WotC New WotC President Is World of Warcraft's John Hight

After WotC president Cynthia Williams resigned a couple of months ago, taking up the CEO role at Funko, we've been waiting to hear who her replacement will be.

WotC has now announced that John Hight--who previously managed the World of Warcraft franchise for Blizzard Entertainment--is taking over. Like Williams, Hight comes from a video gaming background.

Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks said "I admire John’s career focus on fostering community. He is a true embodiment of our mission to bring people together through play. John’s love of D&D and Magic: The Gathering, combined with his leadership in video games, will be crucial as we expand our digital offerings to deliver what our fans crave."

Hight worked at Blizzard for 12 years, on both World of Warcraft and Diablo. According to Business Wire, his role includes oversight of Hasbro's network of gaming studios and digital licensing agreements.

 

[Morrus]

Also, I trust WOW management more than I do Microsoft management.

Guess who owns Blizzard?

Microsoft Gaming - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[KYRON45]

Maybe we should wait for him to put his pencils in his coffee mug before we start complaining.

 

[Parmandur]

He literally wrote the book on game development essentials.

https://www.amazon.com/Game-Develop...-Management/dp/1418015415?ref_=ast_author_mpb

I have no idea how much influence on story and game mechanics he had on WoW and Diablo 3 before it, so it's hard to gage what to expect from him here. Hopefully change for the better.

His pre-Executive bio is interesting. Video game development is not ta letop development, but...the dude has some real street cred it seems. Particularly note the bolded:

"John Hight is the Director of Production, External Development for Sony Computer Entertainment of America. In 1991, John built his first game, Battleship, for the Philips CDi player. Since that time he has worked on over 30 games and nine educational products on various platforms. He's been fortunate to serve many different development roles: programmer, artist, designer, writer, producer, and studio executive. John oversees external production for Sony in Santa Monica, where his team has produced BlastFactor (one of the first downloadable games on Sony's Network Platform) and flow (the first indie game published on PlayStation 3). While Executive Producer at Atari, John brought Wizards of the Coast, BioWare, and Obsidian together to develop Neverwinter Nights 2. In his role as Executive Producer and Director of Design for Electronic Arts, John led the design and creative production of Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2, Yuri's Revenge, and Nox. John holds a BSE in Computer Science from the University of New Mexico and an MBA from USC's Marshall School of Business."

 

[M.L. Martin]

Does this mean we get 4E back?

 

[Parmandur]

Well, another outside video game exec. That tells you what Hasbro thinks the future of Magic and D&D will be.

WotC owns at least three video game studios now, so yes video game development is the direction WotC is going.

 

[Michael Linke]

John left Blizzard in December 2023. Williams left WotC in April 2024. I'm sure he was in talks with WotC even before he left Blizzard. There may have been non-compete clauses that had to time out. I would bet that John Hight was already picked and the transition to him was in progress behind the scenes when Williams left.

That community was very worried at the time he left, as he was in charge when a lot of great things happened for them--Mists of Pandora, Shadowlands, Legion, the revival of Classic. Yes, not great things happened on his watch: Battle for Azeroth, but he would have learned lessons from those. In hoow many industries in the world do we have executives in charge of overseeing teams that care about player engagement, storytelling, game mechanics, graphic design... Like a few other rational people here, I'm really confused as to where some of you expect WotC to find its executives if not from within the gaming industry.

 

[FrogReaver]

Guess who owns Blizzard?

Microsoft Gaming - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

For less than a year….

 

[Dante Ravenkin]

John oversaw D3: Reaper of Souls which was a phenomenal expansion so I'm feeling positive about how this pans out. I personally think WotC should divide themselves into two halves: Digital and Tabletop. That way both sides can focus on their respective strengths and we end up with better products overall.

 

[Michael Linke]

Guess who owns Blizzard?

Microsoft Gaming - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

He was employed at Blizzard long before Microsoft got involved. Maybe he looked for an exit BECAUSE he didn't love the new ownership?

Edit: he left Blizzard 2 months after it was acquired by Microsoft. He had been at Blizzard 12 years.

 

[dave2008]

Does this mean we get 4E back?

Did it go somewhere?