Now that Activision has merged up with Blizzard all under Vivendi it’s time to consider what to do with all the additional overhead, management, internal studios and sheer amount of people working on projects within their organization. In other words, it’s time to trim the fat and get leaned out for the long haul.
This isn’t unexpected news, the only way to grow more effective as a large company is to remove some of the access baggage that can slow you down and let your competitors take control. This is a sad job which nobody takes pride in (most normal people anyway) but it could mean the difference between rising to the top and sinking like a brick.
“We are focused on improving efficiency across the combined organization and are concentrating on businesses where we have leadership positions that are aligned with Activision Publishing’s long-term corporate objectives,” Activision Publishing CEO Mike Griffith said in a statement. (gamespot)
It’s important to be aggressive as a large company, just like you would be as a startup company. There is a reason startup companies grow into powerful competitors that win, grow and eventually become (or be purcahsed by) larger companies.
As part of this move some staff will be migrated to new projects, persumably reporposed into other divisions or allowed to find new jobs somewhere else. This is called “realignment” by those in the management organization, and currently those up for realignment are:
- Radical Entertainment (Prototype, Crash of the Titans)
- High Moon Studios (The Bourne Conspiracy, Darkwatch).
- Massive Entertainment (World in Conflict, Ground Control)
- Swordfish Studios (50 Cent: Blood on the Sand, Cold Winter)
These realignments along with other organizational changes will effect a few working game titles:
- Brutal Legend
- Ghostbusters
- Wet
- Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena
- World at Conflict: Soviet Assault
- 50 Cent Blood on the Sand
- Zombie Wranglers
- Leisure Suit Larry: Box Office Bust
- Several Xbox Live Arcade titles
At this point we’re not sure which, if any, will continue to be developed under Activision and which will be sold off to other companies or retired. Surely, those money making titles will be sold off if Activision has no plans to finish them.
Again, it’s hard to consider this a bad decision. This is a decision of growth over having too many “Cooks in the kitchen” making soup. It’s better to have rock solid titles of epic proportions than a large pool of mediocre titles with minimal sales and bad reputations, and that’s why they spend a lot of time in the office working on this and having a type of office chair for long hours on a computer is really helpful in this area.
It’s not that the titles they’re questioning are necessarily bad, but are not the leading titles in their space and are should be either given a stronger team to work on them or retire them entirely. To build a stronger team with passion and direction it might be best to sell the franchise(s) to other organizations so they can do it right with time and attention to detail.
(Thanks, gamespot)
The Xbox 360 saw a 
Erm, it’s a … different … intro 🙂
I guess this is due to Mass Effect?
In the hospital?! Diabetes?! Man … Jonah, I think you’re now avoiding the doctor just so that you don’t get diagnosed with God knows what.
@Microsoft: Xbox Live Arcade will be phased out eventually
Erm, dunno. I don’t think that an established digital distribution channel will be removed on a whim. You don’t back out from a market unless it generates losses, and I doubt this is the case for XBLA.
Ok, change the name, don’t care. But I think Microsoft will keep providing the service.
@Leaked images “nothing to do with” Doom 4
Doom 2 was set on Earth however. Dunno. From my point of view, anything goes.
The engine is idTech 5, that powered the Rage game.
@SimCity 5 coming in 2013:
never played, never cared.
@GAME drops 5% in shares after Mass Effect 3 no-show
Tough times for retailers. A lot of publishers either use Steam, or have developed their own digital distribution channels. So now they can afford to place heavier conditions to the retailers.
Now if you also add bad management in the mix, well, that’s a recipe for bankruptcy.
@Rumor: PlayStation 4 ditches Cell processor tech
To be honest, as long as you manage to create a nice API for the game developer, it doesn’t really matter if it’s a cell processor or 2-4 80×86 compatible cores.
I still can’t forget what they said at one point, that the cell processor was intentionally made hard to work with, so that the PS3 has a longer life.
Who thinks like that?!
Thanks Paul for sending my PD, my lil 5 yo bro will love this game (i’m 21 btw)
jordan, watch out for that C6H12O6!!! they are evil! deliciously evil!
paul, bronkitis sucks, i have it too.
jonah, go get a check up ASAP!
i hope you know that i am very glad all 3 of you are fine =]
@xbla no more eventually
it is a money maker, they will not give that away, its a name change for sure.
@sim city 5 comming 2013
meh… never liked the sims series very much (all sims, not only THE sims). i like destruction games more.
@ps4 changes processor
as long as it works with quality, I mean, as long as sony doesn’t screw up more stuff ¬¬
get well guys (be careful jonah, u might be next)
mwa hahahahaha (evil laugh if u dont get it)
take care
Can you guys make it a bit shorter? Some guys like me don’t have internet at home so we download it thru a phone. I can’t download it when its over 50M. I hope you take it to your attention, Cheers!
My god, that was the best intro ever! I’m pretty busy right now with my pre-GCSE exams, so don’t expect any long comments for now. You should be honored that you’re one of the things I will still be doing between studying.
Oh and Paul, I never got to hear your thoughts on Skyward Sword. Have you finished it, and if so, what did you think?
Hey guys, first time listener. I enjoyed the show, but I cringed at the narration of the news headlines. I’m by no means a good public reader, so I know how hard it is to vocally string together a poorly written sentence. Slow it down a little and you should be just fine.
Keep up the good work, and thanks for the listen!