Jeff Kaplan wants Blitzchung ban to be reduced or reverted

Jeff Kaplan, Game Director of Overwatch, wants the ban against Blitzchung to be reduced or even completely reverted. This became clear in an interview the Overwatch boss had with the Wahington Post.

“I was relieved when they reduced his suspension,” Kaplan said. “And I think the suspension should be reduced more or eliminated. But that’s just me.

“I’m obviously a huge supporter of free speech. It’s something that’s very important to me. It got to me personally. I think the punishment was too harsh and I was greatly relieved when they gave his money back. I think that was extremely important.”

Even though Jeff feels this way, other people at the company don’t agree with him.

“I think as individuals, we all have very different feelings about what happened in regards to the Hearthstone tournament and Blitzchung,” he said. “There is a lot of very different reaction among all of us.”

If Jeff had the alone say in the matter, he would revert the ban, but others at Blizzard seem to disagree with him on the matter.

Hearthstone player Blitzchung got banned after he showed support to the protesters in Hong Kong during an official tournament livestream. They also took away his prize money, but after a reconsideration, Blizzard decided to return his money and reduce the sentence to six months instead of a year.

At Blizzcon 2019, Blizzard J. Allen Brack said that Blizzard handled the matter to quickly and their response time was too slow in regards of communicating with their fans.