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Dustin Browder, game design director for Battle for Middle-earth for Electronic Arts, will be leaving the company March 9 to join Blizzard as a senior designer.

Browder, who has been with EA since the Westwood Studios days, has worked on several RTSs, including Red Alert 2 and C&C Generals. He said he will be working out of Blizzard's Irvine office and will be answering to Rob Pardo, who has worked extensively on Blizzard's Warcraft franchise, most recently, World of Warcraft.

He has not been told what project he will be working on when he starts March 14, but he assumes it will be an RTS because of his background. Could it possibly be Warcraft IV or StarCraft 2? "I hope so," he said.

Browder said that he had heard from a friend that Blizzard was looking for some designers, so he sent in a resume. "It's hard to turn down working for the company that made World of Warcraft," he said. "I play that game several hours a day."

In regards to Battle for Middle-earth, he said he wasn't completely happy with the game. "I wanted a bit more polish, particularly in the single-player campaign," he said. "I'm not sure if anyone is ever 100 percent happy with the final product, but Battle for Middle-earth was a good game that could have been a bit better."

There have been some rumors coming out of EA that even more of a shakeup with the old Westwood team is coming. Mark Skaggs, who recently announced that a new RTS in the Red Alert universe was in the works, is said to be taking a leave of absense to spend time with his family. There is no official confirmation from EA, but how that pans out remains to be seen. We'll stay on top of it and bring you more details as they become available.

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