John Staats, lead level designer of Blizzards new mmog Titan would have been dismissed. State has worked for more than ten years at Blizzard, and was also one of the main designers for World of Warcraft. There is still no confirmation or reason given.
According to Massively, a site specializing in mmog’s, Blizzard Entertainment said goodbye to John State. An anonymous informer claiming that the State is relieved, after an employment of more than 10 years. State worked at Blizzard on Titan, the new mmog of the company. He was lead level designer and thus responsible for the design of the various zones in the game.
State previously had a similar function within the World of Warcraft team. There, he worked under Jeff Kaplan, responsible for the ‘world design’ within the WoW team. Kaplan described the State as ‘the hero of the WoW development team’. The state was responsible for the design of characteristic parts of the game, such as Blackrock Mountain and Booty Bay, but also contributed to all the raid dungeons, and many other dungeons.
The dismissal of the heads of State is not confirmed by Blizzard and there is also no reason is known for his departure. Blizzard is properly known as a company that is efficient in its employees and as a company where staff are also long remains in service. The studio rewards employees for that. The exception is the departure of a large part of the staff of Blizzard North in 2003. The staff would have left, because publisher and former owner Vivendi was not satisfied with the development of Diablo III. Blizzard saw then in 2005 forced Blizzard North to close.
