This was fascinating! Thank you for the ALC. I really enjoyed learning more of the history of Blizzard. If you are at all familiar with this video game company, you may enjoy this one as well.

I started playing World of Warcraft when I was 12 (which I think was the first year it was out) and I have been a big fan of Blizzard for a long time, occasionally dabbling in Overwatch (which I am very bad at but enjoy) and Diablo (also bad at but enjoy). Though I only really decided to “break up” with Blizzard after recent allegations came out, it is clear that there has been a long history of poor decisions and employee disrespect. Therefore, I was eager to read this book.

Part 1 was a bit dry - I found it to be mostly focused on the business aspect of things and I zoned out a little with money and acquisition talk. I think Part 3 was the best as it focused the most on the human aspect and a little less on just bad business decisions. I really felt for the employees who wanted to hang on to the company they once loved and make games they cared about but just couldn’t bear such a horrendous employer.

I listened to this in the background while working, cleaning, falling asleep etc. so I probably can’t give the most polished review, but as a simple gamer curious about the fall of a company I once idolized (I know, probably don’t idolize corporations) my opinion is it’s a three star read. A little dry, but it had enough fascinating moments that I read the whole thing.

Play Nice is another stellar book by Jason Schrerier and the audio book is also outstanding with the story of Blizzard Entertainment being delivered perfectly by Ray Chase.

Greetings! You've likely arrived at this page for one of 3 reasons:

1) you read Jason's other book(s). Great news! This is also an interesting, approachable look at one of the Western world's most famous video game companies. Highly recommend.
2) you love video games in general / Blizzard games specifically. Great news! Jason is one of the best nonfiction writers in the video game space - like the This American Life of video games. You're going to learn so much, and if you have a particular attachment to Blizzard or any specific Blizzard properties, I guarantee you’ll enjoy it.
3) you worked for Blizzard. Uh oh! Babe this is gonna be so crazy for you??

This is wholly and entirely the story of Blizzard, which like most companies, is long, complicated, occasionally boring, and goes through periods of exciting innovation and terribly preventable tragedy. Basically, all corporate bios are Jurassic Park: as it turns out, money and success ruins everything good.

Grounded in what must have been dozens, if not hundreds of interviews, it is remarkable how even-keel the narrative manages to be. Jason reports on some folks who do objectively (and subjectively) terrible things as three dimensional people.

I will say, I think he's treated industry women well in his previous two works, and he didn't treat them poorly in this one. But sometimes the assault and harassment content felt detached - akin to the documentarian recording antelope getting eaten. I understand his desire to be balanced and avoid being salacious, which is why it didn't detract a star for me, but his particular detraction against an
infamous Kotaku article comes across as odd. Jason’s points about when the suite got its name seemed like such a small point to argue in the face of rampant, blatant sexual harassment.

I’ve listened to all three of Jason’s books on audiobook, and they have the same narrator: Ray Chase. Chase does a phenomenal job, capturing the humor and irony, and makes the books that much better.

I was familiar with Blizzard properties and have played a few, but feel no particular attachment to any. That said, I still enjoyed the book and the stories within. I’m sure if I loved Warcraft or Overwatch etc, I would have loved it even more.

All in all, I think this book is easier to follow than Press Reset (which is complicated due to its own nature), but his best is still Blood, Sweat, and Pixels.

Thank you Grand Central Publishing via NetGalley, I deeply appreciate early access to this title. Happy publishing week, Play Nice!

Wow, this was a very well researched book on the history of Blizzard. I have been a fan of their games, especially World of Warcraft, but I had heard that they got into hot water over the last few years. It was interesting learning how the company was founded, about the founders and the first hand feedback from employees over the years. I was not able to put this down.

This is a decently researched biography of Blizzard Games/Activision Blizzard. It is a story of a meteoric rise for 20 odd years and then a steady fall from grace marked by large failures and scandals. The book ends with a new hope now that former leader Bobby Kotick is gone and Microsoft has taken over. Note that I listened to the audio version and the narrator did a solid job.

The book is fairly chronological and broken down into three arcs: beginnings, rise, and then slow fall. The first half of the book puts a lot of focus on founder Allen Adham while the second half has a focus on fellow founder Michael Morhaime. In between, we get to know the 'players' within the company: executives, developers, creatives. Through it all is the looming presence of President Bobby Kotick, a divisive figure that the author does not demonize or lionize.

This is a tale of great creativity, unrelenting hours, the 'Blizzard pay tax' that saw most employees working well below comparative wages at other companies just for the privilege, frat house antics, sexism, ego, and massive hits. Because 33 years is a long time to explore, we don't really get deep insights into specifics: e.g., the ins and outs of failed project Titan or how Diablo IV came about. So although this isn't deep, it does have breadth: discussions of the various owners of Blizzard, the lawsuits against them, failed relationships with Netflix and others, development hells, etc.

The author relies mostly on interviews and notes that most of what he wrote was spoken directly to him and not taken from interviews. What this means is that the scope can feel a bit narrow (only opinions by those willing to speak, which is often disgruntled former employees) and the author doesn't venture much in the way of speculation or opinion (which can be both good and bad). It is very much a book about people rather than games or the gaming industry.

There is a lot here and certainly fans of WoW, OW, Diablo, Starcraft, Hearthstone, and HoTS have a lot to enjoy in learning about the development and setbacks of the games (not to mention Activision games such as CoD). Certainly, a running theme of the company was that Blizzard always took care to release complete and polished games, often willing to miss deadlines to do so. That is, until the current iteration of Blizzard right before Microsoft took over.

The audio narration is clear, has some differentiation with dialogue lines, and pleasant/not boring. The book is easy to follow in audio version. Reviewed from an advance reader copy provided by the publisher.

Play Nice by Jason Schneider is really, really good, and it’s "can’t put it down" engaging.

Maybe you remember Jason’s last book, Blood, Sweat and Pixels? I think it was read by pretty much everyone who sits in the Venn overlap of “people who read books” and “people who play video games.” Okay, maybe not everyone but most.

And If Blood Sweat and Pixels was a condemnation of development operations and business practices that lead to crunch, Play Nice is a condemnation of the corporate governance model that prioritizes excess profits returned in quarterly intervals, the model which uses mass layoffs to meet expense ratios, and in most cases prioritizes churning out mediocrity over creativity.

But it doesn’t make that case explicitly. As a journalist, Schreier does a professional job of telling the story in a compelling way without blasting his opinion into every situation and misstep… it’s very un-2024. And it’s very refreshing.

Play Nice takes you on a journey of the last 30+ years of game development at Blizzard. The meta-narrative is pretty repetitive. Guys get frustrated with their jobs and leave to start a game development company. It does well enough to grow some, then struggles, and gets acquired. Which, I guess if working in game development had a core game loop, it would be that. Once acquired, the business grows leaving some workers feel disgruntled, and they leave and start new game development companies. Usually, everyone feels really bought in and like they might get rich, but very few actually do, and the few that do easily justify leaving the regular workers out of the windfall.

This book's a lot of things. It’s a business history book, but also a book about video game development, obviously, but it’s also a book about corporate greed… AND its a book about people — people who care passionately about their craft and creating something special and amazing, about people who built lasting friendships while giving every molecule of themselves to their work, evidenced in 18-hour workday chunks. It’s about the creative spirit and chasing a career doing what you love.

And all of *those* angles of it are inspiring and very much worth reading.

There are other reasons to read, of course. If you just want the dirt on what happened to cause Blizzard’s failed releases, insight into fan community blowback, employee tumult, and quotes from employees for every good and bad step they’re all there.

But mostly, its worth reading because it's a well-researched and well-written coming-of-age story about one of the biggest and most successful businesses of the last 30 years.

Review link live on 10/7/24 @7am CDT

I had loved Schreier’s previous books and I’ve spent countless hours playing Diablo and World of Warcraft. Schreier summarized the company history, what made its games special and outlined the issue that came with rapid growth really well. While for a super fan the drama and the sequence of events might not be as new, it's still a great summarization. As with his previous books, I loved Ray Chase’s narration.

Jason Schreier has been a well-known journalist in the video game industry for years. I have been a fan and followed him for as long as I can remember. I have been there for the leaks, I have been there for the articles about crunch culture, and I was even there for Jason’s clever comeback to Dr. Disrespect about doing a Skype interview from the bathroom. All of that to say I am a fan.

Play Nice is informative and well-written but I find myself struggling to figure out who this book is for. If you are like me and have been following the industry for years and have a good knowledge about it then most of this book will not be new information to you. If you don’t follow the industry I don’t see you picking up this book. That’s why I’m struggling.

I know I follow games closer than the average enthusiast so I may be looking at it too critically. Activision Blizzard is a huge company that was part of the largest video game acquisition in history. If you’re interested in finding out how it started and all of the good and bad while it was on its way to its approximately 70 billion dollar deal then this is the book for you.

If you or someone you care about has found themselves pouring endless hours and days into the Warcraft, Starcraft, and/or Diablo video game universes, you owe it to yourself to read this deep dive into the forming, rise, and fall of the legendary game company Blizzard Entertainment. Jason Schreier continues in his role as our greatest chronicler of gaming history and the lives of gamers and game makers. Blizzard has such a fascinating and complicated history that I think just about anyone can find themselves getting sucked into this narrative about brilliant games bringing massive success, which inevitably leads to massive expectations and massive problems.

Ray Chase is a fantastic narrator who excels at both making the potentially dry business and programming details compelling and conveying the emotions of those interviewed for this book. You feel the elation and anger as well as the grief and regret. Chase is one of the greats.

Many thanks to Hachette Audio, Grand Central Publishing, and NetGalley for providing a copy of this audiobook for review purposes. My thoughts are my own.