A hot potato: Bobby Kotick, the former Activision Blizzard CEO who gamers crowned the most hated figure in the industry, has given a lengthy interview that's unlikely to improve his public image. Kotick calls the many harassment lawsuits against his ex-company "fake" and planned by a union to increase its membership. He also says the acquisition of Project Gotham Racing studio Bizarre Creations was a bad decision, labeled one CEO the worst in the industry, and slammed the Warcraft movie. Kotick made his comments during an interview on Kleiner Perkins' Grit podcast. Activision Blizzard faced several lawsuits and investigations after the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) sued the company over allegations of a toxic workplace culture, widespread sexual harassment, discrimination against women, and an environment described as having a "frat boy" culture.A Wall Street Journal report claimed Kotick was aware of the allegations "for years" but failed to do anything or even tell the board. In response, Activision Blizzard staff launched a petition demanding he step down.When asked about the lawsuits and petition, Kotick said, "That was fake.""I can tell you exactly what happened," Kotick continued. "The Communication Workers of America [CWA] union started looking at technology. They kept losing because they represented the News Guild, Comcast, and they realized they were losing members at a really dramatic rate, so they gotta figure out: how do they get new union members? So they first targeted a bunch of different businesses - Google, some other tech companies, Tesla and SpaceX, and us.""It's the power of unions," Kotick said. "I didn't really understand this until we went through this process. They were able to get a government agency, the EEOC [Equal Employment Opportunity Commission] and a state employment agency called the Department of Fair Employment and Housing [DFEH], to file fake lawsuits against us and Riot Games making allegations about the workplace that didn't... weren't true, but they were able to do this." // Related StoriesActivision paid $54 million in 2023 to settle a lawsuit brought by the California Civil Rights Department (CRD) over accusations of widespread gender and pay inequality. The sexual harassment and discrimination suit was settled for $18 million in 2022. Meanwhile, Riot Games paid $100 million in 2022 to settle a similar lawsuit.Activision also had to pay the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) $35 million in 2023 for failing to disclose workplace harassment issues to investors and violating whistleblower protection rules."They're [the CWA union] so clever," Kotick said. "They realized that would be a thing that they then could come into a company - because we pay well, we have great benefits, great working environment, and they could say, 'hey, the culture is bad', 'people are harassed' or 'they're retaliated against', or 'there's discrimination'"."They came up with this plan, hired a PR firm, and they started attacking our company. They got these two agencies to file these lawsuits to claim there was some sexual harassment... We didn't have any of that. Ultimately they had to admit that this was not truthful and withdraw the complaints."Kotick claims he fired people "on the spot" if he was made aware of inappropriate conduct in the workplace.The ABetterABK workers group, which supported many Activision Blizzard employees during the lawsuits, responded to Kotick's comments. It stated, "The executives of our company did not protect us and often made the situation worse or directly perpetuated the harm.""The trauma, discrimination, and abuse that our coworkers and former coworkers endured is not fake or a 'plan to drive union membership'," the group added. "Our unions were born from the very real and harmful way executives reacted when made aware of these situations."Elsewhere, Kotick said ex-Electronic Arts and Unity CEO John Riccitiello was the worst CEO the video game industry. An opinion he seems to be basing on EA's financial performance during Riccitiello tenure April 2007 to March 2013.Kotick also said that Activision's decision to buy Bizarre Creations, maker of Project Gotham Racing, for $67.4 million in 2007 was a bad one. The studio released Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2, Blur, and James Bond 007: Blood Stone after being acquired. Activision announced in 2010 that it was closing Bizarre Creations.Kotick not only failed to remember the name of the studio "that did the driving game for Xbox" he also got its location wrong, saying it was in Manchester instead of Liverpool. At least he got the right country.It also appears that Kotick is not a fan of the 2016 adaptation of Warcraft, calling it one of the worst movies he's ever seen. He said it was a distraction that impacted the development of the WoW game and one of the reasons veteran designer Chris Metzen left the company in 2016."Our expansions were late. You know, patches weren't getting done on time. And the movie was terr it was one of the worst movies I've ever seen."Warcraft made just $47 million in the US, but managed to generate $439 million worldwide, mostly thanks to its popularity in China, making it the highest-grossing film based on a video game at the time. That still wasn't enough to break even as its production, marketing, and distribution costs reached around $450 million to $500 million. Reviews were mixed, but it was certainly better than many other video game adaptions especially those made by Uwe Boll.