- This topic has 16 replies, 12 voices, and was last updated 17 years, 1 month ago by
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Mr Martin will also announce that a second US firm, Blizzard Entertainment, plans to set up a game support centre in Cork city.
Blizzard Entertainment is a market leader in entertainment software, having developed games including World of Warcraft, Diablo, and Star Craft.
They will initially recruit 50 staff, though they plan to increase that number to 100 positions within three years.
Presumably this is just tech support? Any hope of ramping up for developement in the future? Or is all that generally done at their base in California.
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"game support centre"
Yep that sounds like tech support to me.
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Well I saw it on the rte business section this morning
http://www.rte.ie/business/2007/0919/jobs.html -
Ya i read it there too.
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I had seen ads looking for GMs and such awhile back but I assumed it would be in Dublin. Nice one for Cork anyway.
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This is great news, perhaps someday it will be more than tech support comps in Cork.
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When i first saw this i though great Ireland is getting the kick start it needs but its only Tec support. Its a start though.
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When i first saw this i though great Ireland is getting the kick start it needs but its only Tec support. Its a start though.[/quote:58775ab44a]
start of what?more tech support?
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true :(
I just didnt want to sound nasty, thats why i added "its a start" :lol:
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Well, it IS a start, but only to more understandable tech support, unless they get Indians living in Ireland to work there ;)
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No I would definitely say it is a start. Getting more industry interest in Ireland is never a bad thing. Well done to anything involved in getting them over here!
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I hate to rain on your parade, but if a tech support centre is all the government can attract I reckon things are pretty dire.
This isn’t a significant step towards ireland having a games industry anymore than British Airways outsourcing its telephone booking system to India would signal the birth of an indian aviation industry. It is basically a cheap outsourced low skill operation.
Several years ago I was approached by, and agreed to speak to some government department (IDA) about developing a games industry, I’m still waiting for them to get back to me.
Seriously if the government wants to get things started they have a lot of different models of how to achieve this. Canada has major government incentives. Victoria in Australia has assistance for start ups. Film industries worldwide have received various incentive schemes but I fear our government just don’t take the Games Industry seriously. (How much every year goes into paying farmers not to grow crops?)
We are still producing high calibre university graduates who want to work in games….but they have to emigrate. Maybe some day they will return, but I wouldn’t count on it.
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I seem to remember Blizzard specifically saying that they would never open support offices outside of their european headquarters in Paris, so I would watch this closely. If they have announced this, then either it is something that they would not have been able to keep quiet if they tried or they are just abandoning their previous position.
The latter seems more likely, but the former could lead to some interesting developments, as it would be very easy to keep another tech support branch under the radar by simply employing people through another company.
Probably wishful thinking, but still.
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Well they have their WOW gm office in Dublin already for quite sometime. I suppose thats support of a manner.
In my head this is just an extension of that. Though obviously thats just opinion.
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That was what I was getting at. The office in Dublin is hired through another company, and if this was just another one of those they could use just another company to hire through so that they can keep to their facade of misty eyed idealists who treat people well and never go back on their world in order to project an image as something other than what they are, a company that is interested in money.
Not that there is anything wrong with money.
This quote seems appropriate now."I’m just doing this for the money. Oh yes, money money, I would shovel it down my throat if I could."
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