These theories are purely speculative, and frankly should not be taken to seriously. The idea the Ben Brode was 'forced out' of his own game because of sudderwock is ridiculous.
The only theory that I can come up with that involves him being forced out is if there was a sexual harassment scandal or something.
But most likely he has planned the departure for a while, and wanted to wait for after WW came out to announce he is leaving. We can come up with all the theories in the world, but the most likely outcome is that he just wanted to leave.
You have no clue when both of them informed the company. And even if both of them "blindsided" Blizzard, which is nothing but pure speculation with assumed bad intent, they chose a very polite timing to do it.
I'll give you the 'polite timing' thing, but Blizz was blindsided. I've watched many high-profile exits from the company I work for, and even with short notice, there is always a statement from the company that says "so and so has chosen to leave the company to pursue other endeavors we wish him the best of luck yadda yadda" Like I keep saying, it goes back to 'control the narrative' otherwise the speculation with presumed bad intent runs roughshod, as a quick glance through the forums will indicate.
Lol Trump fires people in high profile positions all the time, and ppl can't believe Brode might have been fired (or about to be so he resigned)
There are also things such as power plays or maybe the company saw Brode as a threat since he was too much of the face of the game - contrary to other Blizzard games where you barely know the developer's name.
Also keep in mind in his letter he's going to start a new project that has a lot of uncertainty... if Brode was happy and Blizzard was happy, he wouldn't be risking it all for a "new adventure".
It baffles me how people can't really understand that if you're in an industry to make GAMES and you spend 10+ years of your life just making CONTENT for the same game it gets boring.
People that make videogames are creative, to keep doing the same thing over and over for years and years get boring and really burns out the person. He is probably just ready to move on and do something else. I'd personally hate to spend 15 years and the same thing and in the end, no matter how good I was at it, I'd just end up thinking of everything else I'm missing and all the other stuff I could have created if I just left my comfort zone.
People that spend over a decade in a franchise deciding to move on is the most common thing in the gaming industry. Even Sakurai is f--ing sick of making Smash Bros titles, for example. Let him move on and and the game grow. We will miss him as a community. The game though, probably has been in the hands of other, equally capable people for a long time. We just got the memo now.
Having been made redundant twice in my career, with no notice at all, Ben's announcement doesn't have the air of an employee that's been forced out. He's been allowed to post his farewells and leave on his own terms. This is pivotal. If anything more un-towards had occured he'd have been shuffled off somewhere. I thought his post was quite classy.
Look at how Chris Metzen retired, he was lucky enough to be able to do so and went ahead. Ben, if I'm reading his statement correctly appears to have similar freedom in his personal life . 10 years is a long time to stay in one place as well. Maybe he just wanted the change. I suspect he would have had a fairly lengthy notice period (think 3-6 months) and may have been working this down without announcing it.
His departure was sudden (no notice whatsoever) and right after the release of an expansion. He's starting a company but he has no details. He doesn't even know if they will make games or not. As much flak as they've gotten for the Shudderwock debacle and their reticence to ever admit they completely botched something right off the bat, I wouldn't be surprised if Brode got the boot because of his comments.
You should be embarrassed by this post. You have officially entered conspiracy theorist territory. I hope we eventually get an official statement from Brode and Blizzard, debunking the idea that he left on bad terms. Just so you can post the sequel to this thread "Did Blizzard threaten legal action against Ben Brode to cover up the forced termination over Shudderwock?" Don't be a clown.
I will humor you though and say that timing is relevant to his departure. What else happened recently? An expansion launched. Since an expansion just launched and we know Blizzard works a few expansions ahead, it's not crazy to assume that Team 5 also starts to wrap up production on a new expansion around the time a new one launches to keep ahead of schedule. Assuming that Blizzard just launched and finished work on two new expansions, what better time is there for Ben to leave than at this point?
But who am I kidding, that doesn't make as much sense as Brode getting fired because of an off hand comment in an interview about fucking Shudderwock. LMFAO
Cory Barlog fucking leaked God of War before Sony was ready to announce it and kept his job, but one of the most beloved faces in the Hearthstone community lost his because of Shudderwock. Okay.
He left to start his own company. Everyone stating otherwise are silly little children who have yet to experience the real world. People leave great positions all the time to start their own thing or move around...doing something for a decade can often leave you feeling like it's time to let someone else take the reigns of something you've given a good portion of your life to.
To those slating him...well, there's a reason he's been working for blizzard and you're sat being salty on a forum.
This isn't the kind of decision he'd make suddenly on a whim. Far more likely he'd decided he needed a change a month or two back and stuck with it to finish off one last xpac out of respect to the team/ the game/ the community.
Seems like people are going well out of their way to read into this as negatively as possible (ironic considering it's about arguably the most positive person in the entire HS community). I can't blame him for wanting a change. Doing anything for 10 years will get old but imagine doing so with the demands of this community AND the Activision overlords the entire time on a game where, creatively, you get very little say. As he said he's fortunate to be in a position to make a change.
My guess would be he had given ample notice to blizzard. They requested that he wait until after the expansion’s release because leaving beforehand would’ve hurt the expansion.
FWIW - BB, and everyone else at the company, is bound by an NDA, and other agreements, which extend well beyond anyone's tenure at Blizz. He can't mention what his post-Blizz plans are, because Blizz owns all the creative "stuff" he did while working for the company. If he's had an idea percolating for two or three years, and wrote stuff down on scratch paper, it's Blizzard's property, not BB's. Hence, not mentioning anything of substance about his post-Blizz plans - presumably, inasmuch as BB isn't a mindless zombie, he has had plenty of ideas percolating inside his head, and his plans are developed to the point where it was time for him to move on. At some point in the future, we'll know what those plans are.
Or - some dude in the community wants to stir shit up for the sake of stirring shit up, and suggests that BB was forced out "all of a sudden" for completely innocuous comments similar to hundreds of other tweets he's posted over the years, and the only evidence he sites for his fatuous claim amounts to "something is fishy." Christ. If I understand correctly, threads with low-effort content are meant to be locked once they are detected . . .
Although it seems impossible for us to imagine that he doesn’t have the worlds best job, it is common in corporate America for people to amicably take offers from elsewhere in their industry
No one ever leaves Blizzard by giving public notice, it always is very sudden. They are in the business of online gaming, which is a live market. If they give public notice then fans may take that as a sign there is something wrong with an upcoming expansion, and it could hurt sales. The reaction to departures from Blizzard shows how rampant speculation can get.
By leaving after the expansion's release, it gives time for the tinfoil hats to come off before the next expansion and for everyone to see that all is well.
Everything is fine there and with the two gentleman who left. Years from now you will see them visiting Blizzard HQ to do interviews for Hearthstone's 10 Year Anniversary.
Long Answer: No, because of so many things. Ben Brode was a HUGE positive influence on Hearthstone, many game companies would love to have such a charismatic and iconic public face that they do with Ben. Closest I've seen beyond Ben would be Geoff Goodman for Overwatch.
The most likely reason in my opinion for his departure is a long-standing string of misaligned goals and directions from the company and him. He has a history of perhaps going against what Hearthstone's direction was, and that's public, behind the scenes I'm sure this was much worse. His last comment about Shudderwock was probably just the latest in a long string of (in his opinion) bad design choices that are taking Hearthstone farther and farther away from where he sees and wants it going.
And after all of that frustration, there comes a point where you realize that you don't have much more to give to this project, that the way this game is going, it seems your efforts in shaping it are going nowhere and you need to have that sort of creative outlet back in your life. So you start to dream and scheme, about what it would be like to recapture those glorious days back in the infancy of a project, where ideas are teeming and nothing seems impossible, no idea too crazy to add, in fact, everyone revels in those crazy ideas because that's what creates a great game. This project, Hearthstone, though great as it is, is a behemoth set in stone. There are marketing and PR, and a solid player base, and hundreds to thousands of employees working this now, and what at the forefront was important (Making the game fun, implementing cool/unique ideas, pushing the limits of what's possible) now takes a back seat to Cost Effectiveness, Marketing, Reaching a wider audience, etc.
That's what I feel has drawn Ben more than anything away from Hearthstone, this idea that Hearthstone has moved on from a project to a game, and while it can fun to keep up and maintain a game when it gets as big as Hearthstone is now, your influence and control over it becomes almost null, and that creative outpouring you've grown accustomed to over the past years has now slowed to a trickle and replaced with more management responsibilities.
It makes too much sense to me why Ben Brode left for a new company, he wants that thrill and like he said, he's in a great position to do so. He's very likely planned this out for months or even years, and saved accordingly, and even timed his departure at perhaps one of the greatest peaks of his career, right after the launch of a Hearthstone Expansion in which his face has seen PLENTY of cameras and interviews and videos.
I don't think Ben Brode was forced out, there inevitably was some friction between Ben and the other executives I'm sure, but I don't believe in a hundred years that Blizzard would have forced Ben out at this point, especially since they seemed to be ramping up his public appearances rather than pulling them, which you would expect if they were planning on pushing him out.
I doubt Shudderwok had anything to do with him or Chu leaving. They've most likely been planning this for quite some time...probably since last year even. If anything may have put pressure on him to look elsewhere I would think the drop in revenue from 400 million down to 200 million may have been a bigger factor than anything.
I do not think so. I think it has to do with the following:
1) The drop in revenue.
2) HS fails to attract new players because of its brutal modes - PVE did not fix it. The game is just too brutal for beginners. Especially nowadays with Spiteful / Cubelock / Call to arms meta.
3) Kobolds and WW are underpowered compared to Ungoro and LK, making purchase of boosters less of a necessity, pulling revenue further down .
4) Over 10 years in the same company, with the pressure from top management I can understand Ben wants some fresh air.
Long Answer: No, because of so many things. Ben Brode was a HUGE positive influence on Hearthstone, many game companies would love to have such a charismatic and iconic public face that they do with Ben. Closest I've seen beyond Ben would be Geoff Goodman for Overwatch.
The most likely reason in my opinion for his departure is a long-standing string of misaligned goals and directions from the company and him. He has a history of perhaps going against what Hearthstone's direction was, and that's public, behind the scenes I'm sure this was much worse. His last comment about Shudderwock was probably just the latest in a long string of (in his opinion) bad design choices that are taking Hearthstone farther and farther away from where he sees and wants it going.
And after all of that frustration, there comes a point where you realize that you don't have much more to give to this project, that the way this game is going, it seems your efforts in shaping it are going nowhere and you need to have that sort of creative outlet back in your life. So you start to dream and scheme, about what it would be like to recapture those glorious days back in the infancy of a project, where ideas are teeming and nothing seems impossible, no idea too crazy to add, in fact, everyone revels in those crazy ideas because that's what creates a great game. This project, Hearthstone, though great as it is, is a behemoth set in stone. There are marketing and PR, and a solid player base, and hundreds to thousands of employees working this now, and what at the forefront was important (Making the game fun, implementing cool/unique ideas, pushing the limits of what's possible) now takes a back seat to Cost Effectiveness, Marketing, Reaching a wider audience, etc.
That's what I feel has drawn Ben more than anything away from Hearthstone, this idea that Hearthstone has moved on from a project to a game, and while it can fun to keep up and maintain a game when it gets as big as Hearthstone is now, your influence and control over it becomes almost null, and that creative outpouring you've grown accustomed to over the past years has now slowed to a trickle and replaced with more management responsibilities.
It makes too much sense to me why Ben Brode left for a new company, he wants that thrill and like he said, he's in a great position to do so. He's very likely planned this out for months or even years, and saved accordingly, and even timed his departure at perhaps one of the greatest peaks of his career, right after the launch of a Hearthstone Expansion in which his face has seen PLENTY of cameras and interviews and videos.
I don't think Ben Brode was forced out, there inevitably was some friction between Ben and the other executives I'm sure, but I don't believe in a hundred years that Blizzard would have forced Ben out at this point, especially since they seemed to be ramping up his public appearances rather than pulling them, which you would expect if they were planning on pushing him out.
EXACTLY this. I'd bet anything that he didn't tell blizz, hence their confusion, to avoid any kojima style incidents. Modern game industries obsession with profit margins is very upsetting. I'd guess he's gonna try and start his own gig so he doesn't have to worry about that, since brode has been raging against that machine since probably the first expansion
"I have seen worlds bathed in the Makers' flames, their denizens fading without as much as a whimper. Entire planetary systems born and razed in the time that it takes your mortal hearts to beat once. Yet all throughout, my own heart devoid of emotion... of empathy. I. Have. Felt. Nothing. A million-million lives wasted. Had they all held within them your tenacity? Had they all loved life as you do?"
These theories are purely speculative, and frankly should not be taken to seriously. The idea the Ben Brode was 'forced out' of his own game because of sudderwock is ridiculous.
The only theory that I can come up with that involves him being forced out is if there was a sexual harassment scandal or something.
But most likely he has planned the departure for a while, and wanted to wait for after WW came out to announce he is leaving. We can come up with all the theories in the world, but the most likely outcome is that he just wanted to leave.
Free to try and find a game, dealing cards for sorrow, cards for pain.
Lol Trump fires people in high profile positions all the time, and ppl can't believe Brode might have been fired (or about to be so he resigned)
There are also things such as power plays or maybe the company saw Brode as a threat since he was too much of the face of the game - contrary to other Blizzard games where you barely know the developer's name.
Also keep in mind in his letter he's going to start a new project that has a lot of uncertainty... if Brode was happy and Blizzard was happy, he wouldn't be risking it all for a "new adventure".
It baffles me how people can't really understand that if you're in an industry to make GAMES and you spend 10+ years of your life just making CONTENT for the same game it gets boring.
People that make videogames are creative, to keep doing the same thing over and over for years and years get boring and really burns out the person. He is probably just ready to move on and do something else. I'd personally hate to spend 15 years and the same thing and in the end, no matter how good I was at it, I'd just end up thinking of everything else I'm missing and all the other stuff I could have created if I just left my comfort zone.
People that spend over a decade in a franchise deciding to move on is the most common thing in the gaming industry. Even Sakurai is f--ing sick of making Smash Bros titles, for example. Let him move on and and the game grow. We will miss him as a community. The game though, probably has been in the hands of other, equally capable people for a long time. We just got the memo now.
Having been made redundant twice in my career, with no notice at all, Ben's announcement doesn't have the air of an employee that's been forced out. He's been allowed to post his farewells and leave on his own terms. This is pivotal. If anything more un-towards had occured he'd have been shuffled off somewhere. I thought his post was quite classy.
Look at how Chris Metzen retired, he was lucky enough to be able to do so and went ahead. Ben, if I'm reading his statement correctly appears to have similar freedom in his personal life . 10 years is a long time to stay in one place as well. Maybe he just wanted the change. I suspect he would have had a fairly lengthy notice period (think 3-6 months) and may have been working this down without announcing it.
Golden Hero Collections thus far; -
Europe: Druid, Hunter, Paladin, Mage, Priest, Rogue, Shaman, Warlock, Warrior (9/9)
Americas: Druid, Mage, Paladin Shaman (4/9)
Everywhere else: Workin on it.. (0/9)
Haha noo ffs!
This was planned long ago. He just did make it public after the exp landed. Becuase not take focus from it.
He left to start his own company. Everyone stating otherwise are silly little children who have yet to experience the real world. People leave great positions all the time to start their own thing or move around...doing something for a decade can often leave you feeling like it's time to let someone else take the reigns of something you've given a good portion of your life to.
To those slating him...well, there's a reason he's been working for blizzard and you're sat being salty on a forum.
This isn't the kind of decision he'd make suddenly on a whim. Far more likely he'd decided he needed a change a month or two back and stuck with it to finish off one last xpac out of respect to the team/ the game/ the community.
Seems like people are going well out of their way to read into this as negatively as possible (ironic considering it's about arguably the most positive person in the entire HS community). I can't blame him for wanting a change. Doing anything for 10 years will get old but imagine doing so with the demands of this community AND the Activision overlords the entire time on a game where, creatively, you get very little say. As he said he's fortunate to be in a position to make a change.
My guess would be he had given ample notice to blizzard. They requested that he wait until after the expansion’s release because leaving beforehand would’ve hurt the expansion.
FWIW - BB, and everyone else at the company, is bound by an NDA, and other agreements, which extend well beyond anyone's tenure at Blizz. He can't mention what his post-Blizz plans are, because Blizz owns all the creative "stuff" he did while working for the company. If he's had an idea percolating for two or three years, and wrote stuff down on scratch paper, it's Blizzard's property, not BB's. Hence, not mentioning anything of substance about his post-Blizz plans - presumably, inasmuch as BB isn't a mindless zombie, he has had plenty of ideas percolating inside his head, and his plans are developed to the point where it was time for him to move on. At some point in the future, we'll know what those plans are.
Or - some dude in the community wants to stir shit up for the sake of stirring shit up, and suggests that BB was forced out "all of a sudden" for completely innocuous comments similar to hundreds of other tweets he's posted over the years, and the only evidence he sites for his fatuous claim amounts to "something is fishy." Christ. If I understand correctly, threads with low-effort content are meant to be locked once they are detected . . .
Although it seems impossible for us to imagine that he doesn’t have the worlds best job, it is common in corporate America for people to amicably take offers from elsewhere in their industry
No one ever leaves Blizzard by giving public notice, it always is very sudden. They are in the business of online gaming, which is a live market. If they give public notice then fans may take that as a sign there is something wrong with an upcoming expansion, and it could hurt sales. The reaction to departures from Blizzard shows how rampant speculation can get.
By leaving after the expansion's release, it gives time for the tinfoil hats to come off before the next expansion and for everyone to see that all is well.
Everything is fine there and with the two gentleman who left. Years from now you will see them visiting Blizzard HQ to do interviews for Hearthstone's 10 Year Anniversary.
Short Answer: No.
Long Answer: No, because of so many things. Ben Brode was a HUGE positive influence on Hearthstone, many game companies would love to have such a charismatic and iconic public face that they do with Ben. Closest I've seen beyond Ben would be Geoff Goodman for Overwatch.
The most likely reason in my opinion for his departure is a long-standing string of misaligned goals and directions from the company and him. He has a history of perhaps going against what Hearthstone's direction was, and that's public, behind the scenes I'm sure this was much worse. His last comment about Shudderwock was probably just the latest in a long string of (in his opinion) bad design choices that are taking Hearthstone farther and farther away from where he sees and wants it going.
And after all of that frustration, there comes a point where you realize that you don't have much more to give to this project, that the way this game is going, it seems your efforts in shaping it are going nowhere and you need to have that sort of creative outlet back in your life. So you start to dream and scheme, about what it would be like to recapture those glorious days back in the infancy of a project, where ideas are teeming and nothing seems impossible, no idea too crazy to add, in fact, everyone revels in those crazy ideas because that's what creates a great game. This project, Hearthstone, though great as it is, is a behemoth set in stone. There are marketing and PR, and a solid player base, and hundreds to thousands of employees working this now, and what at the forefront was important (Making the game fun, implementing cool/unique ideas, pushing the limits of what's possible) now takes a back seat to Cost Effectiveness, Marketing, Reaching a wider audience, etc.
That's what I feel has drawn Ben more than anything away from Hearthstone, this idea that Hearthstone has moved on from a project to a game, and while it can fun to keep up and maintain a game when it gets as big as Hearthstone is now, your influence and control over it becomes almost null, and that creative outpouring you've grown accustomed to over the past years has now slowed to a trickle and replaced with more management responsibilities.
It makes too much sense to me why Ben Brode left for a new company, he wants that thrill and like he said, he's in a great position to do so. He's very likely planned this out for months or even years, and saved accordingly, and even timed his departure at perhaps one of the greatest peaks of his career, right after the launch of a Hearthstone Expansion in which his face has seen PLENTY of cameras and interviews and videos.
I don't think Ben Brode was forced out, there inevitably was some friction between Ben and the other executives I'm sure, but I don't believe in a hundred years that Blizzard would have forced Ben out at this point, especially since they seemed to be ramping up his public appearances rather than pulling them, which you would expect if they were planning on pushing him out.
I doubt Shudderwok had anything to do with him or Chu leaving. They've most likely been planning this for quite some time...probably since last year even. If anything may have put pressure on him to look elsewhere I would think the drop in revenue from 400 million down to 200 million may have been a bigger factor than anything.
I do not think so. I think it has to do with the following:
1) The drop in revenue.
2) HS fails to attract new players because of its brutal modes - PVE did not fix it. The game is just too brutal for beginners. Especially nowadays with Spiteful / Cubelock / Call to arms meta.
3) Kobolds and WW are underpowered compared to Ungoro and LK, making purchase of boosters less of a necessity, pulling revenue further down .
4) Over 10 years in the same company, with the pressure from top management I can understand Ben wants some fresh air.
I'd bet anything that he didn't tell blizz, hence their confusion, to avoid any kojima style incidents.
Modern game industries obsession with profit margins is very upsetting.
I'd guess he's gonna try and start his own gig so he doesn't have to worry about that, since brode has been raging against that machine since probably the first expansion
BEN and CHU working on Valve's Artifact \o/