To gamers, the name Blizzard might conjure mental images of a giant cow, named World of Warcraft, dispensing cash from golden udders. Or it might just evoke images of a very well-off company. Don’t judge me.

The reality of the matter is, though, that they are a business and in order to remain a business they have to keep the fat trimmed. It’s a bleak fact, but lay offs happen, and not because some heartless Snidely Whiplash-esque villain in a suit somewhere decided to amuse himself by twirling his mustache while reveling in the sight of people as they find out that they’ve just been fired. With that said, a lot of lay offs are about to happen over at Blizzard. 600 employees are in the process of being axed. When probed for details, Blizzard admitted that roughly 90% of the terminations were, “unrelated to internal development, and the World of Warcraft development team is not affected.” They also confirmed that this would not impact forthcoming releases.

Hopefully the former Blizzard employees can find new opportunities on the horizon. Working for such a prestigious company will certainly look good on their résumés.

Source: gamesindustry.biz