Blizzard veteran Bill Petras passed away at the age of 54. Petras began his 24-year career in the early 90s as part of the development team at GameTech (Ripper, Star Crusader, and BloodNet), his first project for Blizzard was StarCraft where he was responsible for storyboard, 3D and cinematic art.
From 1997 to 2005, he was the lead art director for World of Warcraft while the game was a global phenomenon, in 2005 he left the company and participated in founding Red 5 Studios (Firefall), in January 2010 he returned to Blizzard where he worked as the lead art director for Overwatch and Overwatch 2. He left the company in October 2021.
The news of his death was shared on LinkedIn by Harley D Huggins, who also worked for Blizzard and was Petras's close friend. A memorial for Bill Petras will be held in the coming days.
"Writing this news with a broken heart, Bill Petras, a legend of the video game industry, has unexpectedly passed away. Billy was a gifted young artist who worked for Blizzard Entertainment for nearly two decades. He was extremely proud of his work, most notably as Art Director for World of Warcraft and Overwatch.
"Billy and I joined Blizzard the same week and have been friends for the last 28 years. I will miss our constant and long conversations about life, game development, games, art, comics, toys, monster movies, and Conan. He will be missed by me and everyone who knew him."
