For a good decade, Blizzard Entertainment has been a tireless champion of developing and publishing acclaimed PC games. Warcraft, World of Warcraft, StarCraft, Overwatch, Diablo, and Hearthstone (we can skip Storm Heroes, I'm sorry) have stayed more or less at the top of their age range. In some cases, for decades. Blizzard has been ahead of the curve in founding, on Wart.net, a kind of storefront launcher in many of its games. It has an annual conference, at BlizzCon, where thousands gather to see each other as their favorite Blizzard characters and are excited about the announcements. Most of all, it's just one of the manufacturers-publishers whose name carries the same kind of "seal of quality" that you can use in the likes of Nintendo. But things change, and a new challenge approaches. A plucky, small independent studio called Riot Games fucks pop in the title.
The background here is really fun, too. For the uninitiated, back in 2002 Blizzard released the popular, powerful real-time Warcraft 3 game, and in 2003 it came to light that some models came up with a new version of it called Defense of the Ancients, a type of fun building for RTS defense ( and they actually did it with the official plan of the world which is why, you think, Blizzard was very aggressive with its terms and conditions (Warsters 3: Reforged). After Defense of the Ancients mod became more popular, rival company Valve purchased its rights – much to Blizzard & # 39; s sadrin – and hired one of the mod's leading developers, pseudonymous "IceFrog", to make Dota 2 their own -2009. The inventor of this mod, Steve "Guinsoo" Feak, who worked on it even before IceFrog, went on to join the founders of Riot – a couple of influencers, a business school called Marc Merrill and Brandon Beck – and formed League of Legends.
Now, Dota 2 is offering tens of millions of prizes to its tournament winners and True Valve has a monopoly next to the PC gaming store. Liot & # 39; s League of Legends is usually the most watched game on Twitch, probably the world's largest, and probably the world's largest game. As of August of 2019, the League has the highest ratings of eight million the same players around the world. At the time, at Blizzard, the memory of Warsters 3 was presented with criticism and controversy, the RTS as a genre was in the worst state it has ever been, and the company is still receiving massive protests from fans and its own hosting staff for Ng Wai Chung, or "Blitzchung" – one of its professional players.
This is just background. Riot has since unveiled Legends of Runeterra, a collectible card game that will go live with the audience and Hearthstone. And recently featured in Valorant, it is most accomplished – if not least – by shooting, character, and team-based skills that build a fun triangle with Valve & # 39; s Counter-Strike: Global Offful and Blizzard & # 39; s Overwatch. In a nutshell, Blizzard, Riot, and Valve have created companies that secure their lunch, each one very rich – Blizzard is now an activated Blizzard, remember – and each has their own unique perspective. The trio are Valve-filled, unable to resist the urge to resume his card game, Artifact, and "Project F", a detailed mocking of Riot from their birthday announcement, a RPG-like action-packed spin on League of Legends universal spin on Diablo. Riot's pointless fighting game is the only one that has never been anointed by one or both of their main rivals.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, however, Marc Merrill, now chairman of Riot Games, refuses to be drawn into discussing direct competition – or any form of rivalry – with other big PC players in the games. In fact you are arguing the opposite. "That may sound weird, but we actually don't think about the world from a business or industry standpoint, especially related to other developers or other topics," he said, when I put all the long history on him. Instead, Riot's desire is simply to "do better to become an actor".
"It's not & # 39; Beating Magic (Gathering) & # 39; or & # 39; Beating Hearthstone & # 39 ;, or anything like that," he adds, using the magazine Riot Legends of Runeterra as an example. "Those are some of the best games we've ever played – I've played almost 6000 Hearthstone games. But with a certain type of player, we believe – and the team really believes – that there is a chance to do things that will make their own niche.
"That being said, when we look at the different types of games – I'll just give an example, we'll say MMO – the analysis goes a long way: where are our player's expectations? Where have they been? Have you been looking at an MMO, like: WoW are 20 or 15 years old, WoW is still a genre game, a master of genre, amazingly, such a compelling game in all grades. So if a team or someone else goes, hey, we want to build an MMO that is in the same vein as WoW, they have to admit and understand how it can be different and be important and meaningful … but any analysis or viewpoint based on that information is useless to companies. "
Maybe all talk of rivals is more of an outbreak, then as always, when people talk about the industry. As brutal and surprising as all that historical experience was between these three companies back in the bad time of late, the fact is that now, at least between Blizzard and Riot – which probably share a lot in common, in terms of games – things look good. Merrill talks about Blizzard's development team ("Rob Pardo and the rest of the team. Chris Metzen. And (Jeff) Kaplan is still there and he's an amazing developer"), and he'll talk about Blizzard as "an amazing company". He is proudly speaking of a "fiery conversation" he had with Mike Morhaime, co-founder of Blizzard, a few months ago, when the two were angry about shared learning and public understanding and all that. Merrill's discussions of improving sports or competitive services by "standing on the shoulders of giants," or "rising tide lifts all boats", also point to Epic and Fortnite's work as "great work from the games-as-a Standing site" and "auxiliary memorial". for Riot to keep "continuity and emergence".
No "Riot did what Blizzd & # 39; t", sadly. But even if Riot and co. admit it or not, there's competition there. There are just as many bank pounds and hours in the day to donate to Overwatch 2 or Valorant, or League of Legends or WoW. People watch one game at a time on Twitch. They make one game at a time to become an esports pro, and create one outfit at a time for their cosplay. Just as, of course, people are turning games around and alternating between themselves, the world of games today and certainly one to join. This is a time to build a personality around popular pieces of pop culture and one where Netflix, respectfully, talks about Fortnite as a major competitor, over HBO or Hulu. Companies want your eyeballs, rather gruesomely, and they want all of them for themselves.
So, as Merrill experienced, a wave of Overwatch League could drive up revenue and raise the League of Legends Championship boat, with more esports exposure to advertisers and markets and so on. But what will the Overwatch League look like when Valorant launches, with Riot & # 39; s esports technology and spreading the weight behind it? And what will happen with Counter-Strike prices – which have recently entered a record high – if topers and turnovers play Valorant on Riot's beloved, interest-free servers? What will happen to Velorant if they don't?
That, of course, is all a guess at the moment. But after all that guess remains the big question, that Riot itself is on top of it. It may no longer be appropriate to call the studio "crumbling", but the biggest sex discrimination lawsuit – originally settled for $ 10m last year, having been reopened after a negative report about the company's culture – has now returned. by looking the state of California is worth more in the $ 400million region.
As much as Riot would like to move on and talk about it, the truth is that he probably won't. Endemic sexism is a type of scent that tends to last for a long time, even more than a partner's abnormality, and it is not clear how Riot's culture differs, 18 months from the first report. It's part of the reason Angela Roseboro, Riot's replacement and replacement was hired after the crisis and was said to be a "godsend" by some Rioters, while updates were posted on LinkedIn for articles such as "Out of Callen Comes Conviction". And that's why women are still more prepared to ask if it's safe to work in Riot (according to Roseboro's anecdotes they no longer have). Riot's COO, Scott Gelb, was named numerous times in the reports and remains at the company, Roseboro's sidekick saying "memes do not represent the person and leader I know" and "from everything I've read, I can tell you that not everything reported in the media is true", while Riot sources tell the media " it's hard to cool off and move on in the face of the fact that at the end of the day, Riot chooses to pay the women back here for the trouble of continuing to work with the victims of abuse.
The question, beyond culture itself, is the potential impact that culture can have on these games made by Riot and its community as a whole. There is a simple point to make: while Riot's quest to conquer our deeply-rooted "culture," was played out in public, the company was making games against competing shooters and, League of Legends, known for its many toxic experiences online. Genres and games can't be solved with a single brush, obviously, but MOBAs, hard "archers, and combat games can be called natural forms that expose them to serious poisoning – or at least the biggest imbalance in the audience. One 2019 study, for example, reveals that the five games in which the highest percentage of players experience abuse were Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offful, Overwatch, PUBG and League of Legends. Research from 2017 shows that female performers make up 10 percent of the audience of MOBAs as a genre, and seven percent of first-person shooters. For tactical shooters, such as Valorant, that number is even lower, at 4 percent. Worrying, in other words, there is a bad mass of them all. The company allegedly male-dominated with a disturbing culture that makes sport dominated by men, has anti-Semitism. The game needs more attention than most others when it comes to treating poison among its players, and the question – if you follow that concept – becomes one of Riot as a company.
I've already voiced concern about Riot's plans to handle the poison with Valorant, especially in its reliance on the same League of Legends communication system, with the addition of some voice chat for good measure. Merrill's attitude seems to indicate that the laissez-faire in-game path will continue. "I think it's an exciting challenge and a general opportunity: how do we do that in a healthy way? And in a way that can be caught rather than seen as Riot trying, you know, build this & # 39; police state & # 39 ;, or & # 39; the police think & # 39; We want to help people learn in an efficient and effective way.
"If there is a competition – to get people to deal with it – a certain percentage of the time, it will be powerful. And with energy, some people will manage that well, and some people will manage that small resource. And that becomes (Riot's) question, namely: how do we help people behave? How do we improve one's strength? How do we train for sports? How do we strengthen the culture of celebrating your teammates?
"We have faced a lot of criticism," admitted Merrill. "As an organization, as an entrepreneur, from a game standpoint. I mean, if you wanted to come and find things to criticize Riot, there's a list of outfits, right? People can talk about the way we have been X and Y (speaking traditionally), or, & # 39; oh, the monetization comes in some form, & # 39; s, & # 39; s socially toxic. & # 39;
"In our opinion – and we are obviously very prejudiced against what we do – I think the League of Legends community is a wonderful community. And a lot of the frame of mind about (the players) focuses on the topics they saw when they were poisonous. ; hey, look, we are promoting something that was wrong, & # 39; t trying to say we & # 39; Improved Poison by doing XYZ. That emphasized that we think something is wrong and we make it better, than to say good. it is good. And when you look at online behavior (games), it's just like it can happen on a basketball court.
"The difference is in real life, of course, you can go talk to somebody and say, & # 39; hehe! & # 39; You know, or you can call someone – you can go. In an online game, most of the time people don't have the power to do that, or when you leave the game you find punishment, things like this, give us responsibility when it is not our fault that people can be violent or evil with each other, but with our own the problem. So what do we do to help develop a good community?
"And from things like how we do ethical reforms, report cards, and how we launched the honor system and all these things, there's a perfect lens to look at what Riot has been doing for the community and think of us as a global leader in how the Internet will be managed. We have helped advise Google and Twitter as well as various other companies that have questioned the practical and professional approaches to dealing with people Ethics in the world online.
"And for the mindset, in the way and to do something new and focused on that, it's a really, really important thing. And it's a really difficult problem to solve.
"I think there are some similarities to, you know, our culture and our organization … it's visually appealing. The developers are incredibly empowered, everybody loves to share the details … there are a lot of good things to appreciate about the Riot's performance. especially at a rate. And then we've had some cases – for the first time in the company's history, right – but with 2500 employees over 13 years. Also, I think there are many lenses to look at that. "
To bring back that question of internal culture – and its reflection on the toxic war in the game – Merrill's takeaway is: "We want to help people learn how to thrive and succeed in these (competitive game environments). Because we think it helps to generate life skills. I think the same thing inside (Riot). that we need to be mentally safe, because we are a creative company. There are & # 39; t ideas that are risky – once people need to feel safe to have amazing ideas, and they can discuss it among their friends and peers as well as developers and colleagues. We work hard to build a great community. Build a good company. I think there is a lot we can do. I think there is so much that everyone can do. "
As Merrill puts it, maybe the global recession will improve all boats, and the company's liberal, revolutionary approach to its culture and society will succeed. Requests from women to work in Riot are actually on the rise, he tells me – after the first dip – and requests from top women in the company have risen dramatically, which Merrill thinks is due to the way the company handled the allegations – and publicly mentioned them. The word from the staff, starting in 2019, is that "real progress" has been made.
There may be many Rioters you talk to – at least in the public eye – you will say the work is not being done, and the company can keep improving. That is definitely a message from the Roseboro Revivals and indeed from Merrill itself, and there is a wash list of great steps you can show for Riot to take from the report – social impact, community work, and the good man-made sounds – just like there is a list of outfits Merrill describes. But as the new world order for the gaming PC approaches, with Blizzard riding its feet and Valve crashing its way to Techie esot America, Riot's biggest problems are still its own thing. The solution lies not just in Riot repeating the mantra of constant improvement, but in whether the company's leadership truly believes that: the work is actually not done, in its internal culture and in its games.
