10 Hugely Influential People In Gaming You Need To Know About

9. Bobby Kotick - CEO, Activision Blizzard

There are a lot of boardroom types making macro-level decisions which affect the gaming industry, but as CEO of Activision Blizzard it's Robert A. Kotick who seems to be pulling some of the biggest levers and turning some of the most impactful dials. He's a spreadsheet boss - as the head of one of the most prominent publishers in gaming, there is a clearly evident disconnect between the man and what pops out at the end of the production cycle. He's running a business, and he runs it as such. The top level executive decisions which pass under his pen roar upwards into hundreds of millions of dollars, and this man has one job: squeezing as much money out of each investment, and putting smiles on investors faces. You have to consider him as the exact opposite of someone like Satoru Iwata - the Nintendo boss gleams with heart and passion for the industry, while Kotick instead comes across like a mercenary overlord. The irony is that, even though it's assumed he cares only about the money being made from Activision's games, not the quality or user experience, he still has incredible sway and pull regarding which games grace our consoles. This is the man who spearheaded the decision to spend a reported $500 million on Destiny, after all. Does that make him an asset to us, the gamer, or a liability? Also, with crowdfunding and self-publishing becoming a viable proposition, does a toothy dinosaur like Kotick still hold as much power these days? That depends on your standpoint. But his weight within the industry is beyond question.