The head of Amazon Games, Mike Frazzini, has apparently stepped down from his role, announcing the move internally in a Friday announcement, as first reported by Bloomberg. The stated reason? To focus on his family.
Readers will recall that in January of 2021, Bloomberg published a detailed expose of the behind-the-scenes at Amazon Games, pinning much of the blame on none other than Frazzini. At the time, the multi-studio company had flopped with two games – Breakaway and Crucible – and had pulled New World back for do-overs and delays. Sources claimed the problems inside the company included everything from sexism and discrimination, racist design, incompetent leadership, and issues with the Lumberyard engine.
An Amazon spokesperson told Bloomberg yesterday that Frazzini had “helped build the games business from the ground up,” saying, “Our recent successes with New World and Lost Ark are the result of the long-term, customer-focused vision for games he helped establish.”
But of course, the MMORPG veterans who read MassivelyOP know that both New World and Lost Ark have in fact seen multiple setbacks since their respective launches in fall 2021 and winter 2022. New World has suffered from significant design issues, exploits, and major bugs following its rocky release last year and has seen a drop in peak concurrent players from nearly a million to under 30K as of this very evening. Lost Ark is an import from Smilegate, published in the west by Amazon; it’s fallen from 1.3M peak concurrent to 400K over the last two months.
It is not yet clear who will be replacing Frazzini.
