Gamertell

In the midst of the worst economic meltdowns in our nation’s history, Activision Blizzard merged and became the biggest dog in gaming’s yard. The company’s CEO Bobby Kotick is widely considered a golden boy in the industry, last month (December 2008) earning a nomination for CEO of the Year from business site Market Watch.

A lot of gamers have a different opinion of the exec at the head of the world’s largest publisher and no one has expressed it quite as vehemently as Ars Technica’s Ben Kuchera in a column published January 21, 2009.

At my other job I cover small-town Texas politics and, as a freelance blogger, I spend a minimum of 8-10 hours a day on the Web. So I consider myself something of an expert at hatchet jobs. Trust me when I say Kuchera rips Kotick unmercifully. He compares the Activision CEO to guys like Nintendo’s Reggie Fils-Aime and EA’s Peter Moore who, in Kuchera’s opinion, ,love the games they sell.

In one of the column’s many scathing paragraphs, Kuchera blasts Kotick for not publishing the much debated Ghostbusters game. That happened, in Kuchera’s opinion, because, “Harold Ramis most likely wouldn’t write a sequel every 10 months.”

Whether you love Kotick or hate him, it’s worth a read just for the ripple effects it’s already having in game journalism. Somebody anticipated as much, and at the end of the column pleads patience with readers as Activision game reviews could be late for a while.

Read [Ars Technica] Also Read [Game Politics]