Wannabe Wii players need not apply.
Irvine’s Blizzard Entertainment Inc., the world’s top maker of online video games, is looking to local colleges and universities to recruit the best software engineers, programmers and graphic artists to build out its billion-dollar empire.
Blizzard, a unit of France’s Vivendi SA, has found a cash cow in the “World of Warcraft” series, a game where millions of players face off over the Internet in a role-playing game.
“World of Warcraft” and its offshoots count more than 10 million subscribers and have been translated into a dozen languages.
The games have spawned a movie,due out next year,and hundreds of fan Web sites.
Because of its popularity, the company wades through hundreds of job applications every year and fields thousands of letters from fans asking how to crack into the industry.
Only the applicant who shows a true yen for online video games,and sports the technical skills to back it up,gets a second look.
“We want people who are passionate about whatever it is they do as a job or hobby, and of course, video games,” said Lenny Grossi, senior manager of global staffing at Blizzard. “Passion is something you can’t teach.”
A good portfolio helps too, he said.
“We try to tell all of the students that we’d love to see samples that look like they could actually be in our games,to try and match our style,” Grossi said. “They need to show the ability to deliver work that could really end up in a game.”
Blizzard views its millions of college-age fans from all over the world as a big source of untapped talent.
It launched a formal recruitment program with some schools in Southern California about a year ago that’s seen “extremely positive feedback so far,” Grossi said.
Blizzard has snagged recruits from the University of California, Irvine, the Art Institute of Orange County, Santa Monica City College and the University of Southern California, among others.
The program has two tracks. One is an eight-week summer internship for students of computer programming, graphic arts, software engineering and public relations. Other students work in Blizzard’s quality control department testing games.
“We want to tap into our fan base, because we have tons of students who play our games and a lot of them are really talented artists, producers and programmers,” Grossi said. “The earlier on you can get those interested people who have the passion for this business, the better chance we have to groom them for full-time positions.”
The other goal of the program is to have a direct pipeline to hire recent grads.
“We want to know who is the best in the class at any of our partner schools,” Grossi said.
No Tie
The few candidates who make it in for interviews are often surprised by Blizzard’s laid-back environment.
Flip-flops,not suits and ties,are a staple of everyday attire around the office.
“I’m wearing shorts and flip-flops right now,” Grossi said over the phone. “We have actually had people take their ties off when they come in for interviews. We say, ‘Hey take that off, you don’t need that around here and you’ll be the only one wearing one.'”
Blizzard has room to grow.
Last year it moved into a 235,000-square-foot campus in the Irvine Spectrum, the old home of chipmaker Broadcom Corp.
Perks include a sand volleyball court, basketball courts, a fancy gym, laundry service and a subsidized cafeteria with gourmet goodies.
It isn’t unusual to see workers having a lunchtime picnic with their families or playing pickup games of basketball, he said.
Blizzard outfitted each game development team area with a lounge where workers can swap ideas while playing video games from Blizzard’s extensive library.
“It allows people to be open and communicative, because game making is a collaborative process,” Grossi said. “It helps to fuel the creative juices.”
There’s lots of play around the office, but jobs are taken seriously.
Interns and new hires aren’t doing menial tasks such as fetching coffee.
Each is paired with a mentor and participates in everyday business.
“They are making significant contributions to the team they are on,” Grossi said.
Among this year’s class of 16 interns, some are working on Blizzard’s latest “World of Warcraft” installment, dubbed “Wrath of the Lich King.” Others do programming work on its massive multiplayer software. A few get to work on unannounced projects.
Chief Executive Mike Morhaime started the company with a few friends from college,developers Allen Adham and Frank Pearce,in 1991.
Morhaime’s come a long way since.
He was the driving force behind the $19 billion deal to combine Blizzard with Activision Inc. to form the world’s biggest game developer.
The deal closed last month after six months of approvals.
The Santa Monica-based company, dubbed Activision Blizzard Inc., was formed in a complex deal by Vivendi and valued at about $19 billion.
Blizzard’s Irvine operations are set to remain intact and continue to be run by longtime leader Morhaime.
