Blizzard officially announced Diablo 4, the fourth installation to their popular dungeon crawler franchise Friday afternoon at BlizzCon 2019.
Players have been patiently waiting for this day for a long time now. Diablo III was released seven long years ago and that isn’t even the longest span of time fans of the dark fantasy horror series have waited for a new installment. Between Diablo 2 and III there was a whopping twelve year gap.
Diablo 4 marks a return to the dark and gritty world that made Diablo 2 so popular with fans, but takes that aesthetic a step further by filling the game’s many locations with piles of rotting corpses, dark tones, putrid swamps and marshes, brutal plagues, and blood, oh so much blood.
“We are going back to the franchise’s darker roots,” Blizzard said. “We hope you’re as excited about that as we are.”
Check out the official trailer below:
The new game will feature PVP zones.
“Whether it’s the sense of dread from Diablo 1, or the classic loot chase that we’re still inspired by in D2, or the best-in-class visceral combat from D3 that we still enjoy, we are approaching this game with complete reverence and we hope it shows,” it was said on the stage.
Diablo IV will feature classes such as barbarian, sorceress, and in a return for the first time since D2, druid.
After a brief description, a gameplay trailer was shown. The game appears to feel similarly to Diablo III in terms of combat, but with a darker feel more reminiscent of Diablo 2.
The game will be available on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.
The new expansion has been rumored to promise:
- Open-world design
- Collectible mounts that players can ride
- Lilith has arrived and replaced Diablo as the new end boss
- Expanded contextual interaction with the environment
- Diablo II Easter eggs
- Monetization system will be in place at launch
Check out the gameplay trailer below:
BlizzCon and Diablo IV’s announcement comes at a challenging time for Blizzard. Last month the company banned professional Hearthstone player Blitzchung for his peaceful protest in support of Hong Kong during a post-match interview. The fallout from Blizzard’s decision has results in a large controversy for the company that’s results in large scale protests and many players cancelling their Battlenet accounts.
Last year Diablo fans were borderline enraged when Blizzard announced Diablo Immortal, an upcoming mobile game for Android and iOS. Described as a “full fledged action RPG,” the game takes place immediately following the events of Diablo II: Lords of Destruction, during the 20 year gap proceeding Diablo III. Blizzard has yet to release Diablo Immortal and based on fans reactions, not many people would care if they decided to scrap it.
Stick with us for more BlizzCon converage throughout the weekend.
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