Blizzard has released their fourth quarter 2022 update for Diablo IV, focusing on what players can expect from their seasonal system after the game launches, in-game monetization, and overall scale of the game.
The game’s scale is “much more ambitious” than what they’ve done in the past, and Blizzard has an “army of developers” ready to support the game “for years to come” after it launches.
Yesterday, we covered the story of a German survey that had been sent out to consumers asking about what they were willing to pay for in Diablo IV with real money. This story had some upset about the possibility of the game being riddled with microtransactions as well as pay-to-win mechanics that practically force the player to spend money in order to succeed.
Luckily, it appears that Blizzard has picked up on concerns and have dedicated a large selection of their community update on the monetization of Diablo IV, so let’s take a look at some of the biggest pieces of information in their post:
One of the first major updates in their post is how the new seasonal system for Diablo IV. The developers plan to have a new seasonal structure that allows you to roll up a character for each season to experience a new piece of Sanctuary every season. They want each season to have fresh new gameplay features and quest lines that help to flesh out the world of Diablo IV.
Every season is also going to have rebalancing that introduces new legendaries, unique items, Paragon boards, glyphs in attempts to shake up the meta and encourage players to try out new builds over time.
Another interesting idea coming to Diablo IV is a new “Live Event” system coming every season. New things that are going to happen around the world of Sanctuary that you can participate in. The developers have stated that they want this game to feel like a living world, with people and creatures that feel like they are struggling to survive in the world, just like you are.
They are striving to make a game that feels alive. which means that you may see an invasion by some kind of monster, or a new merchant showing up in the desert selling goods to players who are willing to try and make the journey to find him. They want these events to be gateways to new adventures that provide unique rewards.
Perhaps the most important part of their post, however, is the discussion around season passes and the in-game cash shop. Diablo IV will be launching with in-game season pass system that has both a free and premium track for you to work through as you play the game.
The Season pass will function much the same way that season and battle passes work in other games before it. You can level up your battle pass for free getting access to free limited rewards, but you can also spend in real money to unlock the premium track to get access to premium currency and cosmetics.
This certainly may make some worry that Diablo IV will go down the track that Diablo Immortal did, becoming one of the worst anti-consumer experiences on the market.
However, the developers have stated clearly that the season pass in-game boosts will only be available via the free track, while the premium track will focus on aesthetics such as cosmetics and premium in-game currency that can be spent in the game’s in-game cash shop.
On that topic, we can look at the cash shop. The cash shop will have only cosmetic items available for purchase with premium currency, but the developers were quick to state that the in-game shop items have no stats and provide no in-game boosts to player experience.
Blizzard also stated that the in-game shop is only a system that exists on top of the already hundreds of available transmog items that can be found within Diablo IV for free.
It would seem that the developers for Diablo IV have been very aware of the negative reception to Diablo Immortal and were quick to jump in to ensure players that their experience with Diablo IV will be a more positive one.
If you are interested in reading this press release yourself, you can on Blizzard’s website here.
Diablo IV is launching across Windows PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, and PS5.