In an interview with CVG, Activision CEO Erik Hirshberg has rejected the notion that the company is risk-averse, adding that Activision as a whole is a lot more than just a yearly Call of Duty and that they actually have some appetite for risk.
I think there is a false narrative that all Activision wants to do is put out a Call of Duty every year, when in fact we’ve shown some real innovation and appetite for risk.
He then cited Skylanders and Destiny as proof of that.
But we have, you’re sitting next to a poster of Skylanders, which is a franchise that didn’t exist eighteen months ago. It’s a new IP, a new genre, a new play-pattern, untested in an area of the business that was shrinking. I feel like people breeze past that when they ask me about diversity. I don’t know anyone that’s taken a bigger bet on a less proven franchise based on their gut-instinct than we did with Skylanders.
We’re doing it again with Destiny – on one hand it’s a first-person shooter, on another it’s a new genre, it’s a shared-world shooter, bringing elements of the MMO into shooters, which is incredibly exciting. We’ve shown a consistent willingness to take risks, and a consistent ability to take the right bets.
Finally, he said he believes that other publishers that have a more diverse portfolio aren’t necessarily more original at all.
I think that publishers which have wider and ‘more diverse’ slates are far less risky than us, are far less creative. Just because you have a game in every genre does not mean you’re creative. So, what we do is certainly a strategy that’s not for everyone, and it’s not the only way to make good business, but it works for us. It’s something that pre-dates me, it’s something Activision has done for many years
Certainly, Hirshberg is entitled to his own opinion but so are we - and frankly, his arguments are quite thin. The company is a lot more conservative than even most other big publishers, let alone smaller ones, and trying to bring Destiny as a counter in the conversation is a moot point - yes, there is a certain kind of risk to the operation (mainly because of the enormously huge budget of the game), but Bungie itself and its immense fan base are a huge cushion to the risk involved.
What’s your opinion, anyway?
