In a revealing interview on Grit, former Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick, who led the company for 32 years before stepping down in December 2023, expressed strong criticism towards Universal's 2016 adaptation of Activision Blizzard's Warcraft. Kotick described the movie as "one of the worst movies I've ever seen," and pointed out its detrimental impact on the development of World of Warcraft. He highlighted the film as a significant "distraction" for the development team, which he believes contributed to the departure of veteran designer Chris Metzen in 2016.
Kotick praised Metzen, calling him "the heart and soul of creativity of the company." He explained that the Warcraft movie, which was greenlit before Activision's acquisition of Blizzard, consumed a lot of resources and diverted the attention of the developers. Kotick noted, "You think about all these people who make video games for a living, and now they have the chance [to] make a movie. They're helping with the casting, and they're on the set, and... it's just a huge distraction." This distraction led to delays in game expansions and patches, affecting the timely delivery of content.
Despite the movie's poor performance in North America, where it grossed only $47 million, Warcraft managed to temporarily become the most successful video game adaptation internationally, thanks to its popularity in China. Overall, the film earned $439 million for Legendary Pictures, though it was still considered a financial disappointment due to its high production costs.
Kotick mentioned that Metzen took the movie's failure personally, which influenced his decision to leave and start a board game company. Kotick later "begged" Metzen to return to Blizzard on a consultancy basis. However, upon his return, Metzen was critical of the planned expansions, suggesting they needed to be "redone" entirely. Despite Kotick's minimal interaction with Metzen after his return, he acknowledged Metzen's significant contribution to the last expansion, World of Warcraft: The War Within, which received a stellar 9/10 in our review. Kotick believes the next expansion will also be excellent, attributing much of the recent success to Metzen's involvement.
