Man, it’s been a long, long time coming, but Blizzard Entertainment workers have finally formed a wall-to-wall union, specifically meaning that it includes everyone from game designers and engineers to artists and QA workers – the latter of whom paved the way for this move with QA-backed unions at Blizzard Albany and Raven Software.
Game File’s Stephen Totilo says that the group – dubbed The World of Warcraft Game Makers Guild – represents over 500 workers at Blizzard’s World of Warcraft team in Irvine, affiliated with the CWA union.
Readers will recall that early whispers of unionization efforts at Blizzard began back in 2020 following a massive wave of layoffs and an employee effort to identify pay disparities. But employee mobilization really ignited in 2021, when California regulators filed a shocking sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuit against Activision-Blizzard that was then compounded by additional investigations and suits. The California lawsuit was ultimately settled in 2023 and never went to trial. As part of the settlement, the state withdrew its complaint with an acknowledgement that the allegations against ABK, its board, and Bobby Kotick had not been substantiated by a court or independent investigation; and ABK put $45.75M into a fund to compensate female workers and promote diversity initiatives in the industry, while not admitting wrongdoing. ABK likewise settled with the EEOC and SEC; executives denied any systemic malpractice in its settlements and statements, even as ABK developers apologized and condemned the corporate response. The lawsuits and mainstream reporting on ABK culture led to a wave of additional allegations, public backlash, and the ousting of multiple devs, including Blizzard’s president; half a year later, Microsoft announced it was buying ABK. Through it all, under alleged unionbusting pressure from ABK, workers at the studios continued to organize.
The now-settled original California lawsuit was first made public three years ago this week, a fact presumably not lost on the WoW team organizers here.
Even before the sale of ABK to Microsoft was complete, the company promised to negotiate with workers, which it has done. In fact, WoWGG (yes) isn’t even the first Microsoft studio to unionize this week, as it was preceded by the Bethsoft-based One BGS USA union’s formation – another wall-to-wall union following in the footsteps of the ZeniMax QA union, whose formation in 2023 made it the biggest games union in the country. Over 600 QA workers under the Activision banner also unionized this year following yet another round of mass layoffs.
According to GameDeveloper.com, the WoWGG union will now choose bargaining committee members to set its platform. “We suspect our top bargaining items will include layoff protections, improved work from home policies, transparency around performance and promotions, and pay adjustments to align with the expensive areas we live,” Blizzard senior software engineer Kevin Vigue says.
We're the World of Warcraft Gamemakers Guild: the first wall-to-wall union at Blizzard! We're thrilled to include WoW's QA, Art, Sound, Design, Engineering and Production voices for a democratized workplace. At this crucial moment in games, we stand together as one. For Azeroth! pic.twitter.com/ieewW5KFuI
— WoW Gamemaker's Guild (@WoWGG_CWA) July 24, 2024
Specifically, this is Blizzard in Irvine, and even more specifically, the World of Warcraft team.
The official name's a mouthful:
The World of Warcraft Game Makers Guild – CWA Union (WoWGG-CWA)
— Stephen Totilo (@stephentotilo) July 24, 2024
