The creators of Diablo think Blizzard has completely changed, according to an interview with PC Gamer.
David Brevik, Erich and Max Schaefer spoke with PC Gamer during ExileCon, with Brevik noting that Blizzard has completely changed. Max Schaeffer also added,
“The old Blizzard is gone. When we quit, there was like 180 employees total. There's thousands now. The whole empire is different, and Activision didn't have any influence. At that point it was just Blizzard and then some anonymous corporate owner, Vivendi or whoever. That was it. And so now [Blizzard is] a video game empire that has to appease shareholders and all that sort of stuff."
One of the reasons they site for their departure is that focusing on actual game design became more difficult as time went on with Erich Shaeffer saying,
“I think the biggest thing is we didn't talk about shareholder value. We didn't talk about Chinese government and what they might want. The only thing we ever talked about was what we wanted to do and what the fans would like. It's obviously not the case anymore, for better or worse. I don't blame them. They're a giant corporation."
The trio also chime in on whether or not Blizzard was bowing to pressure from China, with Brevik stating that it sounded, “like a conspiracy.”
It’s a fascinating insightful interview and dives into their time at Blizzard and their thoughts on everything going on with their former company these past few years.
