New Job Opening at Blizzard: Lead Designer Warcraft (First Reforged mention in months!)

[kindredsoul]

Source: Lead Designer, Warcraft Franchise Projects in Santa Monica, California, United States of America | Game Design at Blizzard Entertainment

 

[Retera]

Someone linked me this on discord and said that I should apply. Initially I was against it, but then later I decided to throw a pretty honest resume about my current life at it. Either they'll see it as mostly irrelevant because I was doing high paid software development in a non-video-game field until now, or maybe they'll see Warsmash on there and it will catch their eye.

But when I think about it, in the possible future where they do call me up and interview me or something, I'll admit it starts to weigh on my conscience a bit. Surely working on Reforged technology, for anyone, will be a thankless task. If I'm not mistaken I would guess the codebase has probably started to turn into spaghetti code, the people who worked on it may be mostly gone, and at the same time some of the users want or hope for mutually exclusive features. Any way that I think about it, undertaking further work on Reforged would be kind of like walking on needles. And so it would be really important for whoever does that to ask about Blizzard management's business plan -- essentially, to what extent would a person in this position ("Lead Designer") be leading to a future that they were told to achieve versus to what extent would they be able to literally invent their own vision for the future of Reforged? If there was any level of inventing the future, what are the financial constraints?

Because I feel like ignoring that would just lead to heartache and weird problems down the line.

 

[titans_zealot]

Good luck to those that are going to apply or work hard regardless!

 

[Retera]

After I applied and got the computerized email that it was received, I have not heard more.

The requirements for the position, if taken literally to be a requirement and not simply a guideline, were rather strict. I heard a rumor the intention for this position might be to move around some internal employee. For example, I have about 5 years working as a software developer and 20 years modding Warcraft III, but they said they wanted someone who had released AAA games in the past. So, a guy like me might be completely ignored -- by an automated machine and not even by a human, without even thinking about it.

 

[LazZ]

Looks like the position got filled already. The article has been taken down.

 

[titans_zealot]

sounds like the result of strange internal bureaucracy

 

[MasterBlaster]

It's not really a mention, but a lack thereof, but still - a curious fact...

Blizzard has a spring sale going right now and... we have 25% off on D2:R and 33% off on SC:R, but nothing for Reforged.

Take that as you will. Personally, I think they don't want to remind people that Reforged exists to avoid folks getting pitchforks or memes out

Source: https://eu.shop.battle.net/en-us/sale/spring-sale-2022

 

[Retera]

Take that as you will.

I read some speculation somewhere that Reforged still offers infinite free refunds, and so it was technologically easier for them not to do sales because it makes the refund system simpler. If the game always costs the same price, then the refund system always gives back the correct amount of money.

I really have no idea if that's true or not, though.

 

[MasterBlaster]

I read some speculation somewhere that Reforged still offers infinite free refunds

Yeah, that would definetely explain things - though, if true, I'm surprised that they might still offer refunds. I mean, it's been so long that those who wanted a refund already got it and with the drama dead, people buying the game now and not getting refunds so easily wouldn't be as problematic...

 

[Retera]

Yeah.

In general, I think posting our personal lives and decisions on public media is probably not too wise. But, given that I mentioned previously in this thread that I applied to this position, I can mention now that I received a simple friendly email from Activision that they will not be moving forward with my candidacy at this time. I really appreciate them following through on that. It is certainly better than wondering in the back of my mind about it.

Good luck to whoever got it. My skillset on Warcraft III is mostly on the technical side, combined with skills writing performant Java and C++ code in a non-gaming industry. I appreciate that they said they more specifically wanted someone who has published AAA games in the past. I half imagine that I was probably filtered out by an AI before any humans would have even looked at my application.

 

[Tal'Rarity]

They definitely wouldn't want to hire someone who knew what they were doing.

 

[deepstrasz]

They definitely wouldn't want to hire someone who knew what they were doing.

Way to waste money, heh.