Blizzard Entertainment is planning to acquire Spellbreak maker Proletariat to bolster its World of Warcraft team, according to a new report shared by GamesBeat. A blog post that Proletariat posted yesterday can confirm that one of the consequences of the deal will be the end of its magic-based battle royale game, whose servers will be shut down in early 2023. Proletariat described Spellbreak as a “fresh, multiplayer action-spellcasting game with exceptional movement and class customization that would give players the chance to unleash their inner battlemage” in its thank-you note to players, an experience that was apparently good enough to get the studio founded in 2012 by a group of game-industry veterans from Harmonix, Turbine, and Insomniac on Blizzard’s radar. Dragonflight, World of Warcraft’s latest expansion, will be released later this year.
The move is the biggest acquisition that Blizzard has made — at least for the past decade — to expand its studios. In this case, the mission is to beef up the staffing for World of Warcraft so that it can hit quality and timing goals for expansions. Terms of this transaction were not disclosed.
Activision Blizzard, the parent company of Blizzard, also folded Vicarious Visions, a longtime Activision studio, into Blizzard to work on the Diablo franchise in January 2021. But Blizzard hasn’t been particularly acquisitive, as one of the few we can remember was the acquisition of Swinging Ape in 2005. Rather, Blizzard itself got tossed around quite a bit in its early days before landing with Activision Blizzard back in 2008. Proletariat has been working with Blizzard since May.
Source: GamesBeat