Diablo 3's senior game producer departs Blizzard

By John Bedford Published 23 January, 2012

Parker pens his announcement.

Steve Parker, senior game producer of Diablo 3, announced on Twitter last Friday that he is no longer working for Blizzard.

"Hey Twitter, I'm no longer working at Blizzard or on D3," he wrote.

"I've had a great 5 years there and those guys are going to kill it with Diablo."

No further details were given on the reasons for his departure.

The announcement was made on the same day that game director Jay Wilson outlined key revisions being made to Diablo 3, while reassuring fans that the continued development time would make the game worth the extra wait.

"We want Diablo 3 to be the best game it can be when it launches," he wrote.

"To get there, we're going to be iterating on designs we've had in place for a long time, making changes to systems you've spent a lot of time theorycrafting, and removing features you may have come to associate with the core of the experience.

"Our hope is that by embracing our iterative design process in which we question ourselves and our decisions, Diablo 3 won't just live up to our expectations, but will continue to do so a decade after it's released."

Diablo 3 was originally announced way back in 2008. It's still - hopefully - due for release in 2012.

Picture of John.

About John Bedford

John is an MMO specialist with a particular passion for Eve Online. He once nearly went paragliding.

Read more articles from John by visiting the John Bedford archive page.

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Comments (30) Latest comment 3 months ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • makariel #1 4 months ago

    senior game producer departs just as major revisions come along? surely coincidence.

  • Fenix` #2 4 months ago

    I can see this being blown into huge proportions on the internet, which can arguably affect Diablo III only in a negative fashion :/.

  • Alf-Life #3 4 months ago

    Producer. lol

  • Canyarion #4 4 months ago

    Nah, it will be fine. Blizzard is known for sacking their developers every few years. It happened all the time during/after WoW, look what the effect on that was.

    I don't know the man, but it's still sad he has to go.

  • stee1gargoyle #5 4 months ago

    Does this imply that the closed testing sessions Blizzard have been doing have resulted in negative feedback, do you think? I'm referring to the announcement of "major revisions".

  • anomagnus #6 4 months ago

    News like this is the tabloid version of 'star x sleeps with star y' according to 'friends'.

    Its meaningless gossip, imo.

  • erp #7 4 months ago

    They're going to kill what exactly?

  • Labatyd #8 4 months ago

    Time for speculation: Blizzard decision makers have demanded that consoles be the lead platforms for development. Would explain this huge backwards step D3 seems to have taken and ragequitting at producer level.

  • marmaduke #9 4 months ago

    So was he forced out or just fed up? Either way it seems a pretty shitty way to do business.

  • Inmediasress #10 4 months ago

    @erp
    Well for all intents and purposes Diablo 3 is nothing like the former games were so I guess he may got fed up and left.
    That or Blizzard finally came to its senses and re makes Diabolo 3 in to something that's actually a great sequel to the other games and he was fired because of that, and now he is butthurt severely.

    That of course leaves the question when it will be released and whether or not I might re consider buying it.
    Edited by Inmediasress at 23/01/12 @ 09:29

  • tankboi #11 4 months ago

    So does this mean they will be changing that stupid always-online feature for single player mode? Because that is the only Blizzard news I want to read about and don't give a damn about anything else until that happens.

  • tankboi #12 4 months ago

    @erp

    I think it's yank-slang for 'they are going to do well', so don't worry.

  • RickHard #13 4 months ago

    Well, another news telling us that the developement of the game is somewhat delayed... Pww, D3 seems to be going the way of Duke... I am sorry, but you do not implement "key revisions" to a game that has been 4 years in the making. You save them for the sequel.

  • Canyarion #14 4 months ago

    @RickHard Blizzard has always made games this way. It's what got us Warcraft 1,2,3, Starcraft 1,2, World of Warcraft, Diablo 1,2.
    All those games were late, but at least they were awesome.

  • UncleLou #15 4 months ago

    So does this mean they will be changing that stupid always-online feature for single player mode? Because that is the only Blizzard news I want to read about and don't give a damn about anything else until that happens.

    Nope, not gonna happen. You might as well stop reading about Diablo 3, tbh.

  • vlaana #16 4 months ago

    @Rickhard You go tell one of the most successful game developers of all time how to make a good game, see how far you get.

  • darkmorgado #17 4 months ago

    Cue a load of armchair experts using this as "evidence" that D3 is doomed.

  • niroe #18 4 months ago

    Tomorrow's headline, "ZOMG Guy who made Diablo 3 developers their coffee, resigns!"

    One guy leaving will not destroy the game, it'll still be great!

  • swisstony #19 4 months ago

    I guess using Twitter to signal your availability is as good a channel as any in the hunt for a new job.

  • neorich #20 4 months ago

    No problem, I dont buy PC version, I will wait PS3, maybe I will wait forever.

  • bmfof #21 4 months ago

    If you had any shred of integrity you'd remove this piece of "news", as it states nothing but the guy's departure. So, unless you opt to write a story about every single dude leaving a game dev at some point, there's really no point in this being here.

    But, oh, wait. The actual news here, of course, is the wording he uses in his tweet - that "those guys" (the bad evil Blizzard) are going to "kill it" (kill Diablo, apparently). I guess it's too much to ask from eurogamer to take the extra effort and read further tweets from the same person they so gladly use to make a flashy news article from.

    https://twitter.com/#!/retailsails/status/160242461283856384

    "Yeah, probably should have used a better verb than "kill it" about D3. They're going to do an amazing job."

  • arcam #22 4 months ago

    Wow, what is everyone moaning about? It's a senior producer leaving a AAA upcoming game, surely that counts as news? Maybe not interesting for everyone but legitimate nonetheless.

    And if you read something bad into the "kill it" phrase, that's your fault (or Parker's), not EG's. It's obvious that it was meant in a good way. and EG didn't imply any different.

  • bmfof #23 4 months ago

    @arcam Yeah, so obvoius, the author himself found it necessary to clarify what he ment and admited poor wording.

  • Totza #24 4 months ago

    @Labatyd nope.avi

  • Antaios #25 4 months ago

    Could it be he's just moving on to other things now that the project is just about finished and his work is done?

  • Marshall2008 #26 4 months ago

    With a further minimum 4 week testing of patch 10 and 2 months between announcement of the launch day and the launch day itself we won't see D3 before May 2012.

  • dirtysteve #27 4 months ago

    @anomagnus how is it meaningless gossip? A producer leaving a major game after big changes are announced, IS news.

  • dfinit #28 4 months ago

    @bmfof As usual, the first version is best, so it's no hasard the use of "kill". Not very subtle, but enough to leave him the backdoor he is using with the official "excuse" :-)

  • Stevonymo #29 4 months ago

    Imagine if you have worked countless hours producing something and are gearing up for launch...Your boss comes along and says "nah we are gonna re hash it completely." I think you have your answer why he has walked!

  • Stoposto #30 3 months ago

    He worked for 5 years on diablo.. But that does not mean the game is gonna suck.. He did not work on diablo 1 or 2 and we loved those..
    Just wanted to point out a flaw in the speculations about this destroying the game.
    I see you down vote most of the comments on this being gossip so i guess ill get the same treatment, Look i love conspiracy, i do believe the work is not owned by leader but by corporations.. But i do wear critical glasses on when reading news like these, and this one is BS :)