Workers on Blizzard’s Story and Franchise Development team unionized Tuesday, parent union Communications Workers of America announced. According to the CWA, this makes them the “first in-house cinematic, animation, and narrative studio to form a union in the North American game industry.”
The new union is made up of 160 workers from Blizzard’s animation, in-house cinematic, and narrative teams, alongside series archivists and historians. “These workers are setting the standard for animation, cinematics, and storytelling across the video game industry, creating the breathtaking cutscenes, trailers, and other narrative content that fans have come to love,” said CWA Local 9510 President Jason Justice in a press release.
“I’m excited that we have joined together in forming a union to protect my colleagues from things like misguided policies and instability as a result of layoffs,” said organizing committee member and cinematic producer John Giarratana, continuing, “I think that organizing gives us an opportunity to make our workplace better and safer.”
CWA says that Blizzard owner Microsoft has recognized the union, in accordance with the labor neutrality policy the company agreed to in 2022. In July 2024, 500 workers on Blizzard-owned World of Warcraft formed a union that they called “the largest wall-to-wall union at a Microsoft-owned studio,” alongside Blizzard QA workers in Austin. Other studios across Microsoft have also unionized in recent years, including at Bethesda, ZeniMax Online Studios, and ZeniMax QA, the latter of which finally reached a contract in May after nearly two years of bargaining. Unionized workers at Raven Studios reached a contract with Microsoft earlier this month.
In July, Microsoft laid off 9000 workers, with gaming divisions the hardest hit. These layoffs came on the heels of the company axing 6000 jobs in May. ZeniMax QA workers told Aftermath they were given no warning about the July layoffs, and CWA president Claude Cummings Jr said in a statement that “We are deeply disappointed in Microsoft’s decision to lay off thousands more workers, including union-represented CWA members, at a time when the company is prospering.”
Update 8/12/25, 4:10pm--Added the number of members in the new union.
