Diablo III Game Director Steps Down

Andy Chalk

One Flag, One Fleet, One Cat
Nov 12, 2002
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Diablo III Game Director Steps Down


Long-serving game director Jay Wilson is moving on to a new project at Blizzard.

Jay Wilson has been riding herd on Diablo III for an awfully long time, and he's in the mood to spread his wings a bit. "I recently celebrated my seven-year anniversary working on Diablo III, and while it's been one of the most challenging and rewarding periods of my life, I've reached a point creatively where I'm looking forward to working on something new," he wrote in a message on the Battle.net forums. "The powers that be at Blizzard have been gracious enough to give me that opportunity. Over the course of the next several weeks, I will be moving off of the Diablo III project and transitioning elsewhere within Blizzard."

He emphasized that Diablo III is in fine health, and said that the development team's plans for the future will go ahead uninterrupted. He also acknowledged making "many mistakes" in managing the relationship with Diablo fans, but added that his intent "was always to provide a great gaming experience, and be as open and receptive as possible, while still sticking true to the vision the Diablo team has for the game."

That Wilson is a polarizing figure among the Diablo fan base can be seen clearly in the response to his announcement, which contain plenty of best wishes but no small amount of acrimony as well. Even so, he said his decision to leave was not an easy one, and he goes with no hard feelings.

"I'm proud of Diablo III, and despite our differences at times I will miss the community that has formed around it," he wrote. "I know some of you feel we fell short of our promise to release the game 'when it's ready.' While we're not perfect, we try to make the best decisions we can with the information and knowledge we have at the time. That doesn't mean we always make the right decisions, but if we made a mistake then I feel we've made an exceptional effort to correct it."

What Wilson will get up to next has not been revealed.

Source: Battle.net [http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/7592242994?page=1]


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Uratoh

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Jun 10, 2011
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Ya know, I've been wondering this for awhile. Is this the same Jay Wilson that was so disliked by the Ultima Online design team they made a slime monster rare spawn named 'Jwilson'?
 

SonOfMethuselah

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Oct 9, 2012
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Never had anything to do with the game, but it's hard not to take notice when a figure who elicits deep affection from some in a community and nothing but bile from others moves on from the project that made him so divisive. Good luck wherever you're headed, sir.
 

Tuesday Night Fever

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Jun 7, 2011
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Lvl 64 Klutz said:
Except the opportunity to keep his bad ideas quarantined to the one game.
Ugh. Good point.

Uratoh said:
Ya know, I've been wondering this for awhile. Is this the same Jay Wilson that was so disliked by the Ultima Online design team they made a slime monster rare spawn named 'Jwilson'?
If I remember correctly it was actually a reference to Johnny Wilson because of a negative review he wrote for the game in Computer Gaming World.
 

Sylveria

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Nov 15, 2009
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Yay.. now Mr. Wilson can make other games that launch unfinished, with always on-line DRM, exploited and exploitative cash auction houses, and then dropping the development of features that were promised to be added later.
 

Zenn3k

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Don't let the door hit you on the way out Jay.

Thanks for ruining one of my favorite game franchises btw, as well as completely turning me off of any future Blizzard products (partly out of fear you might now be involved with one of them).
 

Zenn3k

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Uratoh said:
Ya know, I've been wondering this for awhile. Is this the same Jay Wilson that was so disliked by the Ultima Online design team they made a slime monster rare spawn named 'Jwilson'?
No.

http://uo.stratics.com/database/view.php?db_content=hunters&id=220
 

Zenn3k

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poiumty said:
Without checking, I can already tell exactly zero people will be sad about this news on the Diablo 3 official forums.
Oh they certainly are...I already managed to get a thread deleted by the CMs in less than 15 minutes.

Pretty funny if I do say so myself.
 

RicoADF

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Jun 2, 2009
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Zenn3k said:
Don't let the door hit you on the way out Jay.

Thanks for ruining one of my favorite game franchises btw, as well as completely turning me off of any future Blizzard products (partly out of fear you might now be involved with one of them).
Damn it you ninjad me!
Yeah good riddence to him, I wasn't a fan of previous games as I had never played one but even as a new commer this has been stupid.
 

Tamrin

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Hammeroj said:
Lvl 64 Klutz said:
Tuesday Night Fever said:
...and nothing of value was lost.
Except the opportunity to keep his bad ideas quarantined to the one game.
I wouldn't be so sure that all the design decisions of Diablo 3 were entirely his. 'Sides, he's moving off to another Blizzard project. Why anybody would care about that getting ruined at this point, I don't know.
Agreed. After Wings of Liberty and Diablo III my expectations from Blizzard are pretty much shot to hell.

Zenn3k said:
poiumty said:
Without checking, I can already tell exactly zero people will be sad about this news on the Diablo 3 official forums.
Oh they certainly are...I already managed to get a thread deleted by the CMs in less than 15 minutes.

Pretty funny if I do say so myself.
Shot in the dark here. I'm guessing your deleted thread looked something like this?


And thus is why they felt it warranted said deletion?
 

Zenn3k

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Tamrin said:
[
Zenn3k said:
poiumty said:
Without checking, I can already tell exactly zero people will be sad about this news on the Diablo 3 official forums.
Oh they certainly are...I already managed to get a thread deleted by the CMs in less than 15 minutes.

Pretty funny if I do say so myself.
Shot in the dark here. I'm guessing your deleted thread looked something like this?


And thus is why they felt it warranted said deletion?
Nay.

I think it was the "Fuck that loser" - Jay Wilson; sign off that did it ;)
 

teh_gunslinger

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Dec 6, 2007
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A quote from Jay Wilson springs to mind. Something about a loser. I can't remember what it was.

But on a serious note, I suppose it was bound to happen. I don't think people in general feel like keeping working on the same project year on end. In this case a rather bad one too.

Guess we'll see what happens next.
 

Lunar Templar

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Sep 20, 2009
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Lvl 64 Klutz said:
Tuesday Night Fever said:
...and nothing of value was lost.
Except the opportunity to keep his bad ideas quarantined to the one game.
I would raise the question of how anyone would notice? It's not like Blizzard is a fount of 'great ideas' to begin with.
 

Artemis923

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Zenn3k said:
Don't let the door hit you on the way out Jay.

Thanks for ruining one of my favorite game franchises btw, as well as completely turning me off of any future Blizzard products (partly out of fear you might now be involved with one of them).
My thoughts exactly.

Damn near word for word, in fact.