Vicarious Visions has been one of Activision’s most successful developers in recent years, having put out two hits back-to-back with Crash Bandicoot N.Sane Trilogy and Tony Haw’s Pro Skater 1+2. Earlier this year though, many were surprised by the announcement that the developer had been merged into Blizzard Entertainment and would be providing support for future Blizzard games, such as Diablo 2: Resurrected.
However, while previously the understanding had been that Vicarious Visions would get to remain, well, Vicarious Visions, and operate as a separate studio, it seems like that will soon change. Polygon recently published a recent citing anonymous developers at the studio as sources, who claim that Vicarious Visions is soon going to drop its name and be fully merged with Blizzard Entertainment. If Blizzard keeps up its naming conventions for its satellite studios, its possible that Vicarious Visions ends up being renamed to Blizzard Albany.
This isn’t something that Blizzard Entertainment or Vicarious Visions have officially confirmed yet, but word should arrive sooner rather than later, so stay tuned.