Hamilton Chu, Hearthstone's Executive Producer, Also Leaves Blizzard Entertainment
In a tweet early this morning, Hamilton Chu responded to Ben Brode's leaving tweet with something very simple. Both of the ex-Hearthstone team members have set their Twitter bios to "Starting up something new!".
Quote from Hamilton ChuToday is my last day at Blizzard. 😢 Thank you for all the laughter and fun we shared. I will miss you.
Weird! It was mine too...
Not many were aware of Hamilton's involvement with Team 5 as he wasn't out there interacting with the community like Ben. Things he was responsible for though were writing most of the flavor text in Whispers of the Old Gods expansion and the strategic planning and business operations on the Hearthstone side of things. He also headlined Blizzard's strategic Initiatives Group which included business ops for World of Warcraft. It would appear that this isn't only a blow to Hearthstone, but also other areas at Blizzard.
Quote from Developer Bios - Hamilton ChuAs executive producer for Blizzard Entertainment's Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft, Hamilton Chu provides the leadership and direction necessary to deliver players a Blizzard-quality gaming experience. In his role, Chu is responsible for strategic planning and business operations, providing management support for the development leadership, and generally tanking issues for the team whenever necessary.
As head of Blizzard’s strategic initiatives group, his other duties include leading business operations for World of Warcraft and managing Blizzard’s creative development department. Before joining Blizzard Entertainment, Chu served as a producer on Halo and Halo 2 for Bungie before going on to sell his soul to the MBA gods.
In his spare time, Chu enjoys reading comics, writing stories, and pwning noobs of all shapes and sizes.
Which beloved developer is leaving the Hearthstone team next to work alongside Brode and Chu?
I always thought people threw about the "small indie company" thing as a meme.
I didn't think there were people who seriously believed it.
Two people in a development team of 80 is a drop in the ocean.
Congratulation on reaching 'denial' only 4 stages left. Yay, you can do this!
I've worked in organizations with people leaving, I've played games with lead developers moving on.
They're all still going strong. Seen it all before.
Come back to me when the "ship has sunk", but don't hold your breath Old Greg.
wow.. RIP hearthstone!
Anyone with any knowledge of game development can tell you that developers jump ship all the time. It's nothing new. The only reason people are shook is because Ben Brode was the unofficial mascot of Hearthstone as deemed by the community. Hearthstone will continue on with the same quality you have come to know. If you are hoping this somehow signals the end or some greater change in development of things you don't like, you are going to end up being very disappointed.
I hope for the best for every single member of Blizzard in and out.
But if this means, in the near future, we might have a solid HS game, Iam down for it.
Good luck.
I think there have been a lot of high profile names leaving Blizzard recently. Guys like Chris Metzen, Russell Brower and David Kim have all left in the last 2 years and these are some more 'big names' added to the list.
Blizzard has obviously done really well in terms of their talent retention up til recently. Most people wouldn't spend this long at just 1 company unless there was some benefit for them and I think what we are looking at is more of a changing of the guard rather than a sinking ship.
High profile leavers or not, I'm uniquely underwhelmed with this expansion. Starcraft lost David Kim and thousands of people got back into it as they looked to regain the player base. Let's hope the same revival happens for H/S. At the mo, ladder just isn't fun for me at all and hasn't been for a while. And I miss it being fun.
Sounds like Konami thing with Kojima, but hey its not like Metal Gear suffered from that loss right? Metal Gear Survive is a great game right? RIGHT? Doomsayer
Got sacked because Trashwood sold packs poorly, sad truth. Brode and him cared about game, but Blizzard only cares about money.
Please no more Doomsayers. The exact same types of reactions happened when GC & other Blizzard employees left WoW. The end is not coming. It isn't like the big indie company isn't capable of knowing what to do with their game after two people left.
Denial, it isn't just a river in Egypt. A high-profile exodus like this points to a broken culture and ultimatums from the corporate management. My guess is they were just riding it out until the expansion dropped. Prepare for the game to continue its journey down the crapper. Isn't another megacorp releasing a card game soon? Coincidence?
You leave Blizzard, you leave Blizzard, everyone leaves Blizzard!
Oh wait, wrong meme!