Blizzard isn't afraid to compete with World of Warcraft
Tracey John, resident MMO maven at the MTV Multiplayer blog, had the chance to sit with Blizzard COO Paul Sams and VP Frank Pearce at the WorldWide invitational. She asked them some tough questions, and came away with some extremely revealing answers. Beyond reconfirming that Diablo III will categorically not an MMO, the studio heads make no bones about their position on the topic of competing with World of Warcraft. They're ready and willing to do so - it's not something that scares them. Pearce is blunt on the subject saying, "It'd be better for us to cannibalize our own player base compared to having another publisher do it."
They also explore a number of different of tangential topics, such as the benefits of allying with Activision, the possibilities of mobile applications tying into their existing games, and the tradeoffs between developing existing franchises and creating new ones. It's an inordinately detailed look into the mind of Blizzard's top brass, and well worth checking out.
