Less than a day after the shock announcement that magic-based battle royale Spellbreak will be shutting down early next year, it's been announced that Blizzard Entertainment has snapped up the game's developer, Proletariat.
VentureBeat reports that the 100-strong team at Proletariat will be joining Blizzard and helping with the development of its titanic MMORPG World of Warcraft. Blizzard is looking to beef up its staffing numbers for the game as the developer approaches the MMO's next expansion coming later this year, Dragonflight.
- Further reading - Fantasy-Action Battle Royale Spellbreak Shuts Down Early Next Year
This follows news in April that Vicarious Visions — the developer of Tony Hawk Pro Skater 1 + 2 — merged with Blizzard. Proletariat has reportedly been working with the Overwatch and Diablo developer since May this year.
The president of Blizzard Entertainment, Mike Ybarra, had this to say about the acquisition:
"We are putting players at the forefront of everything we do, and we are working hard to both meet and exceed their expectations. A big part of caring for our teams is making sure we have the resources to produce experiences our communities will love while giving our teams space to explore even more creative opportunities within their projects. Proletariat is a perfect fit for supporting Blizzard’s mission in bringing high-quality content to our players more often."
Blizzard itself was acquired by Activision back in 2008, with the parent company (Activision Blizzard) now being owned by Microsoft. The company has just recently re-elected CEO Bobby Kotick to the Board of Directors.
Proletariat was founded back in 2012 and has experience working on MMORPGs such as Lord of the Rings Online before launching Spellbreak in 2020. Seth Sivak, president of Proletariat, said that the team had "an open conversation" with Blizzard, but that now "The really exciting part is what we’re going to build going forward. That was the real selling point for us, the level of ambition for what we want to do with World of Warcraft."
Share your thoughts on this latest acquisition in the video game industry with us in the comments.
[source venturebeat.com]
Comments 21
"Activision buys proletariat".
That speaks for itself.
Is the headline "Activision/Blizzard buys Proletariat" about a game developer, or the idea? Because I would believe either one.
(This also explains a lot about the end of Spellbreak as the F2P Overwatch 2 is about to launch.)
I hadn't return to the World of WarCraft since 2012, maybe I'll give it a revisit later this year. After all I got a better PC now so hopefully the game isn't as buggy as before.
On the one hand, it's good that the company is more or less being saved from potential financial ruin after having to shutter their own big battle royale. On the other though..... the company buying them makes me concerned.
The timing kinda makes the thank you to all the spellbreak players feel rather disingenuous lol.
I know it’s treated as a foregone conclusion but Microsoft don’t actually own Activision-Blizzard yet, do they? The deal hasn’t cleared yet, right?
My condolences
Hahahaha, that’s one hell of a headline. Believable either way.
Well that explains why their game is shutting down. Sucks though as they are shutting down a new IP to bolster an old one.
I'll never get one established studios are bought out just to put them in established franchises. If you want to bolster a current franchise, just hire more employees.
We lost Tony Hawk 3+4 just for Call of Duty because if this asinine method.
Joy. Wouldn't be surprised if we never see anything nearly as creative as Spellbreak from this studio ever again.
i was trying to understand how this news is Nintendo related, and then i realized that this multiplayer game Spellbreak is on Switch.
@JR150 - Pretty sure the trees they'll model for the new zones are going to be nifty.
Wow... Blizzard be buying companies just to cancel their games and enslave them into only working on Blizzard games instead, what a sneak-like tactic. They are basically in a way, killing of other players and developers dreams (ex. Tony Hawk 3+4 and Spellbreak) just to fuel their own greed, which is actually worst than what Disney does. Blizzard is officially worst than Disney now, sheesh big oof
Wow... Blizzard be buying companies just to cancel their games and enslave them into only working on Blizzard games instead, what a sneak-like tactic.
@Chibi_Manny Hey, yeah... Blizzard would know about the Zerg tactic of infesting Terrans...
Every piece of information in this article upsets me to varying degrees.
Best news of all, that's another 100 or so petition signee's about the 'non existent" abuse and harassment that pit of hell is breeding.
Besides that, sounds to me Spellbreak was canned due to this deal, bit too fast for it to seem like Blizzard is coming in to save such poor and desperate developers from financial ruin.
Well there goes everything out of the window
Aren't they being acquired by Microsoft so they're acquiring developers whilst they're being acquired themselves :S
Wait... Warcraft still has a playerbase?
The new EA, where game dev studios
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