Former Activision CEO Bobby Kotick, who was drenched in controversy by the time he left the company at the end of 2023, has called the ex-leader of EA John Riccitiello "the worst CEO in video games."
During Riccitiello's seven-year tenure at the top of EA from 2007 to 2013, the publisher saw some of its highest highs and lowest lows. FIFA became a juggernaut series, despite how aggressive its microtransactions became, but The SimCity debacle basically killed a massive franchise and Battlefield arguably lost the war against Activision's own premier shooter Call of Duty - and Bobby Kotick now jokes that his biggest fear at the time was that someone else would replace Riccitiello at the rival company.
In a conversation on the Kleiner Perkins YouTube channel with former EA CCO Bing Gordon, Bobby Kotick recalls that "our fear was always that Bing was going to run [EA]." (Good spot, Gamespot.) "And we would have paid for Riccitiello to stay a CEO forever... like we thought he was the worst CEO in video games."
Riccitiello was and has been a hugely divisive figure. At EA, his maybe-probably-not-jokes about making players pay to reload in Battlefield were, obviously, ridiculed. And the company's treatment of countless beloved franchises during his reign, like Dungeon Keeper and Dead Space, also didn't go over well. Since leaving the publisher, Riccitiello became the CEO of Unity and made almost the entire industry turn on the once-popular game development engine by announcing (and then scrapping) plans to charge developers every time someone installed a game.
But Bobby Kotick isn't exactly an executive with a spotless resume, either, especially not while he ran Activision Blizzard. The publisher also received backlash for forgetting beloved series and gutting multiple storied studios in favor of making the Call of Duty factory bigger. Though Activision's Kotick era is most infamous because the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing accused the company of "constant sexual harassment," among too many other things, in a 2021 lawsuit. Activision Blizzard shares then hit such a low, Microsoft was able to swoop in and eventually buy the entire company.
Picking a side would be like voting in a US election. Though Kotick did admit that EA "tried to buy us a bunch of times" and the two entities "had merger conversations," and just the thought makes my skin shudder.
On a brighter note, why not check out our new games of 2025 and beyond release calendar.
