A Chat with Josh 'Devolore' - Tankspot to TikTok & 9 Years at Blizzard

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A Chat with Josh 'Devolore' - Tankspot to TikTok & 9 Years at Blizzard

Рет қаралды 77,414

Күн бұрын

While Mike was in the US, while we had some time in and around LA we wanted to drop in on Mr Josh Allen aka Lore - who worked on the communications team at Blizzard for 9 years after previously being a content creator at Tankspot. We wanted to discuss WoW's development and his limited experience with the allegations at Blizzard.
00:00 - Intro
00:30 - Tankspot & TikTok
03:00 - Working for Blizzard
10:00 - Community Management
23:30 - The Allegations
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Пікірлер: 252

@Preachgaming Жыл бұрын

While mike was mooching around LA and interviewing Jesse Cox, he kindly let us use his studio to interview former Blizzard community manager Josh Allen 'Devolore'. Josh had been at Blizzard for 9 years after previously being a content creator for Tankspot and he now leads the Gaming Creator Management Team over at TikTok US. In this little sit down, Mike and Josh talk content creation, community management and of course we had to discuss the Blizzard allegations and his own limited experience of what that was like from the inside of the company.

@evilkivi Жыл бұрын

Lore on Tankspot... oh the nostalgy is real. Learned boss fights from those videos

@akumpi Жыл бұрын

Didn't even realize he's the tankspot guy until now! I mean, I also didn't know Ali G and Borat are the same guy.

@ianfacerollsyou Жыл бұрын

Every once and a while if I'm playing, I'll binge watch all the weekly marmot videos and just get blasted with nostalgia, feels great and I'm glad Lore is doing better

@Kyderra Жыл бұрын

This really made me miss TotalBiscuit.

@bjorn-falkoandreas9472 Жыл бұрын

I had a 10 year subscription to Tankspot. That site gave me the confidence to move from raid healing to raid tanking.

@xRip666x Жыл бұрын

it's too real bro...

@Alpha-j2k Жыл бұрын

I was honestly a bit disappointed when Lore announced his position at Blizzard and that it meant he could no longer create content. But I knew it was an unmissable step in his career and he absolutely had to take it.

@xRip666x Жыл бұрын

We all wanted to work for Blizzard....then.

@Chaosfeory9737 Жыл бұрын

After the tease at the end of the Jesse talk i've been looking forward to this video. Miss Tankspot, gamebreaker and seeing Josh. Grew up watching a ton of his content. Its great hearing him get to talk about the community and how he's been doing. Thanks Preach!

@KaX321 Жыл бұрын

the weekly marmot was great, so was Legendary (Dem tinfoil hat segments lol). Josh was one of the very first wow content creators I started to follow back in the day.

@IronAgeGamer Жыл бұрын

Im just happy someone finally brought up Ion's shoes

@Knives7777 Жыл бұрын

i watched lore from weekly marmot days from before tankspot. when he used to rant about wow stuff. I miss those days

@earthrester9198 Жыл бұрын

Ah, the days of Weekly Marmot and Blue Plz. We can never go home.

@LukeStrife Жыл бұрын

Excellent interview, really glad to hear his side of everything. Congratulations on the promotion Josh!

@cameronharvey4746 Жыл бұрын

Really amazing chat. It is so beneficial to see an insiders perspective, especially from someone whos job it was to basically look after us.

@shieldslamtv307 Жыл бұрын

Tankspot, now that takes me back

@TheZlimshady Жыл бұрын

OOh yeah...

@ToxicStudiosSWE Жыл бұрын

How i learned to raid properly. Good times ❤️

@therabbits69 Жыл бұрын

Tankspot is still running which is amazing.

@furydivine27 Жыл бұрын

I was so sad when he stopped doing the weekly marmot. That was one of the shows i looked forward to the most back in the day.

@deleteman900 Жыл бұрын

Legend has it he's still playing his shaman to this very day

@renegadechewtoy1657 Жыл бұрын

This right here! more of this type of vids please. loving this.

@nexigram Жыл бұрын

If Choreghast had been an optional piece of content with exclusive, time-sensitive rewards like the Mage Tower was, it would be one of the most beloved additions to the game ever.

@evanbunnell Жыл бұрын

Please no more exclusive, time-sensitive rewards. Engineered fomo is terrible for consumers. It increasingly feels less like someone is being rewarded for playing during a certain timeframe and more like a person is being punished for not playing during that timeframe. Rather, if Torghast had cosmetic rewards that were tied to era specific wings and then Blizzard committed to adding new powers, wings, and balance changes for future expansions, it could have been an amazing evergreen piece of content that would have theoretically only gotten better with more content.

@joe_ferreira Жыл бұрын

@@evanbunnell exactly. These features should be iterations and continue being relevant instead of being dropped after an expansion is over.

@bonestryke5391 Жыл бұрын

@@evanbunnell This, this, this. Big agree.

@ScriptsNZ Жыл бұрын

Great to hear an unbiased perspective from within Blizzard regarding all that's gone on. Really enjoyed!

@axemiprozam6977 Жыл бұрын

new lore poorly done and explained? we do not like it. new lore well done and explained? we like. It's that simple, at least I think so.

@grant9031 Жыл бұрын

Great interview, good insight :)

@melissas4874 Жыл бұрын

For a person in communication? He needs to get some more coaching on it specifically. While I think Ion is too polished, Josh comes off as condescending. I don't even think he means to sound this way honestly - I think he just hasn't had training or is trying too hard to dumb it down.

@jaceks88 Жыл бұрын

HOLY SHIT!!! I so looked for raid guides by Lore when I came back to SL. Glad he's still around.

@GoLowMVP Жыл бұрын

Was very interesting to listen, great work

@Arcashine Жыл бұрын

Great interview Preach, really glad to see Lore is doing well and hear his opinions on how things went.

@Erragall Жыл бұрын

I was saying I hate ians shoes.... It's so good seeing josh lore again, tank spot in cata was the OG Goat Ver insightful interview

@mrkleven3278 Жыл бұрын

Great interview! Always very insightful listening to josh talk about his experience. Wish him all the best at tik-tok.

@Solar_and_Security 11 күн бұрын

Dang.. miss this guy, was good to see he's doing well....His vid's on tankspot were the best thing to see back in my raiding days.

@ChumblesMumbles Жыл бұрын

Lore! His Tankspot content was amazing. His advice on guild management was more on point and relevant than anything they teach in leadership or business management or psychology courses. It's about people and understanding other folks' perspectives and motivations.

@trip9g Жыл бұрын

I have never forgotten Gamebreaker and I've never forgotten good ole Gary Gannon. God bless that guy

@fury-ninja2539 Жыл бұрын

Mike you look unbelievably well and glowing to be back chatting about WoW again, I feel the same, it feels good to be back and I hope they keep it up.

@eodyn7 Жыл бұрын

I wonder what Josh is going to do when TikTok gets banned in the US.

@HARRYAZZHOLE Жыл бұрын

President Donald J Trump wanted it to be at least owned by a US company so that they would need to abide by our laws. But banning it would also work, Instashit also and FB, hell, all the "social" media garbage can go away.

@Zachoff Жыл бұрын

It won't be. No chance whatsoever

@Jonathan-fw6ty Жыл бұрын

Tiktok is known to be working with the CCP to track, capture and put in concentration camps the Uyghur muslims. It's blowing my mind that he accepted to work for that company, after he was pretty outspoken about the bad working conditions/abuse at Blizzard. Then again, Preach was also very outspoken against Blizzard and initially said that he was not comfortable with releasing WoW content until there was a massive culture shift at Blizzard when it comes to equality and working conditions. That never happened, and he's back to making WoW content... lol Like... Jen O'neil straight up left the boat when she realised that nothing would improve. Hell, they even fucking underpaid her compared to Mike Ybarra who was doing the same job ffs

@Hanging_Brain Жыл бұрын

I wish

@Konuvis Жыл бұрын

That was a great interview. Tankspot and Lore.... I feel old.

@ohnoezitsjoez Жыл бұрын

I love Lore's old Heroic Ragnaros rants on those old videos

@JustDave_GG Жыл бұрын

Really enjoyed that Preach and Lore , thanks!

@dscarmo Жыл бұрын

Very interesting comments on the allegations, a suggestion would be marking what section of the video was already on the main video, for easy of skipping.

@AkromaStrategy Жыл бұрын

i miss the weekly marmot

@sabretoothau Жыл бұрын

Great chat guys, cheers.

@elerius2 Жыл бұрын

I just wish Lore had done the entire interview as his GTA RP character.

@Aurelyn Жыл бұрын

I miss the weekly marmot

@warllockmasterasd9142 Жыл бұрын

So sounds like they still didn't get fully what went wrong with Torghast. it was not that Rewards were added. it was that the rewards that was add: Was a grind which was mandatory for player progression power. Instead of transmogs, mounts, pets, titles.

@paranoidsoldier Жыл бұрын

Blizz has a communication team?

@darkbaddog Жыл бұрын

god i had no idea he changed jobbs i do remember him for tankspot tho and i loved dose videos and i miss them such a awesome person and funny to listen to and always intrestign points and funny editing

@mikecassidy9185 Жыл бұрын

Watching this and seeing old footage of Torghast and Covenants brought my PTSD of that garbage back to a horrible place.

@Uhdksurvhunter Жыл бұрын

Lore hit the nail on the head when he talked about obligations. I still think Torghast would have been a fun system, if i ONLY ran it for Transmog, Mounts, Titles and shit like that. The second you wall player-power behind it, it becomes a fucking chore you HAVE to do every single time its reset, and it drains the fun out of it. Same with ALL of the azurite power and shit. I dont want to HAVE to log in everyday in order to stay relevant. I want the OPTION to log in everyday to do what I want.

@Scarorion Жыл бұрын

These chat videos are awesome

@dylanfarris7647 Жыл бұрын

Hell yeah been waitig for this

@royalrepublican3480 Жыл бұрын

i wish they posted more stuff in the patch notes, i love reading all the small things that get changed, could seperate them and or at the end put all the miscellaneous stuff.

@cuddleslol Жыл бұрын

Great interviews :)

@Erok9 Жыл бұрын

Weekly Marmot forever, thank you so much for teaching me to play.

@TheLodgePainting Жыл бұрын

is it just me or is loor slowing turning into wow guy from south park :D

@sbsftw4232 Жыл бұрын

I always thought he was the Dev 'O Lore.

@nickelodeann Жыл бұрын

Dude I still remember the weekly marmot, so much nostalgia

@necrobale Жыл бұрын

Another banger. Can't wait for the Ion interview.

@Zenndragon Жыл бұрын

I grew up watching lore, specifically his PST series, the weekly marmot, and legendary podcast. That was back in the day where you couldn't make a proper living on youtube, if he was making those quality videos in this era, he'd be up there with Asmon. Always a level-headed, and logical take. Every episode was great entertainment while at the same time being educational. Thanks for all your hard work Josh, great to see you on youtube again. Your guild leadership videos straight up taught me how to be a successful business owner. I haven even started the video yet, but I'm hyped!

@davidbetancourt4028 Жыл бұрын

Man, this interview w/Lore reminds me of what I thought Blizzard was before all the 'things' over the last 5 yrs or so, and obviously vs the last 1-1.5 yrs.

@iseeredppl Жыл бұрын

I remember devolore from the Mike B aka Fony days! Good days

@wraithryder Жыл бұрын

not tankspot so much but Gamebreaker with Olivia Wilde - that was the good shit!

@richtea7868 Жыл бұрын

I find it really hard to believe they didn’t have more idea of what went on with the harassment. But I’ve followed Josh for years and believe him but it’s hard to understand. How could they have not known or done more

@Xarca Жыл бұрын

He said that they knew some of it and reported some people with the company basically doing nothing. They just didn’t realize the degree that it was happening.

@Roswend Жыл бұрын

I've been in an organization where a massive scandal was discovered with culture and harassment of female employees. I never saw a tiny bit of it, and neither did a lot of people. Sometimes your job or just your personality can insulate you from it. Doesn't mean it's not real and not a problem.

@hairzilla Жыл бұрын

Good to get Josh Allen Brack on the show

@XentheTek Жыл бұрын

I remember seeing an old guildy who knew him post a picture of Lores gaming room and it being asmongold levels 😂😂.

@qwertyuiop8272 Жыл бұрын

there's a good "how it started / hows it going" in here with "tinfoil hat legendary" Lore

@micahdawson8998 Жыл бұрын

this is an interview that i wish had have happened 5 years ago

@welbhloud Жыл бұрын

I listened to this while blasting through cobalt assembly.

@Trakosh Жыл бұрын

I've always found it kind of amusing and disturbing, that guys in Preach's and Josh's field of work, gets deaththreats like clockwork, for providing coverage on a video game. Meanwhile, my collegues and i (we're carpenters) have never recieved a single one, and if we did, it would be a BIG DEAL. Even though, if our work is handled wrong or slobby, it could litteraly kill someone.

@majafarkhani87 Жыл бұрын

Miss some Ciderhelm

@richskater Жыл бұрын

Everyone else is down here to share Lore memories... I'm down here to say fuck Ion's shoes.

@jacobhenriksen2324 Жыл бұрын

Really good interview! But the background music became really annoying after a while, for me at least

@nauscakes1868 Жыл бұрын

What ever happened to Gamebreaker TV< and why isn't there a KZfaq video explaining the history of it?

@mykeCA82 Жыл бұрын

I believe there is a video explaining what happened and I believe it was a cost associated issue that caused it to end.

@seandaly8748 Жыл бұрын

The magic is gone, explain as much as you want, apparently, no one could do anything about it. it doesn't matter even the people known for calling it out seem like their paid to do it softly now. It WAS a good time for a lot of people though, at least they can't ruin that and the friends I've got from it. You look like well you're smart enough to be ok without it maybe but that's a risk in a different world. Use that experience and move on.

@christopherstanley9997 Жыл бұрын

the weekly marmot, legendary podcast with gary gannon , mike B aka phoney and the lady i cannot recall her name, and yeah yeah yeah its your boy darnel, loved those comedy shorts about the undead rogue and his sparkle pony

@sagacity1071 Жыл бұрын

If Bobby didn't tell overwatch to put in a battle pass or expensive skins why did they go for the greedy option? So they are problem themselves then. That's worse.

@TheChunkeyNinja Жыл бұрын

A better way to think about it is they'll get the tap on the shoulder that they need to make more revenue, it'll then be up to management to make that happen one way or another.

@sagacity1071 Жыл бұрын

@@TheChunkeyNinja fair enough... but Bobby IS the managment in principle. He could push for a consumer friendly principle

@TZamBAL Жыл бұрын

How is moving from working for one of the biggest NA corporation to a shady chinese app considered a step up?

@kharn109 Жыл бұрын

Tankspot was the reason I was actually good at tanking back in early WoW raiding :D

@Kasaaz Жыл бұрын

You can't just say things like '9 years at Blizzard.' Because then I have to think, "Wait, when was that show with him and MikeB and..." And then I start doing math, after which I am faced with my own mortality and the passage of time. Then the existential crisis hits...

@ThyFleshConsumed Жыл бұрын

So he went to work for the CCP's tik tok app? Interesting.

@sagacity1071 Жыл бұрын

Yes... a bit concerning he is helping develop apps that control people.

@ArinGhend Жыл бұрын

OMG so that's what happened to yer man from Tankspot - totally missed that

@bdc3141 Жыл бұрын

I was hoping you'd ask about the xp potion exploit.

@atomiclee8359 Жыл бұрын

Great interview! Want to make it even better? Drink every time Josh says "Like" :P

@Tijuanabill Жыл бұрын

OG Ret pally hero

@RoxesBlitz 6 ай бұрын

Always enjoyed Gamebreaker TV ❤

@ChumblesMumbles Жыл бұрын

Also, what we really need to know is what happened to Lore's corrupted ashbringer.

@joertze Жыл бұрын

loreeeee was my idol in the tankspot days

@Nett11 Жыл бұрын

I miss him doing the survival guides voice overs

@ChoppedCheeese Жыл бұрын

"the early early early days of streaming" A decade ago lol

@Pduczkowski Жыл бұрын

The weekly marmot!!!

@Thurium Жыл бұрын

Srsly I love ur video Mike...u did more PR for blizzard (not on purpose) in the week that u went at their campus that the blizzard PR team did since Legion, just by showing their human side. It's ur video that brought me back to WoW and i don,t regret it...loving Dragonflight and still playing FF14. But i am happy to see the devs as humans and now it calmed my anger at blizzard. I am still sceptical for the future...But at least now i am open minded. Thank you for everything :)

@ExValeFor Жыл бұрын

are you sure about that 'not on purpose' part

@Bodomi Жыл бұрын

I also love Chinese spyware.

@GuilhermeMartins212 Жыл бұрын

Speaking of youtube comments feedback, your videos' volume is always at like... half of every other content creator for years now This must be on purpose, and i'm sure someone else complained before... but making them a bit louder would be nice. Peace!

@DefenderX Жыл бұрын

I love your face Mike 👍

@wraithryder Жыл бұрын

didnt ask about blizz internal processes for creative ideas or how much impact external feedback actually has or how long it takes to implement... :(

@meercatsdots Жыл бұрын

i so miss tankspot/weekly marmot

@dusansos1 Жыл бұрын

You missed an opportunity to fotoshop his beard and hair for the thumbnail

@Zabam Жыл бұрын

Him talking about working at tik tok like thats not a bad thing

@Thomas20831 Жыл бұрын

Tankspot And Gamebreaker the good old days..

@ceroenblanco Жыл бұрын

GOATs

@LomaGnome Жыл бұрын

Can confirm, preach is the boogieman.

@WarchiefPeebs Жыл бұрын

This interview was everything. I’m so glad you talked about the sexual harassment events directly. It’s what I was looking for.

@KGSOsimpilot Жыл бұрын

Why? I’m not saying it wasn’t bad but what does talking about it gain?

@WarchiefPeebs Жыл бұрын

@@KGSOsimpilot One of the few things we did not get is how 1) the employees felt about it and 2) how the company dealt with it after the fact 3)How are the employees today. I didn't stop playing because "I don't like the systems!" "Sylvanas is bad" "Warcraft is DED" No. I stopped because I drew the line at how badly a company could possibly treat their employees. A lot of us did. I don't want to know of individual stories, those are personal and belong to them. I wanted to know about the three points above. This helps us know that yes, it's gotten better, the bad apples were picked out, the employees are proud of the game they put forward and working at blizzard isn't a black stain on their resume. Some of us care.

@BuGsYBD Жыл бұрын

While I wish him the best on his journey, I can't ignore the fact that his absence has had a positive affect on MY engagement with Blizzard. Since his departure, communication from the CM Team, Social Media interaction and Developer comments on bugs/features has improved 100 fold. He left just before DF Alpha, which made the time for crucial player feedback, smooth and for the first expansion since WoD, we got that. I personally felt no friction and our feedback received replies and more, much like the Dev Watercooler post of the GC days.

@mung01re Жыл бұрын

Daily reminder that you don't care about Blizzard's harassment allegations. Stop pretending like you do. You just want an easily accessible reason to hate WoW.

@Verbstiltzkin Жыл бұрын

the thing that sucks the most is if all the feedback gets to the dev team, that means that they purposefully wait with updating it until much later. which feels worse than them not listening.

@suntiger745 Жыл бұрын

They touched on this a bit in the main “We went to Blizzard” video. It has a lot to do with how the systems and features interact with each other, and also how far ahead they are with content. Like, they learn about an issue, but the work for the next two patches has already mostly been made, and undoing that would delay the next patch by a few months, which would delay the next patch after that and so on.

@Verbstiltzkin Жыл бұрын

@@suntiger745 yeah but it still took them what? 7 months to release 9.1? they are way too slow at solving issues that are reported before it even releases.

@hasduz Жыл бұрын

Tech is slow and even more so when you work with legacy systems. Wow is notorious for working with an engine that is not very flexible it’s literal foundation is built on the old wc3 map editor

@nauscakes1868 Жыл бұрын

Wait. Josh quit Blizzard? That used to be his dream job!

@richtea7868 Жыл бұрын

He got a lot better job now

@jqc5 Жыл бұрын

Do you find more people are playing alone now? Are people still hanging out in discord for random chatting? Discord is great for grouping and talking while doing dungeons and raids......It seem years ago I had more fun just hanging out in discord., now people just use chat in game.........

@krismurray4011 Жыл бұрын

My guild uses Discord alot just for chatting and enjoying the game.