27] all with the same sort of you know underlying technology um so i think like they were trying to do

[00:24:32] the same for this but it's not it's not easy to do that kind of stuff you know it's really not

[00:24:37] which is why like that's why unity is so popular you know it's because it's one of the few engines

[00:24:45] out there that can do that kind of cross platform stuff and if the like a company is big genshin

[00:24:51] impacts whole yourverse company is using unity that's for a reason you know it's because there's

[00:24:56] just not a lot of alternatives out there so it sounds to me like this was trying to develop your

[00:25:02] own version of this internally rather than defer to something like unreal engine or defer to

[00:25:07] something like unity and apparently that these ambitions of a hundred players in a single server

[00:25:13] a single map and you can't remember i how know if unity is particularly great for that either

[00:25:19] so you can't remember genshin impact like it's not truly an mmo in fact it's barely even an

[00:25:24] mmo at all it's got like it's got co-op features you can join another person's world and do like

[00:25:30] limited co-op with them but it's not like a continuous open world in the same sense that world

[00:25:36] of warcraft is you know um again we'll warcrafts kind of unique in that context as well and it's say

[00:25:42] really did sound like they were trying to do that sort of they were trying they were just biting

[00:25:47] off more than they could chew and it was like this really ambitious project and it had been in

[00:25:51] development for six years and then they reckoned it was still another three years away from maturity

[00:26:00] and in that in that sort of three years in six years of development time and then another three

[00:26:06] years on top of that that's like hundreds of millions of dollars in terms of just labor costs

[00:26:11] and all that kind of stuff it's a it's an astronomical amount of money that could have potentially

[00:26:17] you know been spent on warcraft expansions it could have potentially been spent on

[00:26:22] you know overwatch content or some like one of their quote unquote more successful games you know

[00:26:28] and in this business you have to take risks if you want to make the next big thing

[00:26:32] you kind of have to take risks but there's a game recently that came out that kind of flies

[00:26:37] in the face of that argument and that's Power World which is developed by 15 people on a budget

[00:26:44] have a reportedly around eight million dollars and it's sold eight million copies in a week

[00:26:50] it's blown the up and it's sort of it's completely and it's it's project audices

[00:27:00] willhouse it's a survival game you know so it's like would there have even been a market for

[00:27:07] uh Odyssey when it came out I really think like they want they should have released that game in

[00:27:13] early access can you name for me a single survival game that was released feature complete they're

[00:27:20] all early access every single one almost every single one is early access grounded was early access

[00:27:28] and uh you know enshrouded in early access and that I think I've talked about the rising in early

[00:27:34] access ox survival evolved was early access um and uh Conan exos was early access they're

[00:27:41] they're all early access so I don't understand why Blizzard was like we're gonna we're gonna just

[00:27:46] develop this you know and make it feature complete first and then try and retroactively complete

[00:27:53] with these get compete with these games that have had um market penetration already with

[00:27:58] early access periods and stuff so it just sounded like an easy they had to be they decided

[00:28:06] for whatever reason they had to be cut and we'll get into the reasons in a minute it sounded

[00:28:10] like that was just almost like a no brainer situation it was like if we're gonna make cuts it has to

[00:28:15] be here because this is the you know the the sort of the situation this game is in this is how

[00:28:23] much it's gonna cost to actually finish it off and this is like you know how much we can save by

[00:28:30] doing this and how much like we can reprioritize resources in games that are making money today

[00:28:38] and that is warcraft that is Overwatch that is Diablo um you know and and another stuff and

[00:28:47] you know Microsoft did say in the in their emails they've got other promising unannounced projects

[00:28:54] that some developers will be shifted to as well. Love rumors that that could be Starcraft related

[00:28:59] because you know Phil Spencer was talking about Starcraft at BlizzCon I don't know Phil will be

[00:29:04] welcome at BlizzCon ever again after this week but you know he did he didn't talk about Starcraft

[00:29:10] and um you know you've been called into question whether or not we'll even have another BlizzCon

[00:29:16] yeah I did I mean that's another way you could make savings because I was told this year that

[00:29:22] BlizzCon had had cost them like millions of dollars um it's you know and I remember people were

[00:29:30] complaining about how much the tickets cost and how much the hotels were and you know because

[00:29:34] Blizzard earmarks all those hotels as well so they have to pay the hotel trains um it doesn't

[00:29:40] make any money it's like a huge drain on resources as well it's never made money that show is never

[00:29:46] made money but you know it depends on your perspective and like from Blizzard's perspective and

[00:29:53] probably Activision Blizzard's perspective it was like that's part of the marketing spend that

[00:29:58] is like about building fandom and curating fandom and all this kind of stuff. Again the hype going

[00:30:03] again the hype going I don't know if Microsoft has that same mentality because Microsoft is a very

[00:30:08] cold company they are sort of notorious for not being able to read what consumers want

[00:30:15] they're notorious for struggling to connect with fans and customers and and miss being

[00:30:22] unable to read the room they are notorious for this so like when I think about what as someone who's

[00:30:28] you know long experienced what Microsoft does and how they operate BlizzCon is something that I

[00:30:34] would expect them to cut so and you know it'd be devastating because I've never I've never got

[00:30:40] the opportunity to go to BlizzCon it's always been a dream of mine to go but I would rather

[00:30:45] I'd rather people have jobs than that we have that we have BlizzCon you know but even then it's like

[00:30:51] if they call BlizzCon they're probably people whose job it is to run BlizzCon so that's going

[00:30:56] to probably be job cuts as well so oh god it's a whole mess man it's a whole ass mess and yeah and

[00:31:02] I think that that's part of the reaction from at least for us as players is going into this

[00:31:13] because you and I talked about this a bunch of times going into this situation with the sale it was

[00:31:19] like here we go Microsoft white night writing in they're gonna throw Bobby Cotech down a well and

[00:31:27] you know we're gonna save the company and everything's gonna be great and you know we talked about how

[00:31:32] small the portfolio portion an activism blizzard would represent out of the Microsoft I mean on top

[00:31:41] of all of this and as has been noted they closed the day that Thursday Microsoft did at evaluation

[00:31:47] of over three trillion dollars so it's a big ass company is worth a lot of fucking money so we did

[00:31:54] not think that anything like this I'm sure collectively if you'd asked anybody Wednesday night hey do you

[00:32:01] think that Microsoft is going to lay off nearly 2,000 people and cancel blizzard game and layoff a bunch

[00:32:07] of other folks and no you're crazy no that's Microsoft they would never do that so to see this happen

[00:32:15] it's not even like a cold slap a reality it's like a Mike Tyson punch to the solar plexus like

[00:32:21] it's just it's out of nowhere and it's fast and it's hard and you just like what the fuck just happened

[00:32:26] so that to us is new like the the Microsoft experience you know as you talked about you know seeing how

[00:32:36] they navigate this landscape and the perspective that they have and maybe a misguided one at times

[00:32:41] like that's not something that we have experienced yet before and so this is certainly our first

[00:32:48] dose of that reality coming in and they have something that people were looking forward to even if

[00:32:54] we didn't really quite know what it was like that's that's a challenge and again just to rewind

[00:33:00] a little bit for our listeners and for folks that may not know can you just can you briefly describe

[00:33:06] a little bit what something like unity when you say an engine like unity or unreal engine or one

[00:33:12] of these other ones can you just in layman's terms describe what that is what those are

[00:33:18] yeah so like unity is like unity and real engine for for examples they're like the underlying

[00:33:27] software that you build your game in so it's like you know for a unit to you need an example

[00:33:34] it's like a whole user interface and this is like where you you know you create build your world

[00:33:39] and this is how you set up your game logic and all this kind of stuff and and then you know when

[00:33:45] he's done you compile it and export it as a game and then you log into Microsoft or at PlayStation

[00:33:51] or Google's website and where you can upload a game and get it approved by them for publishing

[00:33:56] and stuff like that. Blizzard has always made its own engines you know and they've been very very

[00:34:02] successful at it. One of the reasons world of warcraft is un-fucking touchable is the engine like

[00:34:09] every when you've played world of warcraft every other MMO feels sluggish yeah on on on responsive

[00:34:17] and and and all this all this all the stuff and it's because of warcraft engine it's like

[00:34:22] it's really hard to emulate that I remember when I like world of warcraft in my first real MMO I

[00:34:28] played Final Fantasy 11 a little bit as a Final Fantasy fan but I didn't get it and also it was

[00:34:34] brutally difficult and frankly depressing to play Final Fantasy 11 not like it's like when

[00:34:40] you when you died in that game you lost experience points you could level down and it was brutally tough

[00:34:46] you had to level in groups fighting a group was painful if you were anything

[00:34:50] other than the healer it was a nightmare it was a nightmare game so I was really looking forward

[00:34:54] to world of warcraft as a warcraft 3 player and I was just kind of like this is this is going to be

[00:34:59] much better and over the previous stuff and I was like this is sounds like it's fixing everything

[00:35:02] that I hated about Final Fantasy 11 you could play by yourself you know it's got all sorts of stuff

[00:35:08] you know I remember being excited about the fact you could sit in chairs and go to an in you know

[00:35:13] gold show and not in Moon Glater but but yeah it's like that's proprietary to Blizzard it's Blizzard's

[00:35:24] engine right and that's why I applied Stole's the old Republic I was like why doesn't this feel

[00:35:29] like wow why is it so sluggish and I didn't really understand them in engines at the time

[00:35:33] like you know and then I played like Elder Scrolls online again it's like sluggish and janky and

[00:35:38] horrible feeling compared to well even Final Fantasy 14 round reborn which is like the only

[00:35:44] credible competitor to world of warcraft in the subscription and most space even that just doesn't

[00:35:49] feel as responsive and sort of tactile as wow does and it's because of you know the proprietary

[00:35:57] tech that Blizzard has developed over you know decades to make well what it is super responsive

[00:36:02] while also being massively scalable and relatively easy to rapidly build content for

[00:36:10] so in there my and also this is the real kicker you know unity cost money

[00:36:15] unreal engine costs money and they take a cut that's their business model right

[00:36:20] like you can use unity but you have to pay us this you have to pass that right there was this big

[00:36:25] uproar over the summer because unity was like they were going to increase their fees for developers

[00:36:29] because there I've been money trouble problems as well like every other company yeah like we need

[00:36:34] to find money from somewhere the only way we can do this is we're gonna charge for every single

[00:36:39] installation of a game rather than the flat fee you know and everyone was like oh well what about

[00:36:44] privacy what about host you know hostile you know fake installations to hurt the dev and all these

[00:36:50] kinds of there's just there's really backup communication and it ended up with the unity CEO

[00:36:55] you know resigning and it was this whole ass mess so yeah it's difficult to deal with an engine

[00:37:03] when it's not yours so like there is a logic there where it's like we should develop our own

[00:37:08] engine in house and then we have full control over everything to do with it you know so I can see

[00:37:13] why Blizzard would have done that because every single game they have pretty much as far as I know

[00:37:19] is its own engine except for Diablo and Mortal I think I've got a feeling Diablo more and

[00:37:26] might even be on Unity so I'm just gonna check that while we talk but that's the that's the mentality

[00:37:32] for developing your own engine but like I say it's really really hard like Halo Infinite

[00:37:38] which was developed by Microsoft and 343 was notoriously had issues with getting content and still is

[00:37:48] like it gets content patches way slower than Overwatch does gets content patches way slower than

[00:37:52] other shooters do and you know the the big thing that's often blamed is the proprietary

[00:37:59] engine they built for it like and because it's proprietary you have to if you've got like if

[00:38:06] you're hiring a new developer you have to train them on it which is slow but like if it's

[00:38:11] something that's known like Unity or Unreal Engine then it's like oh I can like instantly

[00:38:17] highest I can instantly hire an Unreal Engine developer and boom they're ready to go they don't

[00:38:21] have to train them on everything and yeah like Unreal and Unity like studios will have in house tools

[00:38:28] for these things but it's nowhere nearer as complicated potentially it's training them on a proprietary

[00:38:34] proprietary engine so that was blamed for Odyssey having this sort of really long and expensive

[00:38:43] dev cycle they were developing the engine alongside developing the game and trying to do too many

[00:38:48] things at once with it and I think in the Bloomberg article they're actually talking about should we

[00:38:55] switch out from real engine because at least then it's a known quantity and we can get people

[00:39:00] online but even that has issues because Unreal Engine not particularly great at doing Open World

[00:39:07] and it's not particularly great at doing other stuff like or at least it wasn't historically I think

[00:39:14] it's got a better but there's like only Fortnite really which sort of fully showcases what

[00:39:22] Unreal's capable of doing and then that's because Fortnite the developers also own the engine so they

[00:39:30] know they know that engine inside out and upside down backwards so switching your whole engine over to

[00:39:38] another code base and stuff is also not really an option it just got into this sort of

[00:39:46] this sort of no-go situation I guess so I've just looked it up so theablo mortal actually uses a

[00:39:57] proprietary engine built by netties so like again I remember the net ease connection yeah apparently

[00:40:05] that's coming back to I don't know if we talked about it but rumor is the blizzards well I suppose

[00:40:10] Microsoft Microsoft has patched up their relationship with netties

[00:40:16] coated reportedly created it so might see Will the Warcraft come back to China as well which

[00:40:24] Microsoft would like very much for money and I'll hopefully Chinese gamers you know we'll like that too

[00:40:33] might mean a lot of them have to start over again because I don't know if the

[00:40:38] the server information will be there but that's a whole other catfish yeah to discuss

[00:40:44] but yeah I'd see yeah it just seems like that was an easy pick for Culling and they swam the axe

[00:40:54] well just to sort of cap the engine mention is because I don't know that you and I will ever be

[00:41:02] able to do an episode where cyberpunk has not mentioned cyberpunk was built on an internal engine red

[00:41:09] engine and you know that notorious for having different issues with that and it sounds like

[00:41:14] for project Orion which is the sequel that they're switching over to unreal engine if I recall

[00:41:19] yeah sure and part of that is exactly what you mentioned is training and cross training because

[00:41:26] it's a lot faster to recruit people that already know how to work on that then it is to train

[00:41:31] them on this brand new thing that they're kind of building this train is going down the tracks so

[00:41:36] it sounds like it's kind of universal across the board with these development companies

[00:41:43] it's a higher and fire thing too right because like if you are working with contractors

[00:41:48] it's like training them on the engine and then laying them off that's like a huge waste of resources

[00:41:53] but if they already know the engine because it's something everybody uses or is at least more

[00:41:58] more familiar out there like when people are learning to game dev typically they start with uni

[00:42:04] then maybe they go to unreal engine because that's the one everyone uses you know

[00:42:10] like Microsoft doesn't offer slip space the high low engine for people to just play around with

[00:42:16] you know you have to you have to be an employee to get access to that information it's proprietary

[00:42:20] information right so yeah it's it's it's pros and cons right but it's one of the things that

[00:42:28] makes blizzard games so expensive is because they do do a lot of in-house stuff which requires you

[00:42:35] know more engineers potentially than you would if you were using something like unreal engine

[00:42:40] but it sounds like the culture might change I wouldn't be surprised if we see

[00:42:45] I I believe in my heart of hearts that and I don't have any information on this this is does

[00:42:50] I don't take this a little leak or something but I believe in my heart of hearts that we are

[00:42:55] gonna get a starcraft shooter third person starcraft shooter I believe that in my heart I don't

[00:43:02] I don't know what maybe I'm partially just manifesting it you know the starcraft ghosts

[00:43:07] oh I'm right there I'm with you every time you talk about this I start to get excited

[00:43:13] yeah I honestly believe that will make a starcraft shooter of some capacity and I think it'll be

[00:43:20] built in Unreal Engine you know there's a great there's a great example of a third

[00:43:26] violent for third person shooter with with monsters and stuff that feels heavy and that's

[00:43:31] Gears of War you know so yeah Gears of War with you know Starcraft stuff in it

[00:43:38] that's all I want out of life really I play that all day yeah that would make a great bridge between

[00:43:46] Starcraft on 2077 and Orion get my get my fill on that gotta play um so we have a survival game

[00:43:56] whatever was gonna be called that's out all those folks sounds like they're out maybe there's

[00:44:03] a handful that got transferred somewhere but like you said all we're seeing is whatever's reported

[00:44:07] on social media people kind of reporting you know I'm in I'm out whatever the deal is the other

[00:44:12] in Blizzard anyway the other sort of franchises that I think we've seen hit were Overwatch 2 and

[00:44:18] Diablo I saw a lot of artists being let go or other people being let go um relative to those two

[00:44:25] franchises in particular is this because they're not performing as well is this because the main

[00:44:32] development is over with is there's some redundancy with these that people just don't seem to be

[00:44:38] aware of what are you what are you what are you getting out of I don't know what are you seeing out

[00:44:43] of that that points to why these franchises got hit I'm like some of it is like you know I think

[00:44:54] we're using Overwatch as an example I've got a feeling that some of the teams that are responsible for

[00:44:59] PV content were probably let go and I wouldn't be surprised if that's because you know they had a

[00:45:05] team that was developing PV content for the PV mode and then they were you know the the story mode

[00:45:11] stuff was cancelled and then they're like okay well instead of yeah instead of doing the story

[00:45:16] mode what we're gonna do is we're gonna do these PV missions and stuff like that and um I actually

[00:45:22] played a couple they're pretty fun but it's at the same time it's like well when I when I open up

[00:45:27] Overwatch I'm probably not gonna be playing the story mode I'm probably gonna be playing the multiplayer

[00:45:33] right yeah so I wouldn't be surprised if some of you know the the team that was dedicated to building

[00:45:41] Overwatch PV content maybe that was an aspect of Overwatch that was downsized um you know and you

[00:45:49] know so they can shift the resources over to the stuff that is working which is the you know the

[00:45:54] PVP content um and Overwatch is one of if not the most negatively reviewed game on steam

[00:46:03] and some of that's backlash against micro transactions so I'm gonna say why is that isn't just

[00:46:08] that bad I don't really play it that much yeah it's it's it's not it's not that it's like it was

[00:46:14] it was backlash it's backlash against micro tracked transactions implicit in general

[00:46:19] it's backlash against a PV mode being cancelled and it's also backlash from Chinese players who lost

[00:46:23] access to music games from the net ease partnership so they use a steam reviews to vent their frustration

[00:46:30] and you know it became this meme where it's like give Overwatch a negative review right um but

[00:46:37] despite that it's still one of Blizzard's best performing games there was a LinkedIn a LinkedIn

[00:46:43] someone updated their LinkedIn with like the Achievements they're done and they're like yeah we

[00:46:48] may Overwatch made $250 million profit last year you know it's it's it's doing well you know there's

[00:46:55] nothing to you know there's nothing to deny about right um and uh yeah so there's that aspect of

[00:47:03] it and I think like just a bit sort of Overwatch I won't work in the playoffs you know fell there um

[00:47:11] I'm not sure I saw a lot of playoffs in the Diablo camp I saw a few yeah I was and I was surprised

[00:47:18] considering that it's still relatively new and still putting shit out but I saw at least a handful of

[00:47:24] folks yeah it seemed to be mostly in the artist area yeah I mean maybe I think like there's this whole sort

[00:47:32] of there's this sort of contention about Microsoft's corporate culture and that's like revolves

[00:47:41] around using contractors instead of full-time staff so like I think from maybe from Microsoft's

[00:47:47] perspective is like once the game's out your artist probably aren't arting a lot when there's

[00:47:54] not an immediate thing to be working on and it really sucks because one of the things that

[00:48:00] is so iconic and so good always about Blizzard games is the art I remember in Shadowlands which was

[00:48:08] ill received by the community shall we say putting it away yeah putting it lightly everyone always said

[00:48:14] yes Shadowlands is bad but the art is great the environment is still still really good saying we

[00:48:20] battle for Azeroth people didn't like grinding Azeroth but they still love the art the environment

[00:48:27] art was still on point some of those zones just var and unbelievable absolutely amazing like some

[00:48:34] of the best environments I've ever seen in the game and I know that engine is old as hell but

[00:48:39] there's the art style is timeless and the art direction for battle for Azeroth was absolutely

[00:48:43] spectacular and dragonaws have been no different I mean absolutely spectacular you know the Emerald

[00:48:49] Dream is absolutely gorgeous so absolutely stunning zone and yeah it's but when it comes to

[00:48:57] the ava I'm not sure because I know I know that Microsoft is really bullish on the avalo and

[00:49:02] its future I just wonder if like it's just not hitting some kind of targets and probably part of

[00:49:10] that is the life service I mean season season more of the avalo is awful season two seem to pull

[00:49:17] it back a bit but it's still had problems but I don't know if you've been watching the drama at all

[00:49:22] yes season three yeah season three has gone step backwards again and they added a bunch of stuff

[00:49:29] that everyone hates in action RPGs which is gates barriers and traps which no one likes having

[00:49:37] a wait for traps to go away before you can move these are games always about moving and killing

[00:49:42] stuff quickly and if there's just some you know spikes that come up and you have to just wait

[00:49:47] for them to go away like an automatic door it's it's not fun I don't know who in their right mind

[00:49:55] would have thought oh yeah let's put some traps in here this would be a great idea it's like bro

[00:49:59] what are you doing pathorex are literally tried this and everyone hated it everyone hated it

[00:50:05] luckily they responded very quickly and nerfed it already but I think like the life

[00:50:10] server the ongoing issues with the life service is probably why Marx off was like we need to

[00:50:15] scale this back a bit and hopefully we can grow it and come back later and I say come back later because

[00:50:22] dude one of the things like as someone who's been following Blizzard for a while you'll probably

[00:50:28] remember remember other rounds of layoffs that have happened over the years yep with Blizzard

[00:50:33] I think there was some in 2016 some in 2018 and despite this Blizzard grew to its biggest

[00:50:41] headcount ever during the pandemic so like over like 2020 2020 2020 to 2022 they almost doubled

[00:50:50] in headcount so even though they were they don't know those massive layoffs before those

[00:50:57] before the pandemic they they went back into the other direction and did and basically hired

[00:51:02] them all back you know over time and I remember seeing like I remember seeing people in twer being

[00:51:08] like oh I was laid off but now I'm back you know because they it's like oh we actually needed

[00:51:12] these people you know yep and it's like and again this is like borders on a border discussion about

[00:51:18] the the way the American economy is and the way the American corporate culture operates but

[00:51:24] it's you know they call it higher and fire for a reason it's like you fire people to make

[00:51:30] you quarterly look good and Microsoft share price went hard up when they announced these layoffs

[00:51:39] and then you actually when you actually double back around and start building your new projects

[00:51:44] and stuff you kind of start realizing actually maybe we do need some more community managers or

[00:51:49] actually maybe we do need an artist that really understands Diablo or yeah we do need this person

[00:51:55] and then they start hiring them back gradually over time and you can't do that and you're

[00:52:00] to the same sort of degree but there are like there are roles that you still aren't going to get

[00:52:05] hired back and that's like in publishing because Microsoft does its in house publishing team

[00:52:12] retail retail liaisons because Microsoft does it only in tells retail stuff customer service

[00:52:18] Microsoft doesn't believe in customer service if you've ever if you ever purchased anything from

[00:52:23] Microsoft store and had an issue with it you know sure as hell that Microsoft does not believe in

[00:52:27] customer service yeah so yeah those departments are probably never coming back but yeah I think

[00:52:36] we could see a lot of the people who got or at least some of them who got laid off mysteriously

[00:52:40] get their jobs back in the coming months but if they would even want to work at Microsoft again

[00:52:46] after this I don't know but not a large jobs out there right now yeah it's as we've talked about

[00:52:54] it industry wide right in gaming and tech it's just it's happening all over the place and you know

[00:52:59] here in California I don't live that far from Silicon Valley and this stuff you see even just

[00:53:05] semi locally you know boom and bust cycles of a lot of these businesses it is staggering to watch

[00:53:13] depending on especially the budgets and amount of millions of dollars that are involved that

[00:53:19] just seemed to flow around it's insane and so I guess to get you know we're almost an hour in

[00:53:27] here and we haven't yet even talked about our our favorite franchise the whole reason this show

[00:53:32] exists in the first place world of warcraft for the most part from what I've seen has been mostly

[00:53:40] untouched um the only exceptions that I've seen so far is I have seen a couple community managers

[00:53:48] in Europe of varia being one of them one that uh near and dear to my heart the one that

[00:53:54] consoled me after watching the annual cinematic at blizzcon and it appears that her position was

[00:54:01] affected and as you said and as she seems to have suggested along with others the process is

[00:54:09] different in Europe and so you know maybe there's something else that might happen might get

[00:54:14] transitioned or you know maybe there's a there's a longer runway there uh which yeah is way better

[00:54:20] than I think what people get here uh but overall it seems like world of warcraft has fared pretty

[00:54:28] well I haven't seen a single dev that I follower am aware of mentioned that they were let go

[00:54:36] uh we talked last time about the road map and I had asked the question even like is it dangerous

[00:54:41] to put out some of these things specifically like an alpha because you never know what'll happen

[00:54:46] and to that end holly longdale did put a post out on twitter that said because some of us our

[00:54:53] road map and plans for classic and modern world of warcraft aren't changing this team is here

[00:54:59] for our players and each other even in grief I love them Andy wall so great she's

[00:55:05] having met her in person I assure you folks she she is the genuine article she's very nice

[00:55:10] she seems really cool she's she's legit so

[00:55:17] we seem to be okay somehow yeah warcraft did avoid the bulk of this stuff and part of it is because

[00:55:27] warcraft's still just like so much money you know it's it's the cash code it's the one that makes

[00:55:32] money it's the envy of the gaming world world of warcraft is how much like could you put a dollar

[00:55:37] amount on it no I can't but I just I just know from talking to people like it's like

[00:55:42] it's the envy of the gaming world even though it's been in decline and stuff you've got

[00:55:46] you've got a game that gives guaranteed cash flow you know yeah there's there's no risk here you've

[00:55:52] got a dedicated playbass who will never quit I've got like I've got like years of play time

[00:55:59] accumulated and and and you know I always buy the 12 month every single year it's like it's like

[00:56:07] patreon for a game you know the world of warcraft it kind of just it's the guaranteed cash flow

[00:56:13] quarter of a quarter you don't want to depredise that and that's why like Marks of those things

[00:56:18] like Xbox Game Pass or Xbox Live Gold it's guaranteed income you know because people don't

[00:56:24] unsubscribe as long as the game's good as long as the service is good and Blizzard World of Warcraft

[00:56:31] has improved a lot in recent years and I do think like I think we talked about before like I do

[00:56:36] think they're on board in process for new players needs to be a lot better but I think that's what

[00:56:40] things like season of discoveries for you know season of discovery is just you know very accessible

[00:56:46] and it's a very popular on streaming services and you know that sort of makes people curious I get

[00:56:51] messages all the time you know from Xbox fans like saying I really want this to come to Xbox because

[00:56:57] I want to try for the first time and I always hint about bringing it to consoles and I do think

[00:57:01] it will come to consoles which again we'll give it a whole new audience but yeah it does seem like

[00:57:08] warcrafts completely avoided the bulk of these cuts and as a warcraft fan I'm really happy about

[00:57:16] that but at the same time it's just it's bittersweet you know because all this other stuff happened to

[00:57:22] all the other teams and all the other studios and yeah I don't know what a what a awful it's really

[00:57:30] weird how the industry is right now there's like yet last year was so many high quality releases we

[00:57:36] had like cyberpunk expansion which is really well received and it felt like every month there was

[00:57:41] at least two or three nine to ten out of ten games that were launched last year because the pandemic

[00:57:47] sort of crush had ended and then everyone was suddenly back in the office and all these games

[00:57:53] that were devating development progressing slowly all of a sudden came like turbocharged and you know

[00:58:00] we got to a point where there was just tons and tons of great games coming out and it's still

[00:58:05] continuing even now we've had loads of good games come out in January even now but it's like

[00:58:11] in the background there's all these labs tons and tons of labs it's crazy absolutely crazy

[00:58:18] so has somebody with his hand on the pulse and I mean this is your day job is

[00:58:28] reporting on these issues why from a from a 30,000 foot view

[00:58:34] why is this happening right now why why is it that it seems like now within the last I don't know

[00:58:40] year maybe you know you can correct me on this but it seems like in more recent times anyway

[00:58:45] that more of this has been happening that there are more devs that are out of jobs than we've ever

[00:58:52] seen in such a period of time is there like a like a major contributing factor to this is just

[00:58:58] the perfect storm like what is it so I read a really really long now the sister recently about

[00:59:06] the state of the gaming industry and what it means and I can you know drop your link and you

[00:59:11] could stick in the description when when podcast goes live people want to check it out in detail

[00:59:17] but essentially the short answer is is it's a combination of things so like I mentioned

[00:59:22] activisions headcount ballooned during covid and I think part of this was there was this white

[00:59:30] spread belief that covid and lockdown would create a wave of new gamers it would create a you

[00:59:38] know people who are like you know maybe they're playing Diablo more for the first time or

[00:59:41] hard stone or or wallcraft or something trying out the hobby for the first time and you know

[00:59:47] and we're stuck at home because we stuck at home or we stuck at home or you know we don't have to

[00:59:53] commute anymore so we've got more money to spend on things like games and we've got a little bit

[00:59:59] more time you know presuming we're not slack enough when we're working from home we at least don't

[01:00:05] have to we don't have to commute anymore so that will you know add another couple of hours

[01:00:10] of day to gaming time potentially and the expectation there was oh no so kids not at school so

[01:00:17] the expectation there was it would create a wave of new gamers and those gamers would be sticky

[01:00:22] and they would they would not stop gaming after the pandemic ended and everything would be honky

[01:00:26] doorian the industry would grow overall however that didn't happen um there was a boost to start with

[01:00:38] and you know we saw lots of games hit the most concurrent users ever and like I know you know

[01:00:44] working on a website seeing our traffic stats our traffic was absolutely insane during the first

[01:00:50] couple of lockdowns everyone stuck at home on their phones you know more than ever you know

[01:00:55] browsing reading about gaming news and you know and our company and and the there are various tech

[01:01:02] website brands we had a boot time everyone stuck at home they were built they were like researching

[01:01:08] you know what's the best PC for a home oh my face it was the best webcam for Microsoft Teams and

[01:01:14] and all these kind of stuff so there was this big boom time for everyone who is in tech

[01:01:18] so everyone in tech was like okay we need to we need to take advantage of this right now

[01:01:23] right now we need to take advantage of this it's higher as many people as we can but as much

[01:01:27] product as we can out there and take advantage of the fact that no one can go to work no one could

[01:01:31] go to school and does seem like blue activation Blizzard was was particularly right in this wave

[01:01:38] if you look at the head count reported head count which you know he's he's going around which I don't

[01:01:43] know 100% exactly it but I have been told that they did definitely balloon head count way beyond

[01:01:50] what was perhaps responsible are we talking about hundreds or thousands thousands we're talking

[01:01:58] about thousands like thousands of people and also like people who are you know everyone had to work

[01:02:04] from home and I suppose like the the mentality was if we're if we've if we are now a work from home

[01:02:10] company because we've got no choice then we can boost development speed by you know hiring people

[01:02:16] further afield people from outside of California you know and this and this whole remote working culture

[01:02:22] that we've got now but that was all that all depended on this notion that the the the new gamers

[01:02:30] that were coming in as a result of the pandemic would stick around and now that the lockdowns are over

[01:02:36] and the pandemic is waned and covid is in the series as you know it potentially was for people

[01:02:41] who were vulnerable to it in the in the early days those gamers haven't stuck around they haven't

[01:02:47] stuck around so you know you've got you've got companies like PlayStation which are the you know

[01:02:52] the biggest console company in the world way way bigger the next box in terms of footprint

[01:02:58] their operating margins which is like you know the difference between how much they spend on

[01:03:04] their company they're sort of expenses versus how much they profit their margins over during the

[01:03:10] course of pandemic shrank from like 20% down to 6% because they you know they for various reasons

[01:03:18] like consumer habits consumers are nervous about spending money and people have gone back to work

[01:03:26] in the office and then they didn't become full-blown gamers you know maybe they just dabbled

[01:03:31] in a few free to play games and maybe they didn't spend any micro money on micro transactions or

[01:03:36] whatever and then you've got inflation so the inflationary process which has gone down that's

[01:03:41] increased costs of everything across the board you know and if you're a global company

[01:03:46] America's inflation is kind of tapered off to some degree but then the rest of the world

[01:03:54] not so much the case you know you like Britain still got like a 12% inflation rate

[01:03:58] and then you've got countries like Turkey which have hit like 60% and even countries like Argentina

[01:04:03] which are looking at like hundreds of percent of tomato it's um it's it's you know and then

[01:04:09] interest rates have gone up so like being able to borrow capital is more difficult so if you do

[01:04:15] want to spin up a new team or something and doing an investment and like you go to a bank and say

[01:04:20] I want X millions of dollars to do this the interest rates have gone up so it's sort of like

[01:04:25] the death of free money which is what was powering the economy for for like you know the last 20

[01:04:32] years almost with these like historically low interest rates but that seems to have come to an end

[01:04:38] as well um so it's a it's a quite a perfect storm of factors that various tech companies and

[01:04:45] various internet companies whether it's whether it's tech or whether it's gaming or anything online

[01:04:50] they had this bet that the pandemic would last forever or something and that people would just be

[01:04:55] able to spend money forever on on you know playing games and slacking off at work but it's just

[01:05:01] there wasn't real it was based on just an unreality and now we've got this situation where

[01:05:08] the whole gaming business the whole gaming industry has actually shrunk when you account for inflation

[01:05:15] so like it's it's grown by like 2% or something which is well behind america's

[01:05:24] average economic growth and it's well behind other entertainment mediums as well which is

[01:05:31] another important factor to behind movies books music all of those sore growth but gaming didn't

[01:05:36] the gaming didn't see growth because costs increase so much and all because it's a mostly an online

[01:05:43] thing companies hired too much and they were like okay we're remote now we can hire anyone from

[01:05:49] anywhere in the world and will balloon head counter will make will make more hardstone expansions

[01:05:54] than everyone will do more of this than ever and you know and it'll just it'll just make people

[01:05:59] spend more money than ever and it just didn't work out that way so like they boosted head count

[01:06:04] and while remaining roughly similarly productive in a lot of cases or that or they boosted head count

[01:06:11] to maintain the level of productivity that they're already at and because working from home you know

[01:06:19] is is yeah I know there's a big there's a big argument in the gaming industry about whether or not

[01:06:26] remote working should be the norm for gaming but it does it does add a drag on on the

[01:06:33] the rapidity of of everything you know if you're uploading if you're uploading builds and

[01:06:38] working through GitHub and all that kind of stuff rather than just like doing things locally on

[01:06:43] a local area network where you've got like full blown it you know internal network speed and stuff

[01:06:48] like that it can put a dragon on you know on the the process especially when you you factor in by

[01:06:56] you know um the size of a game or the size of a team it's like exponentially more

[01:07:02] multiplicative I can't say that word um it's actually it's exponentially more

[01:07:09] complicated when you start factoring these different things so um it's just a reality of it

[01:07:15] you know and also games games expectations keep going up we want more we want more for

[01:07:20] less all the time and you know like Microsoft put out a game and it's like it's not every time

[01:07:27] Microsoft put out a game and it doesn't have the same graphical fidelity of God of War like

[01:07:32] everyone gets mad and it's like God of War cost like $400 million to make or something

[01:07:38] reportedly um I just pulled that figure out by ask by the way but it's it's hundreds of millions

[01:07:44] of dollars hundreds of millions I mean whatever it is that's a shit time it's still it's still a lot

[01:07:49] of money like there's reports that grandfather six he's gonna cost anywhere up to a billion dollars

[01:07:54] to have made oh my god it's obscene yeah and it's like it's like you know they're

[01:08:01] hopefully make a lot of money hopefully for their sake rather it's like I mean but it's like

[01:08:08] imagine if that was a flop imagine if GTI was a flop and then they spent a billion dollars for

[01:08:14] nothing it's it's it'd be a disaster you know that's when the else happened and stuff yeah oh yeah

[01:08:21] so yeah it's a it's a perfect storm of consumer consumer spending on different things you know

[01:08:28] it's a constraint constraints for time and it's also things like you know the costs of

[01:08:34] developing a game have gone up a lot um anywhere up to 20% in some cases and the death of free capital

[01:08:44] and the fact the gaming industry hasn't grown so investors are less confident in it's a huge

[01:08:51] array of factors and I don't know when it'll end you know this people saying things like

[01:09:01] it's could go on from another two years it's could go on from another two years where like

[01:09:06] they still layoffs and there's still projects being cancelled and still studios being shutted because

[01:09:14] there isn't enough growth in the industry there's no enough player spending there's no

[01:09:18] enough new players um or maybe players like our age are playing less because we've got less time

[01:09:23] we're having kids well for me but people normal people are having kids just like yourself Luna takes

[01:09:32] out here um and that's really spent like raising the kids become more expensive than ever so it's

[01:09:37] kind of like what what do I do do I spend $70 on God of War 3 or do I do I play against an

[01:09:43] impact to be free that costs very true no that's very true I mean it's you've hit the nail on

[01:09:49] the head at least in terms of like I guess we're my demographic lies where I might be able to steal

[01:09:56] a couple hours a few times a week to bang out a game that I want to play so I am so everybody

[01:10:04] jokes about having you know a backlog in their steam library but I am so woefully behind

[01:10:10] in everything I have because I just don't have the time and it does feel like kind of generationally

[01:10:18] right we came up at a time where we've always played games we're the first generation really

[01:10:23] that continued to play games when you know supposed to be something that you grew out of

[01:10:28] it's just the challenges is that you don't have as much time for it anymore and yeah you do have

[01:10:33] to be more judicious when I gave a $70 as opposed to $45 or $50 and you know it makes a difference

[01:10:42] every dollar makes a difference especially now to the points that you made about inflation you know

[01:10:47] politically you can go back and forth a lot of different ways about why and when and where but

[01:10:54] it is a real thing and it makes a big difference when you're at the grocery store and you're like

[01:11:00] damn that bill's getting big and you know maybe I'm not buying xyz this week and so those

[01:11:08] those points ring very true to your average person so I do think that that makes a lot of sense

[01:11:17] and so coming out of that we've seen the hits that Blizzard has taken from either individual games

[01:11:26] or entire games or uh in Warcraft's case seems to be relatively unscathed there were two big departures

[01:11:35] that were also part of this that were announced the first I'll mention is that one of the original

[01:11:43] co-founders of Blizzard like silicon and synapse like going back to 1991 Alan Adam adhem

[01:11:52] however I say I apologize uh he has left and he had left before he was around until I want to say

[01:11:59] the early 2000s he came back a handful of years ago and has been in a senior leadership position

[01:12:05] so he departed but the other and the one that's getting the most press is my kibara who we've talked

[01:12:13] about who you you know have a long standing uh acquaintance with and he stepped down

[01:12:23] released a statement I think you'll have to correct me on this I believe there was something

[01:12:28] internal but external on Twitter I know we saw a pretty big post letting us know

[01:12:33] and there seemed to be generally like thanks for being here Mike you know that's a shock but

[01:12:40] appreciate what you've done but then to sort of put the book end on this it looks like I may be on

[01:12:46] LinkedIn he made a statement about how he was going to be taking some time off and traveling in the

[01:12:54] world with his family and then he was going to quote look for hyper growth opportunities with great

[01:12:59] teams following that which as somebody who's been in a layoff if the if one of the people that

[01:13:07] was in a senior management position left right after that and said the shit that he said I would

[01:13:14] be pissed that oh you're gonna go travel the world while I'm trying to figure out how I'm going

[01:13:20] to eat yeah I mean Mike is notorious for putting his foot in it with think with his post on social

[01:13:30] media yeah he really is like some of the I heard that some of the things he said in the past

[01:13:37] when he was in Microsoft led to him being forced to issue a public apology to the whole Xbox

[01:13:44] team like you know really proper dressing down so I will say that Mike is controversial

[01:13:53] within Microsoft within Blizzard yeah and in general like he's a controversial guy for like various

[01:14:01] reasons and one of the reasons is like these sort of tone deaf comments that he makes and he

[01:14:08] I think he will be first to admit that he does this um um you know and yeah that was a pretty

[01:14:16] tone deaf thing from so I didn't know he said that you know about traveling the world but

[01:14:20] um when you said it was like yep that sounds like Michael right um but um yeah so one of the

[01:14:29] things about Mike and um and one of the one of the one of the annoying things about the corporate

[01:14:35] world really bugs me is when they say people have moved on they've moved on they I've moved I'm

[01:14:43] moving on to a different opportunity or something Lulu said it when she got

[01:14:49] when she left left Blizzard and Mike said it and my booty said it about Mike Ibarra when

[01:14:57] he left Blizzard but I you know I know pretty much for a fact that Lulu and Mike were laid off

[01:15:04] you know they were not they didn't volunteer to retire they you know Mike you know um

[01:15:13] uh Jason Shryer from Bloomberg said on Twitter that Mike could said to him at Blizzcon that he

[01:15:20] was in it for the long haul and he was excited about the future and all this kind of stuff right

[01:15:24] so it's kind of like not what you say if you're planning planning to leave um so yeah I don't

[01:15:31] believe for a second that they weren't part of the layoffs too and also it goes along with

[01:15:36] Microsoft's Microsoft's modus operandos for layoffs in general they often target senior members of staff

[01:15:45] who've been there for a long time who cost a lot of money like um Microsoft laid off

[01:15:52] um very famous Xbox figure called Major Nelson um a little while ago I don't know if you know

[01:15:58] or have heard of Major Nelson but he's been there since the OG Xbox days yeah the website

[01:16:03] made in elson.com and he was in charge of Xbox programming and stuff like that

[01:16:08] he got laid off when Microsoft did layoffs last year um also like some other long time

[01:16:15] Microsoft veterans got laid off like Alex Kippman who diverged HoloLens and the Kinect Peripheral

[01:16:20] and he was in charge of all that artificial VR stuff and stuff like that so they often do target

[01:16:27] senior roles for cost saving but also like with regards to you know people like Sam Wires and

[01:16:35] an Adam who probably have quite a lot of stock they probably made a lot of money in the sale

[01:16:44] I'm sure um they're probably not too upset about having to move having to move on you know

[01:16:53] not not that I'm saying Sam Wires did because this Sam Wires was a little bit earlier but also like um

[01:16:59] uh uh Mike I probably not too upset about having to move on because I'm pretty sure Mike is

[01:17:07] probably multi-millionaire and you know and but that's exactly why it's so toned definitely

[01:17:13] to talk about oh I'm gonna travel the world it's like bro you're not you're not just saying that right now

[01:17:17] yeah um but perhaps you don't know you mentioned Lulu who who was Lulu?

[01:17:24] Lulu Cheng Miservy was in charge of Activision Blizzard comms so she was famous or controversial on

[01:17:33] Twitter for she'd been accused of union busting behavior she was in charge of like

[01:17:40] um Activision Activision's corporate affairs and stuff like that and she was um she was at

[01:17:47] Blizzcon in cosplay I think as Jaina I want to say if I remember correctly um so like she's

[01:17:58] controversial because she's quite popular with with some fans and stuff but she's controversial

[01:18:04] within the industry for this union busting accusation and stuff I don't know what the truth is

[01:18:09] there or whatever but um these like these are the kind of the sort of the internal politics that

[01:18:16] I often hear about with regards to some of this stuff um so we've regards to Mike

[01:18:25] Mikey Barra Mike being the Blizzard president um I'm not sure what Mike's what's gonna do there I

[01:18:32] don't know if like they're just gonna not have someone in charge of Blizzard that was gonna be my next

[01:18:37] question is was what if there's a vacuum there how do they fill it yeah I mean they kind of

[01:18:45] did the same with the xenimax because there was p-hines from xenimax who was like head of publishing

[01:18:53] and he left but I'm not sure if he left or if he got laid off you know it's another one of them

[01:18:59] as he moving on he's moving on he's retiring or moving on you know you don't know um

[01:19:05] but it's like but now like the z- as far as I know that there is a head of xenimax who answers to

[01:19:12] Matt Booty so theoretically speaking Blizzard will have a head figure who then reporting to Matt Booty

[01:19:22] and stuff like that because the idea that Matt Booty could manually oversee every single

[01:19:30] Microsoft gaming studio you know of which there are now dozens back in the day there was just

[01:19:35] high-level Gears forza and there was like dozens called of duty all these other studios um

[01:19:44] and uh the idea that he could oversee all that by himself is he's not viable in my head so I would

[01:19:52] think that Blizzard does need some kind of figurehead so a leader you know I don't know I would hope

[01:19:58] that it's like I hope they pick someone who can bring some morale back to their team you know

[01:20:04] like you mentioned Holly Longdown and I think that maybe she'd be good for that job you know

[01:20:08] that's that's who first came to my mind because of the exact reason that you just said is

[01:20:14] I think back to when Mike Borheim left and that was like oh shit that that was kind of one of

[01:20:22] those big-o shit moments where things felt really unstable at that moment because like oh

[01:20:29] that's that's a big one to go and then you had I mean I feel bad for jail and brack I feel like he

[01:20:36] got put in a position that was completely unwinnable and he yeah I genuinely feel bad for him

[01:20:48] and I think he did the best he could with what he had when he was there and you know mistakes were

[01:20:55] made but man I truly feel bad for him and then he looked at this like like you couldn't fake

[01:21:02] you couldn't fake the way we saw him with genuine emotion like yeah I think he was he was always very

[01:21:12] real and then then he left right and and that was I don't know sacrificial lamb I don't know how much

[01:21:20] he was responsible for what happened when all the lawsuits and everything hit but then we had

[01:21:24] the co-presidents right and then they axed it down and then it was just Mike and so there's been

[01:21:35] problems at the top ever since Mike Mooreheim left it just it hasn't been stable

[01:21:42] and I wonder if Holly might be the best person because she is I think a genuine

[01:21:52] person when it comes to her passion for Blizzard for Blizzard gaming particularly for World of Warcraft

[01:21:58] it's not an act like it's legitimate like this is she feels very deeply and strongly about

[01:22:04] the work that they're doing about the people about the franchises like she's she's the real deal

[01:22:10] and she seems to be the kind of personality that people will rally around

[01:22:15] and what it's worth right or wrong I think promoting a woman into that position would be good for them

[01:22:26] yeah I honestly think that's probably what they're looking for like when I am back in the day

[01:22:32] before Sarah Bond recently so I need to explain a Sarah Bond is first but I really type for granted

[01:22:38] because I you know my Xbox audience but Sarah Bond is in charge of she was promoted recently

[01:22:47] she's in charge of the Xbox ecosystem from a platform perspective the developers the hardware

[01:22:56] the the software so things like baton there probably fall under her responsibility or her team right

[01:23:02] so I before she got promoted into that role I was often thinking like they're gonna bring on her

[01:23:07] to be the CEO of Acto Union Blizzard they kind of felt like that was like ideal for her to have done

[01:23:12] there you know ideal replacement for Bobby Cote kind of thing right but then we've got all this

[01:23:18] situation where now we sort of like we don't know where it's all gonna go we don't know if

[01:23:22] there will be a president but I think you're right like someone like Holly would be a great get

[01:23:28] and Microsoft do like people like that for that role you know like Todd Howard

[01:23:33] you know famously the guy made Skyrim you know and Fallout 3 and also recently Starfield like they

[01:23:42] he's basically you know the passion is undeniable you know like people people clown on him but

[01:23:48] you know about like the quality of some of his recent games but you can't deny the dude's passion right

[01:23:55] yes and also you look at Minecraft like he's still one of the founding developers Minecraft

[01:24:00] still were in that studio jab and they do love people like that for those kind of roles right

[01:24:07] mm-hmm so yeah when I think about where they could go with the president I think you're right probably

[01:24:16] doesn't need to be a woman and I often think like maybe they should try I don't know what she's

[01:24:22] doing now did she found a studio like when they were doing the co-presidents thing like what happened

[01:24:28] I can't remember her name off top of my head but she ran for Icaria's visions right mm-hmm

[01:24:32] and then they got absorbed and then you know then she got ousted by Mike you know so I think

[01:24:41] I would have preferred her possibly to have stayed you know and maybe that's the play you get someone

[01:24:49] who can bring morale back to that team I kind of feel like when Chris Metzen came back it was

[01:24:54] that kind of like oh wow it's an OG Blizzard guy coming back that feels great you know

[01:24:59] because Blizzard is about the culture a lot in a lot of ways it's Geno Neil is who are talking about that

[01:25:06] Neil yeah yeah Geno Neil I could get Geno Neil but I don't I don't know what she's doing now and

[01:25:12] maybe she just wouldn't want to but oh god I I wouldn't imagine so but I mean you never know I

[01:25:18] mean any of us that have ever watched professional wrestling in our life we have learned to never

[01:25:24] say never because you just don't know what's gonna happen out there um but yeah it's

[01:25:33] yeah anything's possible yes so yeah we're not gonna talk about the Vince McMahon drummer right

[01:25:41] you know uh that's a no other episode yeah uh but it's more like it's less drama

[01:25:51] and more horror story I think anything you know it's just another reminder that the rich people are

[01:25:58] off you know there's a lot of risk people out there that are insane and I don't know if it's the

[01:26:04] money that makes you crazy or the money that just allows you to be or too crazy um but uh maybe

[01:26:10] maybe being crazy is what gets you money in the first place I don't know oh you know what maybe

[01:26:14] that's maybe I'm not crazy no maybe that's what yeah I'm half crazy maybe that's why too much

[01:26:20] empathy to be rich now maybe that's it you know care too much but uh you know what I won't do

[01:26:26] is uh I will not literally take a shit on my employees if I ever had them so um thank you for that

[01:26:32] I'm good I'm good I'm really happy to know that yeah yeah and I I will not try to uh you know

[01:26:38] extort nude photos of you either um little little less I'm blue this point about

[01:26:43] oh well we'll see what's real yeah never in wrestling right never never say never

[01:26:53] and that's you know kind of back to to the point is you know you never quite know what'll happen

[01:26:59] in these power vacuum situations and so for us here more locally with Blizzard

[01:27:07] in a way I want somebody like a holly long day oh uh I don't think you know like I think about

[01:27:12] like Chris Metzen but I don't think Metzen wants that wide of a swathe I think he like

[01:27:18] about to be crave yeah yeah I think he wants to stay where he is because the other thing is too is

[01:27:24] I worry about whoever's gonna be putting that position because it's always an impossible spot

[01:27:29] I feel like it's you're just you're never gonna make enough money you're never gonna

[01:27:35] make things quick enough you're never you like nothing is ever going to be good enough and that

[01:27:41] steals a person's soul away and you don't want these bad things to happen to good people but

[01:27:49] you never know some people are built for it in a way that others aren't and you know whoever it is

[01:27:55] certainly they're gonna be under the microscope but they'll also have I think the full support

[01:27:59] depending on well I mean depending on who they are supposed to agree but I think they'll

[01:28:03] have the full support of the community because at the end of the day we all want the same thing which

[01:28:08] is play good games to have the people that make them be supported and you know to be moving in that

[01:28:16] same direction together and so perhaps it's overlining but I think at least in where my vantage point

[01:28:26] lies I've seen so much support for the people that have gotten laid off now I know there's people

[01:28:32] out there that are shitting on this and that or whatever but for the most part it's been a lot of

[01:28:37] support it's people reaching out it's people sharing portfolios it's people sharing you know linked

[01:28:44] and stuff it's people sharing other opportunities the network it's it's really

[01:28:49] heartening to me to see the humanity coming together to try to help each other out because that

[01:28:58] above all else is really what matters because you put the games aside you put warcraft and

[01:29:06] cancelled games and money and all that stuff aside I mean we're talking about people real

[01:29:12] realized human beings with their own hopes and dreams and their lives that they're living and

[01:29:20] you want them to be supported because one it's just good to have you know human beings supporting

[01:29:27] other human beings but two in this industry people are gonna make better stuff if they feel good

[01:29:32] about what they're doing and where they are you know and that to me is the number one of I see all

[01:29:39] the money that's being made and I go you could if you wanted to right make an environment that is

[01:29:45] inclusive supportive you know gives people what they need and allows them to be free to create

[01:29:51] because they're artists and they're different they are built different than a lot of other people

[01:29:58] and you have to put them in positions to be successful and right now you have a workforce that is

[01:30:06] scared that is I'm sure about what's going on that is thinking maybe I need to leave this industry

[01:30:14] maybe I've got an eye out for the door and that is a hard way to build a stable team a productive

[01:30:21] team and a good product and it's just a vicious cycle that I hope that this is the blood that needed

[01:30:32] to be let and now we can close that up and get back to good work and supporting people but

[01:30:40] maybe it's a good question for you to kind of end this episode on is do you think that this is

[01:30:48] this is it for now for Microsoft do you think that the redundancies have been addressed and the

[01:30:53] major challenges have been sort of cut off and that now we can begin to rebuild and heal and move on

[01:31:02] or do you think there will be more of this to come I mean I wish I could say that it's probably

[01:31:09] the end of it but you know they still they headcount is still way higher than it was so like I

[01:31:16] want to believe that this though won't be more but how how can you you know it's really hard

[01:31:22] to just say that yeah this is it it's going to be more than this now you can't you can't say it

[01:31:26] and it sucks that you can't say it yeah but I want to believe man I really do but I need to see

[01:31:35] it I need to see the evidence of that that won't be there won't be more so yeah we'll just have

[01:31:42] to wait and see I think we will and as always as I said at the end of last year you know this

[01:31:50] this show will be here to address and to discuss the good and the bad whatever comes up you know

[01:31:58] I had a whole agenda for this show where we were going to talk about the claiming Gil Neas and

[01:32:03] what happened at the tree and a bunch of other good stuff and we will talk about that in the future but

[01:32:12] we will talk about that next time and I'm we we may have to do two trading post ratings at once but

[01:32:18] you know we felt it was important for this episode just to have an open discussion about

[01:32:23] the layoffs the effects that they've had and you know jazz I appreciate you doing a lot of

[01:32:27] the heavy lifting this episode and you know you do have a lift man it's kind of it's kind of

[01:32:35] kind of helps this my day job and it's this kind of like incidental I have to look at all this stuff

[01:32:39] for work and yeah you know it's it's it's horrible man I had people I got a lot of blizzard friends

[01:32:45] you know blizzard sources and I had people found me open tears man I've never I've never known

[01:32:51] anything like that like blizzards in the air and day to my heart and you know I had people on

[01:32:55] social media calling me out for it they were like oh you weren't upset you weren't this upset when

[01:32:59] the halo had its layoffs and stuff like that but it's kind of like sometimes you know

[01:33:05] it just sort of it feels so much more visceral and close to home when it's people you know

[01:33:11] being affected and it's like as much as you try and you want to have empathy for everyone

[01:33:17] it's going through everything all the time it's really hard on a global scale to do that

[01:33:22] yeah you know and they're you know as bad as layoffs are there are things even worse happening

[01:33:28] in the world when you look at the news and it's and that's what gaming you're supposed to be an

[01:33:33] escape from all that stuff you know it's there's only so much negativity that any any one person

[01:33:39] can tolerate any one particular time and games like world of warcraft is like a great way of just

[01:33:44] being like you know I'm okay at the moment playing warcraft I don't have to think about any of this

[01:33:49] stuff and but when these issues come up and these situations arise you can't sort of you can't

[01:33:56] just sort of gloss over and ignore it because there are real people at the end of it like you said

[01:34:02] so yeah that's right that's right well goodness set up better and uh I think uh I think at this

[01:34:12] point we've probably done enough damage for one episode so for those who don't already know where

[01:34:20] can the good people find you out on the internet Jess you can follow me on Twitter x or wherever it's

[01:34:27] called now at jes cordon jz c o r d e n and uh yeah check out my content on windowscentral.com

[01:34:35] I appreciate it hopefully gonna be doing more well content but it's like how do I compete with

[01:34:40] well head man you just can't you just can't compete with well head so um the gothic sprite over

[01:34:46] there has a well oiled machine yeah they are they are amazing at what they do so you know I'm

[01:34:52] really glad that they exist I'm on well head like every single day pretty much but we have windows

[01:34:58] central we get into the weeds about marks of the ecosystem you know and uh the whole the whole

[01:35:04] shebang so they're good the bad and the ugly that's uh for marks of things so that's blizzard

[01:35:10] activation xbox surface windows whatever so yeah thank you very much there you go thank you

[01:35:18] well thank you as i thank you again for uh you know two episodes in we made it too

[01:35:24] you know we're gonna keep this we're gonna keep the streak alive so uh thanks again for being here

[01:35:29] my friend and uh my thanks to all of you for listening and remember you can always follow me

[01:35:35] and this show on twitter at berserker rage and unshackled underscore theory on blue sky at berserker

[01:35:42] and unshackled theory as well as on twitch at unshackled theory and real berserker you can also join our

[01:35:47] discord links for which are in the profile the show on twitter and our bonus role page i want to

[01:35:52] say uh jaz has done a great job of uh jaz and that place up and it's more lively than it's ever been so

[01:35:58] please jump on into our discord having a good time over there and feel free to contact the show with

[01:36:03] your questions comments or otherwise through any of those resources or unshackled fury.com and you

[01:36:10] can find this show wherever you get your podcasts so once again thank you for listening remember to

[01:36:17] keep your swords wet in your banner's high and we'll see you next time bear with