- Former Blizzard employees defend former director Jeff Kaplan, saying he protected them from “corporate BS”
- This comes at the time accusations fly towards Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick of him knowing about employees’ sexual misconduct
- Big names in the gaming community have commented on the matter
Former Director Jeff Kaplan was described by an Overwatch developer on Twitter, as someone protecting devs from “corporate BS”.
Employees Defend Jeff Kaplan
Jeff Kaplan was Overwatch’s former director and played a crucial role in getting the FPS off the ground. While on his post, he was regarded with admiration, even often called affectionately “Papa Jeff”.
According to Overwatch Producer Tracy Kennedy, this mentality was more than just a mere community sentiment. Amidst the ongoing Blizzard Activision storm, Kennedy wrote on Twitter, expressing her support for Kaplan. “The Kaplan I knew was a great guy who hated corporate BS and fought it until the bitter end,” she wrote. “His philosophy was to shield us from it, and that’s why we have the good team we do, but now the toxicity is quite public and many have left from the shock of it.”
Kaplan left his post back in April this year, with his spot being taken by Aaron Keller, who has been at Blizzard for some time and was a founding member of the Overwatch team. Since then, there have been numerous delays for Overwatch 2.
More Bad Apples Surface
It might seem like Jeff Kaplan is one of the few senior Blizzard employees, who have tried to protect their subordinates from the toxicity that was in the company before the many sexual scandals surfaced earlier this year.
The latest scandal that has shown its ugly head, is one involving Activision Blizzard’s CEO Bobby Kotick, who has been accused of knowing about the sexual misconduct all along. These accusations come from an article in the Wall Street Journal.
Naturally, players were not happy to hear this, with many expressing strong criticism. Asmongold, one of the biggest names in the World of Warcraft community made a video, reacting to the controversial news.
“Bobby Kotick, as no surprise, was actually quite aware of the fact there was sexual harassment in the company. And how could he not be aware because he was one of the people that did it. Oh, wow!”, the streamer said.
Other big names, like Youtuber Cr1TiKaL (penguinz0) took a different method of blasting Blizzard’s latest mishaps. The content creator posted a video explaining, in brief, the situation, but did so in a very sarcastic manner.
“God damn, he’s charming,” said Cr1TiKaL in a sarcastic tone, regarding Kotick’s video response to the WSJ article,” such a beautiful way with words. The way he’s just able to expertly dismiss everything as being wrong and misleading, or out of context. Oh, expertly done, truly immaculate stuff.”
It is yet to be seen how the recent development will affect Activision Blizzard, however, it is certainly another black spot in the company’s already tarnished reputation.
