Brian Morrisroe, the Art Director on Diablo III, left Blizzard back in August, shortly after the game’s debut at the Paris WWI. Rumors flew about his departure, but the official word was that his departure had nothing to do with the art controversy, and that he’d left amicably for a great opportunity with a start up outside of the gaming industry. The start up is named Booyah, and it’s still in stealth mode, but it’s in the news today as word of a $4.5m investment is grabbing headlines.
Mobile and web content producer Booyah announced today that it received $4.5 million from Kleiner Perkins. The two seem like a good match, considering the company’s job listings for iPhone engineers and the investor’s special iPhone developers fund.
The Silicon Valley-based startup remains in stealth mode, and KP is its only named backer so far. Still, there are reasons to believe they might come out with something special. Its founders — Sam Christiansen, Keith Lee and Brian Morrisroe — previously worked at Blizzard Entertainment, home of the World of Warcraft games, as well as Activision and Insomniac Games. Between them, the latter two are responsible for gems like Call of Duty, Tony Hawk Pro Skater, Resistance and Ratchet & Clank.
The other two guys, Keith Lee and Sam Christiansen, were also key individuals on the D3 Team, and their joint departure just a few months ago goes some distance towards explaining why there are still so many high level D3 positions listed on the Blizzard Jobs page.
