West, Zampella will 'never be successful again' - Kotick

Activision boss, Bobby Kotick has claimed that fired Infinity Ward founders, Jason West and Vince Zampella will "have a really hard time ever being productive or successful ever again."

That's what he told Edge magazine in its latest issue, which includes a massive exclusive interview with the outspoken Activision head.

In it, Kotick spreads light on the bitter departure of the ex-Infinity Ward bosses - who'v now formed a studio with EA - telling the mag he feels "betrayed".

"It shook my belief in two specific people, who were my friends," he said. "The frustrating thing about that is, the stuff that these guys did, I never would have expected them to do. We're a public company, we've got ethics obligations, and the things they did were... I would go to jail if I did them. 

"You can't use the company and the company's assets for your own personal benefit, and you can't use the leverage that you might have for personal benefit - you're not allowed to do that! And so we didn't have any choice."

Kotick said Activision "knew what the consequences would be," when West and Zampella departed, because most of the core Infinity Ward staff were all close friends.

"When we bought the company, they were 20 or 30 guys - these were guys that shared vacation homes together, they were all best friends, they were at each other's weddings. We knew that when we had to fire Jason and Vince we were going to lose a lot of really talented people," Kotick added.

"That's one of those really difficult decisions as the CEO of a company, where you step back and say, 'No good is going to come of this. They're going to leave and probably have a really hard time ever being productive or successful ever again, and we're going to lose some talented people, and there's nothing we can do about it.' And there wasn't."

Kotick went on to claim he's received "something like 5,000 resumes" for the empty Infinity Ward positions.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=266753

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Can we get a warrant for this guy to shut up?!

And why does he feel BETRAYED?! lol

This guy needs to try the electric chair

Failing that, he needs to try shutting the hell up.

"Betrayal... " - Halo Voice

That was a pretty stupid thing to say. Does this guy have any PR skills? Everytime he says something, I start wanting Activision to fail.

He feels betrayed?

Well... I'm buying the next game they make. Just to make a stand against Kotick!

my only explanation is that he is a redneck who used to work at activision before they accidentally hired him for mistaking him for someone else.

lol the irony

Where did he say that they will NEVER be succesful? All he said that they will have "hard time" to be succesful.

Do you know the real story of what happened between IW and Activision? Propably not. You just know something which people have said... that is why you don't get why he might feel betrayed.

I think what he meant to say is not Infinity Ward FOUNDERS will never be successful again...but INFINITY WARD will never be successful again. Good luck making Modern Warfare 3 any good at all without West or Zampella and like 20-30 of the other original members.