Diablo 4 - Release: April 2023

[HiddenX]

WindowsCentral estimates that Diablo 4 will be released in April, 2023:

Report: Diablo 4 could be launching in April 2023, with preorders going live December

From the seventh Circle of rumormill Hell.

What you need to know

• Diablo 4 is the next installment in the legendary action RPG series from Blizzard.
• A rumor over the summer suggested that Diablo 4 may be getting revealed at The Game Awards in December, and we now have some tentative corroboration.
• Reported on the XboxEra podcast and corroborated by our own sources, it seems Diablo 4 could be targeting an April 2023 launch window.
• The game should go live for preorder during The Game Awards 2022 if the rumors are correct, alongside various digital editions and a premium collector's edition with some rather fiery goodies.
• [...]

More information.

 

[Silver]

I'd bet it comes complete with plenty of monetisation, but thats no kind of bet at all.

 

[Denril]

I dont mind the cosmetics and the battle pass.
I hope the shop won't have any pay to win items.

 

[Drithius]

With Path of Exile pissing off longtime players with its recent direction, the time could be ripe for a new king in the A-RPG space. But I have serious doubts as to Blizzard still having the talent for pulling off anything like that. And I'm doubly leery of any contender's monetization.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Bring it on!

 

[johnnysd]

Greed is the driving force at Activision now though somehow the WOW model has remained mostly the same. I expect them to go more towards the Chinese/Diablo Immortal route with P2W elements. I think D3 even in current form sucks so not ultra optimistic for this.

 

[Hagen]

I dont mind the cosmetics and the battle pass.
I hope the shop won't have any pay to win items.

Even more, I hope that all four modern game plagues are absent:
- Pay-to-win items, as you say.
- Micro-transactions
- Loot boxes
- Day 1 DLC

 

[Pladio]

Oddly enough Diablo 2 was one of my favourite games for ages. I played through as most classes, both in SP and MP, then bought the expansion and did the same again. I really enjoyed it.
I found Diablo 3 very lacklustre in many areas and then never bothered again. It just seems like it's getting worse and worse...

 

[RikusTyr]

They don't have David Brevik and team anymore, Diablo 1 and 2 are classic games. Unfortunately, David is with the new Torchlight game that I'm not interested in... similar situation, first two games were done right. Played Diablo 3 quite a bit but it never felt the same. With the mehness of Diablo 3, that putrid mobile cash shop of a game that will not be named, the company practices of Act/Bliz, will be avoiding Diablo 4.

 

[JDR13]

Greed is the driving force at Activision now though somehow the WOW model has remained mostly the same. I expect them to go more towards the Chinese/Diablo Immortal route with P2W elements. I think D3 even in current form sucks so not ultra optimistic for this.

I'd say greed has been their driving force for quite awhile. That said, D4 doesn't look bad from what I've seen. I didn't care much for the style of D3, but it looks like they've gone back to a darker, grittier look.

 

[bkrueger]

With Path of Exile pissing off longtime players with its recent direction, the time could be ripe for a new king in the A-RPG space. But I have serious doubts as to Blizzard still having the talent for pulling off anything like that. And I'm doubly leery of any contender's monetization.

For me Grim Dawn is the current king in this genre already so I don't need a new one.

 

[Couchpotato]

Huge pass for me again I'll wait for the offline switch version.

 

[largh]

Huge pass for me again I'll wait for the offline switch version.

Which comes around 2064 when Activision is long forgotten and their patents are no longer valid?

 

[Pladio]

For me Grim Dawn is the current king in this genre already so I don't need a new one.

I have seen a lot of praise for this game actually. Maybe I need to have another look...

 

[Couchpotato]

Which comes around 2064 when Activision is long forgotten and their patents are no longer valid?

More like 2024-2025 as Diablo 3 was launched on the Switch.

It also doesn't require you to log on to a server to play SP either. Ironic because Blizzard claimed it wasn't possible. I miss the old Blizzard pre-Wow it was a different developer.

 

[RikusTyr]

For me Grim Dawn is the current king in this genre already so I don't need a new one.

I have seen a lot of praise for this game actually. Maybe I need to have another look...

Grim Dawn defiantly doesn't get enough attention. Crate still patching the game 6.5 years after release. GD is the one ARPG that I've sank many hours into, most since D2. It's my go to ARPG.

 

[mercy]

Diablo 1-2 were the true games. Fantastic atmosphere and breakthrough art direction for their time. Since it went 3D it became a 'BLEH!' for me. As art direction & style suffered. Same with this newest thing - despite radical design choices and UI looking good - in this video. I just don't feel the hype anymore..

 

[JDR13]

So, two "tiers" to choose from when you start the game. Adventure mode and Veteran mode. I hope Veteran mode actually has some challenge. My biggest issue with Diablo 3 was how easy the initial playthrough was even if you increased the difficulty as much as the game would let you.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

I don't like the idea of allowing the player to just select a difficulty which adjusts health, damage and drop rates. It kills the identity of a certain enemy being at a certain level of difficulty. They become just a number, which you can adjust to your liking. That's shitty and lazy design.

I much prefer the way Diablo 2 did it, in that the whole game is at a difficulty level. And you get through it all, and then can step it up a level. Much more organic and less gamified. By just exposing the difficulty to a slider they're basically saying "we can't figure it out, here you set it to however much you want".

And Diablo 3 was even shittier in this, since they let power creep to unending levels. Which lead to having 30 difficulty levels or whatever. It's just stupid at that point.

Too bad Diablo 4 also seems to be doing something similar.

 

[JDR13]

And Diablo 3 was even shittier in this, since they let power creep to unending levels. Which lead to having 30 difficulty levels or whatever. It's just stupid at that point.

I don't have a problem with them letting the player tweak the difficulty. I think the issue is when you're constrained within a certain range. Diablo 3 only lets you raise or lower an amount based on your character's level instead of any difficulty you want.