Former Gears of War boss becomes former Diablo boss as Rod Fergusson leaves Microsoft a third time, "sword in hand," after 5 years overseeing the ARPG series: "I'm proud of what we've built"
In an ironic twist of gaming history, Rod Fergusson is leaving a position at Microsoft for the third time in his decades-long industry career. He announced via social media today that he's leaving Blizzard after five years of overseeing the Diablo franchise to move onto as-yet-undetailed new pastures.
"After five years driving the Diablo franchise with four big launches, it's time to step away from Blizzard/Microsoft, sword in hand, and see what's next," Fergusson says on Bluesky. "I'm proud of what we've built and excited for what's ahead for Diablo, and for me."
Those "four big launches" are, presumably, referring to Diablo 2: Resurrected, Diablo Immortal, Diablo 4, and its expansion Vessel of Hatred. Those titles represent quite a rollercoaster for the community's response to the series over the years, but the highs represent a pretty thorough cementing of Diablo as a major franchise after years of dormancy.
Fergusson started his career at Microsoft in 1996, long before "Xbox" was even a twinkle in anybody's eye, but he eventually worked to support games ranging from Microsoft Train Simulator on PC to Xbox launch title Blood Wake. After working with Epic to develop Gears of War, he eventually jumped ship to the latter studio in order to get the third-person shooter ready for launch on Xbox 360.
He then spent seven years at Epic and two years at BioShock developer Irrational Games, but eventually came back to Microsoft in 2014 to lead the Gears of War franchise at the studio that would become known as The Coalition. After the launches of Gears of War 4 and Gears 5, Fergusson then moved on to lead the Diablo franchise at Blizzard – which, through a multi-billion dollar twist of history, would eventually see him rejoining Microsoft once again.
"You brought strength, hellfire, and vision to one of gaming's most iconic franchises," Xbox boss Phil Spencer said in response to Fergusson's departure. "Playing Diablo IV with you was a blast – thanks for everything you gave to the game and the community."
As for the Diablo series itself, apparently we'll see Fergusson's fingerprints for some time to come. The official Diablo account says Fergusson has "set Diablo up for an amazing year forward."
Meanwhile, the Microsoft bloodbath continues 9,000 layoffs later with the death of Contraband, the '70s co-op game from the studio behind open-world hit Just Cause, and it seems Hideo Kojima's OD is the only thing that's safe.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Games industry in search of new winning combo at Gamescom 2025
The global games industry gathers for the vast Gamescom trade fair in Cologne this week, with hopes that upcoming heavy-hitters like "GTA VI" can help the industry escape its doldrums. Tuesday's opening night event will show off major releases slated for the months ahead, with the starring role going to "Black Ops 7" -- the new instalment in the sprawling "Call of Duty" saga. Trade visitors will have Wednesday to peruse the stands and make connections, before tens of thousands of enthusiastic gamers are unleashed on the vast salon from Thursday to Sunday. Last year's Gamescom drew almost 335,000 people to the Cologne exhibition centre, where studios lay on vast stands with consoles or PCs offering hands-on play with the latest releases. Nintendo is back in 2025 after staying away last year, surfing on record launch sales for its Switch 2 console. And Microsoft's Xbox gaming division will show off new portable hardware expected to be released towards the end of the year. Sony, the Japanese giant behind the PlayStation, has opted out this time around. The mood is mixed for the roughly 1,500 exhibitors attending this year, as major publishers have recently steered back into profitability but the job cuts seen over the past two years continue. In early July, Microsoft said it would lay off around 9,000 people, with hundreds leaving game studios like "Candy Crush" developer King and several games cancelled, including "Perfect Dark" and "Everwild". - Battle for attention - "The industry is consolidating quite a bit" after the bumper years when Covid-19 lockdowns created a captive audience, said Rhys Elliott of specialist games data firm Alinea Analytics. Around 30,000 workers have lost their jobs since early 2023, according to tracking site Games Industry Layoffs -- more than 4,000 of them so far this year. Revenue in the global games market should hold steady at just under $190 billion this year, data firm Newzoo has forecast. The number of players and hours spent with the medium are stable while an ever-expanding number of titles are jostling for attention. And with leviathans like "Roblox" or "Fortnite" swallowing the attention of hundreds of millions of monthly users, "everyone's fighting for a smaller share of that pie," said Circana expert Mat Piscatella. The need to find new audiences has pushed Microsoft's Xbox, the biggest games publisher in the world, to switch strategy, increasingly offering its titles on competing console makers' hardware. "They've had really great success on the PlayStation platform. Sony is making a bunch of money on that too," Piscatella said "It's a little bit of a win-win all the way around." Some PlayStation games are making the trip in the opposite direction, with "Helldivers 2" the first to be made available on Xbox as well as the traditional PC port. - Success on a budget - Shoring up sales is vital in an era where the cost of developing high-spec "AAA" games has mounted into the hundreds of millions of dollars -- exposing studios to massive risk should their games not perform as hoped. But several breakout hits have recently shown that lower-budget games can still win over players with gameplay, story and art style, such as four-million-selling French turn-based battler "Clair Obscur: Expedition 33". "There's a realisation you don't need to spend masses of money to deliver a high-quality game that can appeal broadly and so everyone is rushing towards that model," said Christopher Dring, founder of industry website The Game Business. But "for every 'Clair Obscur' success story, there are 10 games that fail to find an audience at all," Piscatella pointed out. "It's hyper-competitive for those products outside of that big sphere" and smaller developers must fight hard for the funding they need to get games to market. Nor is the cult-hit trend likely to displace the mega-budget mastodons. Analysts predict that Rockstar Games' vast "Grand Theft Auto VI" could notch up the biggest launch for any entertainment product in history. That might be the juice the flagging industry needs to regain some of its mojo. kf/tgb/gv/lb Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Games industry in search of new winning combo at Gamescom 2025
The global games industry gathers for the vast Gamescom trade fair in Cologne this week, with hopes that upcoming heavy-hitters like "GTA VI" can help the industry escape its doldrums. Tuesday's opening night event will show off major releases slated for the months ahead, with the starring role going to "Black Ops 7" -- the new instalment in the sprawling "Call of Duty" saga. Trade visitors will have Wednesday to peruse the stands and make connections, before tens of thousands of enthusiastic gamers are unleashed on the vast salon from Thursday to Sunday. Last year's Gamescom drew almost 335,000 people to the Cologne exhibition centre, where studios lay on vast stands with consoles or PCs offering hands-on play with the latest releases. Nintendo is back in 2025 after staying away last year, surfing on record launch sales for its Switch 2 console. And Microsoft's Xbox gaming division will show off new portable hardware expected to be released towards the end of the year. Sony, the Japanese giant behind the PlayStation, has opted out this time around. The mood is mixed for the roughly 1,500 exhibitors attending this year, as major publishers have recently steered back into profitability but the job cuts seen over the past two years continue. In early July, Microsoft said it would lay off around 9,000 people, with hundreds leaving game studios like "Candy Crush" developer King and several games cancelled, including "Perfect Dark" and "Everwild". - Battle for attention - "The industry is consolidating quite a bit" after the bumper years when Covid-19 lockdowns created a captive audience, said Rhys Elliott of specialist games data firm Alinea Analytics. Around 30,000 workers have lost their jobs since early 2023, according to tracking site Games Industry Layoffs -- more than 4,000 of them so far this year. Revenue in the global games market should hold steady at just under $190 billion this year, data firm Newzoo has forecast. The number of players and hours spent with the medium are stable while an ever-expanding number of titles are jostling for attention. And with leviathans like "Roblox" or "Fortnite" swallowing the attention of hundreds of millions of monthly users, "everyone's fighting for a smaller share of that pie," said Circana expert Mat Piscatella. The need to find new audiences has pushed Microsoft's Xbox, the biggest games publisher in the world, to switch strategy, increasingly offering its titles on competing console makers' hardware. "They've had really great success on the PlayStation platform. Sony is making a bunch of money on that too," Piscatella said "It's a little bit of a win-win all the way around." Some PlayStation games are making the trip in the opposite direction, with "Helldivers 2" the first to be made available on Xbox as well as the traditional PC port. - Success on a budget - Shoring up sales is vital in an era where the cost of developing high-spec "AAA" games has mounted into the hundreds of millions of dollars -- exposing studios to massive risk should their games not perform as hoped. But several breakout hits have recently shown that lower-budget games can still win over players with gameplay, story and art style, such as four-million-selling French turn-based battler "Clair Obscur: Expedition 33". "There's a realisation you don't need to spend masses of money to deliver a high-quality game that can appeal broadly and so everyone is rushing towards that model," said Christopher Dring, founder of industry website The Game Business. But "for every 'Clair Obscur' success story, there are 10 games that fail to find an audience at all," Piscatella pointed out. "It's hyper-competitive for those products outside of that big sphere" and smaller developers must fight hard for the funding they need to get games to market. Nor is the cult-hit trend likely to displace the mega-budget mastodons. Analysts predict that Rockstar Games' vast "Grand Theft Auto VI" could notch up the biggest launch for any entertainment product in history. That might be the juice the flagging industry needs to regain some of its mojo. kf/tgb/gv/lb Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Politico
18 hours ago
- Politico
Russia is quietly churning out fake content posing as US news
McKenzie Sadeghi, AI and foreign influence editor at NewsGuard, said in an interview that since early 2024, the group has been publishing 'pro-Kremlin content en masse in the form of videos' mimicking these organizations. 'If even just one or a few of their fake videos go viral per year, that makes all of the other videos worth it,' she said. While online Russian influence operations have existed for many years, security experts say artificial intelligence is making it harder for people to discern what's real. Storm-1679 developed a distinct technique in 2024 for combining videos with AI-generated audio impersonations of celebrity and expert voices, according to Microsoft's Threat Analysis Center. One high-profile example of this tactic surfaced ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympics and included a fake documentary series featuring Netflix's logo and an AI-generated deepfake voice of actor Tom Cruise as the narrator. And in December 2024, the group used these tools to generate fake videos impersonating trusted sources like journalists, professors and law enforcement to sow seeds of distrust toward NATO member countries and Ukraine. 'They are just throwing spaghetti, trying to see what's going to stick on a wall,' said Ivana Stradner, a researcher on Russia at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think tank. Sadeghi said that 'timing and the news cycle' — events like elections, sporting events or wars — play a big role in Storm-1679's operations. 'It typically tends to surge and launch a wave of fakes around a particular news event,' she said. And while the majority of these videos rarely gain traction and are quickly debunked, the content occasionally takes off. The group was behind a fabricated E! News video in February that claimed the U.S. Agency for International Development paid for celebrities to visit Ukraine after Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022.
