Blizzard North

For other uses for Blizzard, see Blizzard.

Blizzard North Logo

Blizzard North, formerly known as Condor, was the Bay Area division of Blizzard Entertainment, known for the Diablo series. The studio was originally based in Redwood City, California, and then moved a short distance away to San Mateo, California, with Blizzard proper being based in Irvine (in southern California).

History

Condor

Condor was founded in 1993 David Brevik, Erich Schaefer, and Max Schaefer. The name "Condor" came from Project Condor, a game developed in secret by employees of a digital clip art company that went under. They each had a different name for the company, but Condor was the most common second choice, hence why they settled on it.

While the idea for Diablo existed early on, publishers refused Condor's pitches, as the game would be PC exclusive, and the genre was seen as being too niche. In its early years, Condor worked as a work-for-hire studio, and struggled to stay afloat. Their long-term goal was to be able to develop PC games.

In order to stay afloat, the company developed a number of sports games and the Sega Genesis version of Justice League Task Force. Sunsoft offered them work on an Aerosmith game, but Brevik chose to work on Justice League. While showing off the Genesis version, they came into contact with Silicon & Synapse, who had developed the Super Nintendo version (the game's publisher had not informed Condor of the separate publishing scheme). Silicon & Synapse would later be named Blizzard Entertainment, and after the release of Warcraft, which Condor offered beta services for, came back into contact with Condor to hear their pitch for Diablo. Blizzard liked the pitch, and offered to publish the game. The game received a $300,000 budget. To bolster its finances, Condor worked on sports games on the side.

Blizzard North

Condor was purchased by Blizzard about six months before the release of Diablo in 1996. The announcement came in December, 1995, that Blizzard was interested in acquiring Condor. They decided to join Blizzard proper as they had been impressed with the release of Warcraft II, and given its widespread release, were impressed with Blizzard's distribution of its game. The deal was finalized in February, 1996. Condor was renamed "Blizzard North," but was allowed to keep its autonomy. The renaming of the studio as "Blizzard North" was for name recognition—Blizzard South wanted its subsiduary to have its name, and North wanted the Blizzard name as it wanted to be associated with Blizzard proper in light of the successful releases of the first two Warcraft games. The renaming raised some eyebrows in Condor, as some saw the renaming as a sign of a loss of independence. People within Blizzard North began to refer to Blizzard Irvine as "Blizzard South," though in reality, "Blizzard South" was just Blizzard proper. Ultimately, Blizzard North answered to Irvine.

During the development period, Condor had been on the brink of insolvency several times, but the game's success guaranteed their stability. 3D0 made a counter-bid that would have offered more, but Condor chose Blizzard as the company cultures were more similar.

Structurally, Blizzard North was considered an independent studio from Blizzard South, but also reported to them. There was never a real structure on how Blizzard North had to operate in regards to its parent company. The relationship between the two studios was often contentious, but more often than not, at least up to the release of Diablo II, Blizzard North was usually able to have its way. While Blizzard South was known for its StarCraft and Warcraft series, Blizzard North developers believed that Diablo was just as responsible for the company's success, yet resented being treated as subordinate.

When interviewed, Matt Householder stated that by the late 90s/early 2000s, he felt that Blizzard North and South had developed an "insurmountable philosophical chasm." In his view, North was more freeform and exploratory, while South was more linear, less welcoming of random chance. Bug fixing was a point of contention between the two companies, as South believed that games should be near-perfect on release (i.e. most bug fixing done prior to launch) while North was more willing to fix bugs post-release. Mike Morhaime proposed several times that Brevik and the Schaefers join him in Irvine so they could work together, but they refused.

Diablo proved to be incredibly successful, and their 2000 sequel, Diablo II was even more so. An expansion pack followed the year after.

Disbandment

After the release of Diablo II, Blizzard North split into two groups. The first worked on Lord of Destruction, the second to work on ideas that never materialized such as Diablo Junior. By this point, Blizzard North had grown to a company of 60 employees, but was still using a "flat" corporate structure. Tensions were developing within Blizzard North, not only between its founders, but also its staff, with some employees refusing to work with one another. After the release of Lord of Destruction, the two group split again applied—one group would work on Diablo III, the other on Project X.

By 2003, Blizzard North was in crisis. Two years had passed since the company had released a game. The staff were fractured, its offices were in chaos, the development of both Diablo III and Project X (now "Starblo") was stalled, and it could be years until either were released. By this year, rumors were floating that Vivendi (which owned Blizzard) was looking to sell its videogame division. Another rumor stated that Microsoft was looking to buy said studios. The leaders of Blizzard North was miffed that they'd only learnt of this at the same time as the public, and when asked what was going on, Bill Roper (who was a liaison between South and North) didn't have an answer. In June 2003, the four Blizzard North executives, frustrated with the rumors, wrote a stern email to Vivendi asking for financial protections, better communication, and inclusion in the sale process. If the corporation wouldn’t acquiesce to their demands, they wrote, the four executives would resign. The email hadn't been sent as a bluff, but as a means of showing Vivendi how serious they were. However, Vivendi accepted their resignations.

Mike Morhaime stepped in after the departures of Brevik and the Schaefer brothers. He told North that there would be staff layoffs, that Starblo would be cancelled, and North's attention would shift to Diablo III. North's staff had to interview for their own jobs, and executives from Irvine probed each Blizzard North employee about the studio’s problems, potential solutions, and what they wanted to see the company do next. By the end of the process, Blizzard North had lost a third of its staff.

Rick Seis took Brevik's spot, but it was clear he didn't have the same clout Brevik had. By this point, South had become frustrated with North's laid-back ethos in regards to bug fixing. During the week, Morhaime and Allen Adham asked Brevik if he would stay on, but he refused. The parting of ways for Blizzard North staff was a mixed blessing—some employees liked others more than others, and a number of employees followed Brevik and the Schaefer brothers to Flagship Studios. For those left behind, they felt they had a clean slate after the chaos of the last two years. On Morhaime's part, while he had never intended to send Blizzard North's founders packing, he'd still accepted their resignations without pushback. It had become clear to Blizzard South that North had become too toxic and unproductive to remain intact, hence the restructuring.

Blizzard North continued working on Diablo III, albeit under close supervision from Blizzard South. Those who survived the culling were left with the impression that this was their last chance to prove that the project was still viable. However, in the summer of 2005, Blizzard South decided to close Blizzard North. At Irvine, Blizzard's executives had evaluated Diablo III and decided that the company's creative leaders had to supervise more closely. By this point however, World of Warcraft had most of Blizzard's attention, and nobody at Blizzard had the desire or time to move to San Francisco to oversee the game's development. Morhaime told the staff that the development of the game would be moved in-house to Irvine, and that most of the team would be able to re-apply for their jobs, but would have to move to southern California to keep working at Blizzard. Only a few joined Team 3 in development of Blizzard South's version of Diablo III.

Aftermath

A few employees Blizzard North members including Eric Sexton, Michio Okamura and Steven Woo, organized to launch a new company, Hyboreal Games. In 2018, many Blizzard North staff were working at Echtra Games.

Games

As Condor

• NFL Quarterback Club '95 (1994)
• Justice League Task Force (1995)
• NFL Quarterback Club '96 (1995)

As Blizzard North

• Diablo (1996)
• Diablo: Hellfire (1997, executive producers only)
• Diablo II (2000)
• Diablo II: Lord of Destruction (2001)

Canceled

• Second Diablo II expansion
• Diablo Junior
• Starblo
• Diablo III (project later rebooted by Blizzard Entertainment)

Notable Members

Throughout its history, Blizzard North was predominantly male in terms of staff composition. It had 12 members by the time it began work on Diablo I. This had reached 14/15 by the time of the game's release. This increased to 24 at the start of development of Diablo II, and had grown to 40 by 2000. Notable members included:

Founders

• David Brevik
• Erich Schaefer
• Max Schaefer

Other

• Karin Colenzo (office manager)
• Kelly Johnson (artist)
• Michio Okamura (character artist)
• Stieg Hedlund (designer)
• Matt Householder
• Richard Seis (programmer, studio head)
• Phil Shenk (art director)

Trivia

• Blizzard employees on the original forums had a blue "Blizz" icon to represent a Blizzard post while Blizzard North used a red variant of this icon.