Activision Blizzard’s ‘World of Warcraft’ game developers vote to unionize

The more than 500 game developers at Blizzard Entertainment who work on the blockbuster video game “World of Warcraft” have elected to form a union, marking the latest entrant in a wave of unionizing efforts in the video game industry.

Three hundred workers cast votes in favor of joining the Communications Workers of America Local 9510, according to a ballot count conducted Wednesday by a third-party arbitrator, the union said. Eighteen voted “no.” Microsoft-owned Blizzard Entertainment has recognized the union.

Employees are seeking to address issues such as hours, pay, transparency around promotions, remote work and layoff protections, said Eric Lanham, a test analyst who has worked at Blizzard Entertainment for about nine years and is a member of the union’s organizing committee.

“The decision by workers on World of Warcraft to form a union marks a key inflection point in the broader movement for game worker organizing industry-wide,” Tom Smith, CWA’s senior director of organizing, said in a statement. “What seemed impossible six years ago is now a reality.”

The newly unionized workers on the “World of Warcraft” development team are largely based in Irvine, where Blizzard Entertainment’s campus is located, as well as in Massachusetts. The unit includes designers, engineers, producers, artists, quality assurance testers and other game developers.

Lanham said he and his family have been impacted by his mandatory overtime hours, making it difficult to spend time with his child. As a test analyst, Lanham earns about $55,000 annually, pay that he says is far below that of competitors.

“To live in Irvine costs a significant amount,” he said. “We don’t earn enough.”

Blizzard Entertainment is a subsidiary of Activision Blizzard, the largest game company in the Americas.

Activision Blizzard was created in 2008 when Santa Monica-based Activision merged with the parent company of Blizzard Entertainment. Activision Blizzard is known for successful titles such as “Call of Duty,” “Warcraft,” “Overwatch,” “Hearthstone” and “Candy Crush.” It was acquired in 2023 by tech giant Microsoft Corp.

The video gaming giant had a total employee count of 13,000 as of December 2022, according to its last annual report.

The worker election did not have to go through the typical process overseen by the National Labor Relations Board because Microsoft pledged to take a neutral stance toward workers who sought to form a union.

Microsoft’s pledge, unusual among largely nonunionized tech giants, could pave the way for thousands of additional workers to more easily unionize. Already, more than 1,750 video game workers who work for Microsoft have joined CWA.

“We continue to support our employees’ right to choose how they are represented in the workplace,” a Microsoft spokesperson said in a statement. “We will engage in good faith negotiations with the CWA as we work towards a collective bargaining agreement.”

In recent years, video game workers across the industry have increasingly pushed back against their working conditions, including temporary contracts with limited job security and intense pushes to meet game deadlines. The industry has also recently been roiled by layoffs and dissent from workers over the use of artificial intelligence in their work.

Earlier this year, Microsoft said it would lay off 1,900 employees at Activision Blizzard and Xbox. Wired reported this week that to fill the gap of a reduced workforce, some Activision Blizzard concept artists were forced to use AI to aid in their work producing 2D images.

Paul Cox, a senior quest designer at Blizzard Entertainment who crafts the story that takes place in the narrative behind “World of Warcraft,” said that as industrywide layoffs ramped up, “it started to feel like we were lines on a spreadsheet, where people we can’t see are making decisions for us.”

“We want to make sure our voice has equal standing,” he said.

In May 2022, video game testers at Activision Blizzard’s Raven Software subsidiary voted to form a union with Communications Workers of America — a first for a U.S.-based game company — after going on strike for weeks.

Wednesday’s announcement by “World of Warcraft” workers also comes on the heels of a successful union vote by artists, engineers, programmers and designers at another Microsoft-owned studio. Last week, some 240 workers at Maryland-based Bethesda Game Studios, the company behind “The Elder Scrolls” and the “Fallout” series, signed union cards or otherwise indicated their support for the union in a tally.