Blizzard Co-founder Opens Game Company Full of Blizzard Veterans
Blizzard co-founder and former CEO Mike Morhaime announced Dreamhaven, a new game company, on Wednesday. Dreamhaven will develop and publish original games, and opens with two new studios: Moonshot and Secret Door.
Morhaime left his role as president of Blizzard in October 2018 following Activision's acquisition of the company. He stayed on as an advisor until April of that year. He will helm Dreamhaven as CEO.
Activision’s mandate for Blizzard had become to cut costs and produce more games, which turned off a lot of veteran staff. For more context, two pieces I wrote back in 2018: https://t.co/la61HsDDga https://t.co/H8lDRqzCIl
— Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) September 23, 2020
"I'm excited to team up with such talented people who care deeply about games and their communities," Morhaime said in his announcement. "I've always believed in the power of games to bring people together regardless of backgrounds or boundaries. With Dreamhaven, we look forward to creating and sharing new experiences with players everywhere."
Dreamhaven and its two studios repeatedly emphasize their hope to bring players together, suggesting they will be working on multiplayer experiences. The distinction between the creative approaches of each studio is unclear, but Dreamhaven describes itself as a place for developers to take chances and maintain their own identities without sacrificing resources.
Moonshot Games will be led by Jason Chayes, Dustin Browder and Ben Thompson, each of which has a storied history in game design. Chayes previously led the Hearthstone team as an executive producer. Browder has worked on StarCraft 2, Heroes of the Storm, Command and Conquer and The Lord of the Rings. Thompson was creative director on Hearthstone and art director on the World of Warcraft trading card game.
Chris Sigaty, Alan Dabiri and Eric Dodds will lead Secret Door. Sigaty produced several major Blizzard titles, including the original Warcraft 3. Dodds was the first game director of Hearthstone. Dabiri has filled both technical director and game director roles, and has worked on Warcraft 3, StarCraft 2 and Heroes of the Storm.
Dreamhaven currently has 27 employees across its three entities, and is seeking to swell its ranks further. The company has yet to release information about what games it's working on.