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Bobby Kotick speaks at DICE convention, reveals he isn't Lucifer.

Y

Yasae

Banned
SapientWolf said:
He is a devil dick.
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What?

reddevil.jpg
 
C

C4Lukins

Junior Member
Nope, he is still Lucifer. As I recall, he made a statement about how he saw Nintendo, MS, and Sony as competitors. For a third party company to see its distribution partners as the bad guys is just so ridiculous. That is just one example in a history of stupid shit to come out of this guys mouth.
 
N

neorej

ERMYGERD!
Holy crap, Kotick really isn't the devil!

"The greatest trick the devil ever did, was convincing mankind he doesn't exist."

I'm not convinced by this, therefore, he must not be the devil, he must be Mammon.

Owh and

"If you have a company and you want to protect your creative freedom and the integrity of the creative process, if you want to retain your identity and culture, if you want the support of the mothership and the resources of the mothership, we're a really great mothership. But if you want to sell out and move on, there are definitely other companies to talk to."
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That's why you held back console-devkits to IW unless they would do a WW2-shooter instead of the Modern Warfare-FPS they wanted to make? That's creative freedom?
And creative freedom is saying "hey great game, but let's make it a Guitar Hero spin-off instead! And if you say no, we won't publish it LOL!" to Double Fine? Kotick needs to look up creative and freedom in the dictionary.
 
S

Stop It

Perfectly able to grasp the inherent value of the fishing game.
Surely Mr Kotick can notice the blatant transparent bullshit of his PR, at least to one set of people he speaks to. Basically he has now said this:

Kotick to investors: We want to make as much money as possible, this means taking all the fun out of game development. We'll run dev studios like fucking concentration camps man.

Kotick to game developers: I'm not that bad really, I just said those things to keep the investors happy. I love dvelopers and we're better than that other big Publisher.

Only one is the truth, and people at DICE, the 2nd one isn't, but I'm sure you lot already know.
 
Z

ZealousD

Makes world leading predictions like "The sun will rise tomorrow"
I can't help but notice that he didn't mention his other famous quotes.

228852564_ebkPQ-L-2.jpg


Or how about this one?

"EA also teamed with MTV to sell Rock Band, a shameless knockoff of Guitar Hero that added drums, bass and a microphone to the world of make-believe rock stars."
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Or how about all that shit with Brutal Legend?



Hey Kotick, you're still a CUNT.
 
C

Castor Krieg

Banned
Macmanus said:
Hey Bobby, you know how EA got it's reputation mildly out of the shitter? By rolling the dice on some fresh IP. Not shitty oration by their big wigs.
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What will shareholders pick - good rep or profits? Because the "new" EA has not been doing great on the profits front.

For all the hate for the guy he knows that Activision is business, and he needs to deliver results. He does that, I would say he is very good at his job. Whether lack of creativity will hurt Activision in the long run remains to be seen, but with Starcraft II and D3 (as well as new WoW expansion and probably new Blizzard MMO) I doubt it.
 
Q

Quasar

Member
Macmanus said:
Hey Bobby, you know how EA got it's reputation mildly out of the shitter? By rolling the dice on some fresh IP. Not shitty oration by their big wigs.
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And that seems to be working out real well for EA.
 
D

dsister44

Member
CamHostage said:
Still a dick, but anybody who thinks that corporations can just coast like it's still a glorious time doesn't have a real grasp on what it's like out in the market right now. There's no sign yet that things are getting better. Pink slips and cutbacks have I'm positive gone out at companies that aren't evil (but also aren't big like Activision or EA so it's a smaller scale and things fly under the radar) and more studios, independent and affiliated, will close this year.



Wait, Neversoft? You mean that they were slashed, not shut down, correct? RO, Luxo and UD were shut down (two of which make sense, unfortunately; the RedOctane move is the one I'm still seeing as far too cowardly of market futures.) Neversoft still is open unless something has changed.
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Neversoft will remain open for another 2 months. Then its 'thanks for making guitar hero 6, you can leave now so that you wont get any of the profits frm your own product! byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee'
 
D

Deleted member 20415

Unconfirmed Member
bdouble said:
And if you ran the company it wouldn't exist any more and even more people would be without work.
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I didn't say layoffs weren't necessary. I said the guy has some nerve to stand up and comment about his dedication to developers a week after he axed them.

Truly different.

Layoffs keep your company's costs in line with revenue. Business 101.

But don't cast yourself as a champion for the little guy when you still have a little blood in the corner of your mouth. It's disingenuous.
 
R

Remfin

Member
El_TigroX said:
I didn't say layoffs weren't necessary. I said the guy has some nerve to stand up and comment about his dedication to developers a week after he axed them.

Truly different.
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Except he's not claiming his "dedication to developers", he's claiming a commitment to developers keeping their own work culture. This is in contrast to EA (and others) who were inserting corporate managers into dev studios and micromanaging the development process from the inside. Is there any indication Activision does any of that?

That really seems to be the general pattern in the game industry: you can have free reign and risk being cut loose the minute you start under-performing, or you can have soul-sucking corporate suits interfering from day 1. It's hard to imagine there being some kind of middle-ground, especially since the first type is usually waiting for a few failures before the axe anyway. At least with that first type you're in control of your own destiny.
 
T

TheGreatDave

Banned
dsister44 said:
Neversoft will remain open for another 2 months. Then its 'thanks for making guitar hero 6, you can leave now so that you wont get any of the profits frm your own product! byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee'
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Neversoft aren't being closed. But anyone hired for purely Guitar Hero purposes is probably getting the axe after April.
 
V

Vanpira

Member
Ultimo hombre said:
A good CEO would be forward looking. If the industry outlook for 2010 steers towards contraction it would be his job to foresee that and make cuts ahead of time to maintain profits. THese aren't charities.
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That's not forward thinking at all. That's looking at the present and asking yourself, "what will make me more profits now." Cutting employees is a fast way to do so because, if you don't have to pay them, that money that just came in, form the games they made, goes to your profits.

If he was really forward thinking, he would have set up R&D groups in the companies that had idle employees. The R&D groups would have worked on making characters, stories, and game play designs for future games. They could also have made games for the lower cost platforms, like the DS or iPod touch. Maybe set up teams to make Wii games to try and take some of that untapped core market with some more PS2 like games. Other things I didn't think of and so on.

The only time cutting employees is a good idea is when you are losing money. You might say the stuff above is a risk, but that's the point, a forward thinking CEO takes risks. If you read the op you can see Bobby Kotick doesn't take risks, he plays it safe. He doesn't want to stick his neck out to try an unproven thing, he only goes for the sure thing. He isn't forward thinking at all.

Also what's this charity bullshit? A company is the people who work there, not the guy sitting in the big chair or the investors, a company is the people who work there. If there is anyone taking charity, it's the guy sitting on the top. The one making his millions off the backs of his employees.

I would like to point out, I don't think Kotick is evil, or other such nonsense. He is human just like the rest of us, it's just he has more power than he can contend with.
 
Macmanus

Macmanus

Member
Quasar said:
And that seems to be working out real well for EA.
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I keep forgetting how poorly Mass Effect and Dragon Age are doing. Regardless, point taken.

Castor Krieg said:
What will shareholders pick - good rep or profits? Because the "new" EA has not been doing great on the profits front.
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I'm not arguing what is better for business. This was a PR stunt plain and simple. I'm analyzing it from that perspective alone, not what will boost AVTI numbers. If Kotick wants to improve Activision's reputation, innovation is the route to take. Not shotty scripted oration.
 
Trojita

Trojita

Rapid Response Threadmaker
Strider2K99 said:
Even without reading the thread, pretty much most people who respond will not give a shit about what he says and think he's a dick anyway.
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But if you read what he says he comes off as a dick anyway, because he is an asshole. Are the people praising him looking at his quotes with rose tinted glasses or are they Activision PR Employees?
 
U

Ultimo hombre

Banned
Vanpira said:
That's not forward thinking at all. That's looking at the present and asking yourself, "what will make me more profits now." Cutting employees is a fast way to do so because, if you don't have to pay them, that money that just came in, form the games they made, goes to your profits.

If he was really forward thinking, he would have set up R&D groups in the companies that had idle employees. The R&D groups would have worked on making characters, stories, and game play designs for future games. They could also have made games for the lower cost platforms, like the DS or iPod touch. Maybe set up teams to make Wii games to try and take some of that untapped core market with some more PS2 like games. Other things I didn't think of and so on.

The only time cutting employees is a good idea is when you are losing money. You might say the stuff above is a risk, but that's the point, a forward thinking CEO takes risks. If you read the op you can see Bobby Kotick doesn't take risks, he plays it safe. He doesn't want to stick his neck out to try an unproven thing, he only goes for the sure thing. He isn't forward thinking at all.

Also what's this charity bullshit? A company is the people who work there, not the guy sitting in the big chair or the investors, a company is the people who work there. If there is anyone taking charity, it's the guy sitting on the top. The one making his millions off the backs of his employees.

I would like to point out, I don't think Kotick is evil, or other such nonsense. He is human just like the rest of us, it's just he has more power than he can contend with.
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His actions fit his business model/philosophy. Which is to milk dry his current cash cows while hoping to find new ones before the milk runs out. He feels like idle workers are a waste if they're not going to be giving him a cow to milk. When milked dry, he is willing to dispose of them without much care.

I would not want to work for someone like him at the employee levels. However, as at the BoD level or as a share holder, I can certainly look at him for short term gains.

I hope/think he knows that he's killing one IP after another but no one is going to fault him as long as he keeps coming across more to milk. The problems will come when he's fatigued his franchises and there is nothing on the horizon to replace them. By then, you'll likely see him bounce with a stupid amount of money in his pocket.

He is a CEO for shareholdes and BoD members. Not employees. Anyone can see that.
 
M

Mael

Member
Xenon said:
*Kotick as Professor Octopus*
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You can add an arm for Infinity Ward btw

edit
C4Lukins said:
Nope, he is still Lucifer. As I recall, he made a statement about how he saw Nintendo, MS, and Sony as competitors. For a third party company to see its distribution partners as the bad guys is just so ridiculous. That is just one example in a history of stupid shit to come out of this guys mouth.
Click to expand...

Huh? It's actually kinda normal to see people selling the same type of products you sell as competitions.
Heck if 3rd party saw Nintendo as competition they would at least try to make competent games on their platforms, but apparently they chose the easy way out and see them as a chocolate factory or something.
 
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