Blizzard cofounder Mike Morhaime recently spoke about Activision CEO Bobby Kotick in an interview with MCV, and he had nice things to say about the often-criticized figure. "I have an advantage there because I know Bobby personally and we have very long, in-depth conversations, so my view of him is not limited to small sound bites taken out of context," Morhaime said. "I can tell you that Bobby has been very supportive of Blizzard and that we have a great relationship with him. I don't think the public image that some people have of him is fair or accurate."

This may be evidence that Kotick isn't the demon we like to portray him as, but it's not surprising that Morhaime is sticking up for him.

Blizzard's on top, which is a good place to be

To look at how Kotick runs the Activision empire, we need to look at what happens when franchises or developers don't deliver multiple hits a year. We don't have to dig deep for these examples.

Joystiq has a wonderful look at all the studios that were bought or created to deal with the hydra that was the Guitar Hero franchise, and the story paints a grim picture of the fate of many of these developers and their employees. It shows what happens when a company single-mindedly plunders a property of every possible cent before throwing away the people who created the games when the money ran out. The number of studios that were shuttered or suffered layoffs is impressive, all from running a single franchise into the ground with multiple yearly releases.

Or consider Bizarre Creations, one of my personal favorites in the world of racing games. Activision bought the company in 2007, and Bizarre had great things to say about the acquisition. "Bizarre isn't a developer in financial trouble, and we're certainly not looking to be 'saved' by a bigger corporation. We're a dev looking to take our games to the next level, and make the absolute best products we can possibly make," Community Lead Ben Ward said at the time. "Likewise, Activision is not in the business of 'buying out' struggling developers either."

In a few short years the company would be shut down by Activision; its last game was a James Bond title that received almost no promotion, and the game before that was a racing title called Blur that was released too close to many better-supported racing titles. It's unclear whether these decisions were made by Bizarre or by Activision, but what is clear is that within a very short time of the acquisition, things went south for the developer. Now it's gone, leaving only a depressing farewell video in its wake.

Blizzard is left alone

"We wouldn't have been supportive of [the merger] had we believed that Bobby and Activision didn't have an understanding of how special Blizzard entertainment is and weren't supportive of our values," Morhaime said in the interview. "We were convinced that they did and that they were doing this for the right reasons, that the two businesses were complementary and that we wouldn't be giving up our creative autonomy in any way. And that's exactly how it's panned out."

I'm sure Activision leaves Blizzard alone and they get to do what they want. After all, World of WarCraft is the envy of the entire industry; it's a veritable printing press. StarCraft 2 didn't exactly do poorly either. Bobby Kotick is a man who loves hits, billion-dollar profits, and world records. If you're delivering these, I'm sure he's a wonderful man to share a few drinks with. But there are plenty of examples out there that show what happens when the hits dry up and yearly sequels lead to an uninspired, tired product.

I resent the idea that those of us in the press don't like Kotick because of "out of context quotes." It's true the man has trouble avoiding phrases that make him sound like a Bond villain, but it's more likely that we dislike him because we've seen companies we respect ground up in the machine. We dislike him because we dial into earnings calls where he crows about profits and significant liquidity, and then we write about a new wave of layoffs the next day.

With Guitar Hero gone, the Activision empire stands on two legs: Call of Duty and World of WarCraft. Mike Morhaime is one of the men in charge of the latter, and his relationship with Bobby Kotick doesn't put him in a position to understand why the CEO is treated so harshly in the press. We're sure there are many reasons to like Kotick, especially if you're a shareholder. What Morhaime should understand is there are equally compelling reasons for Kotick to be despised.