Blizzard's done it again!

Mamma Mia

"Blizzard's changed!", is a sentence that the old guard over at that beleaguered and battled video game company desperately want to hear come out of the mouths of their many emboldened detractors over the next few weeks. They're moving to extremes in order to do anything that is performative enough that it'll force their vilification status to automatically reverse so that they can go back to normal society without the looks, the condemnation, and most of all, the silent boycotts. But one has to wonder, and one does, how far Blizzard can really go to save their previous reputation when they really should be focusing on the future. I mean, for the purposes of the performance I know it really helps to be able to point to meaningless actions in the now and go "Here, look! Our company is on the up and up now!" but from where I'm standing it just looks like the more they try and prove themselves with the worthless, the more it just looks like they'll be unwilling to fix the actual bad stuff when it rears it's ugly head. (Because why bother? They've already done the thing, no?)

The big issue they have to turn people around on, and the thing which is looming over them like a guillotine right now, is the perception that the culture over at Blizzard has been deeply sexist and unpleasant for female employees. This has been their open secret which the company-proper did absolutely nothing internally about, even as other bigger companies were facing their own meltdowns due to similar or identical issues. What I'm trying to say is, there really is no way that Blizzard could worm their way out of this by feigning ignorance, and that may be the reason why they sent out Brack to bite the big one from the masses in lieu of the rest of the company. Negligence this pronounced demanded blood and this was their way of living up to the bloodthristy crowds. But does it really solve the heart of the problem? Guess it didn't for Blizzard because they decided to go deeper.

Wait, did I say 'Deeper'? I meant to say 'Dumber'. Twice now I've seen little pop up stories about how, in the wake of everything, Blizzard have decided to remove provocative or in-any-way sexual content from World of Warcraft. Which, and this is crucial, achieves nothing. How does going puritanical on stupid low-res portraits address the rampant misconduct that was occurring in the real world? It almost seems like a backhanded temper tantrum from the employees, as if they're saying "Oh what, we can't sexually harass our colleagues anymore? Harrumph! Well then I guess all sex is outlawed now- you heard them, guys; cover up your Draenei, bare skin is illegal." See, I wasn't exaggerating when I called their effort 'performative' now was I?

Another response to this whole affair is admittedly a little bit bigger and even slightly relevant, but it also achieves a bit of the Streisand effect, which anyone with a working frontal cortex would have known was coming from a mile away, but we're talking about Blizzard here. (I'm not surprised) You see, Jessie McCree from Overwatch is having his name changed. Why? Because that name was derived from the real life Jessie McCree who worked for Blizzard and was a total creep to his fellow workers. Thing is, I didn't even know the character was related to a real guy, and neither did a lot of people, which means that in an attempt to prevent this man from receiving a spotlight he doesn't deserve, they've signal boosted his existence to anyone who's wondering why McCree is now called- wait, what was it- McCloud? Oh for the love of- That's Star Fox's name you morons, come up with your own crap! (Now we just have to wait until Overwatch 2 comes out so the name change can come into effect. 2040 here I come...)

But since we're on the topic of 'Blizzard making amends for wrongdoings' how about we circle back around to the debacle that Blizzard was in just before all of this? You remember, the one where they were accused of censoring free speech during the crackdown of Hong Kong in order protect their own vapid corporate interests? Effectively erasing a crisis which has since spiralled into a leading cause of many human rights violations including false imprisonment, suppression of freedoms and, allegedly, deaths. Yeah, Blizzard just sort of came out and say they stood proud alongside all of that, whilst not just squandering, but actively stepping on and squashing, an opportunity to give a voice to those who needed it. Now one might say "They're a video game company, how is it their job to promote activism?"  However, standing up for the Hong Kong people would have been totally in line with the very many moralistic standards that the company had claimed to represent for years now. In their hostility, they revealed how empty all that grandstanding was.

And the reparation for that was- what again? No I'm being serious, what did Blizzard do in order to make up for spitting in the face of a real-life fight against oppression? Because I could be wrong, but I feel like it was nothing. Oh, I mean they dragged out Brack, back when he was still around, to voice some hollow platitudes from an expired can of party apologies; but what about actual policy changes? Well, like I said, they did nothing, which does mean that they stood by and let gormless Blizzcon attendees rant about Hong Kong on a hot mic for however long they wanted, something so meaningless for everyside involved it's hardly worth mentioning, but aside from that they adopted the age-old, 'if we ignore it, it'll go away'. And luckily for them it did, unfortunately karma kicked in and they got done for housing a bunch of pervs instead.

Yet the performance doesn't stop. (At least, not that quickly it doesn't.) For the latest step in this waltz has involved the newly worked upon, and at the point of this publishing 'released', Diablo 2 Resurrected and how people should approach it. You see, on one hand it's a faithful and gorgeous recreation of what is widely considered the best ARPG ever made and thus an absolutely must-own for Diablo fans. On the otherhand, it's being distributed by Blizzard, so you'd be giving those weirdoes money. As it just so happens, Diablo's director chimed in on the whole affair with the comment "it was defiantly very troubling to hear these types of things." (Ahh, distancing yourself from the company's biggest open secret in the first sentence! Classic. This guy's a pro.) Apparently he also commanded players to "do what they feel is right", but I can't seem to find the conversation that was said in quoted anywhere so I'm going to call that a contested quote. If he did say it, then that's probably the first open and honest way that Blizzard have conducted themselves in the wake of everything, reminding players of the responsibility of their wallets and spending power. If he didn't, then that would be line with the way that the design team covered up the Barbarian's hips for cheap 'we're doing the right thing' points.

Floundering and insincere though it may seem, Blizzard are trying to shift their perception into a company that knows how to behave; they just simply have no idea how to go about doing it. Most of their bizarre censorship attempts can be too easily construed as some puritanical purge in order to bring their content to a standard better fitting the 60 year old suits over at Sony, rather than a serious try to show how much they respect woman in the workplace. What the heck does Diablo II's barbarian's hips have to do with the workplace anyway? It will be interesting to see how many people actually buy these papier-mâché olive branches, and how many more are left scratching their heads in bewilderment at this Spongebob-level display of miscomprehension. Either way, Diablo 2 is still going to sell like pancakes, so who ultimately cares?