Blizzard Plans To Drop New Diablo 4 Expansions Every Year

Blizzard confirmed in a September 5 interview that not only will its loot-chasing action-RPG Diablo IV get long-term support in the form of its quarterly seasons, but the game will also receive a new paid expansion every year.

Diablo IV – Bear Bender Build

Read More: Diablo 4‘s Next Season Looks Pretty Gruesome In New Trailer

Rod Fergusson, general manager of the Diablo franchise, said as much to Dexerto, telling the gaming publication that the team’s vision for the game stretches for a while. In fact, Fergusson expressly said Blizzard is focused on Diablo IV for “years and years,” stating that the first season was merely the foundation for its future.

“So, as we look at our quarterly seasons, and we look at our annual expansions, those are the things that we’re really focused on for our live service,” Fergusson said. “We’ve got plans, we have storylines that go well into the future. We’ve got plans. We’re always leapfrogging our seasons, and leapfrogging our expansions, so it’s something we are going to do for a long time. We’re excited. When you look back and realize that there were 11 years between [Diablo III] and [Diablo IV], that feels like we didn’t live up to our players, our community, and what they deserve. That’s something we are rectifying in [Diablo IV] with our seasons and our expansions.”

In this way, Diablo IV’s expansion cadence will mirror Bungie’s Destiny games, particularly Destiny 2, which normally gets new content in the form of free seasonal updates and paid annual expansions. While there are no specifics yet on what new content Diablo IV will see introduced in its expansions, both Diablo II and Diablo III saw new areas, new storylines, and new character classes introduced in the one expansion each game received. Most recently, the mobile spin-off Diablo Immortal got a hot vamp knight, the first new class Blizzard has introduced to the series in nine years. Your move, Diablo IV.

Kotaku reached out to Activision Blizzard for comment.

Read More: Diablo 4‘s Inventory Situation Is Pretty Crummy

Season of the Malignant, Diablo IV’s first content drop that started on July 20, wasn’t exactly well-received by the community, with some fans complaining that the battle pass is quite stingy, and a pre-season patch receiving widespread rebuke for making the game even grindier. So sharp was the criticism that the company not only apologized for the derided changes to the game but also promised to never release such a patch again. With the second content drop, Season of Blood, kicking off on October 17 and coming with a bunch of meaningful tweaks to storage management and status effects—among other things—here’s hoping Blizzard finds its groove.

 

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No Surprise Call Of Duty Drop On Game Pass, Xbox Boss Says

A Game Pass logo sits in front of an Xbox background.

Image: Microsoft / Kotaku

Now that Microsoft’s purchase of Activison Blizzard has officially been completed, Xbox Series X/S owners have been hoping to see games like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II and Diablo IV appear on Game Pass any day now. But Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer poured cold water on the rumor mill hype in a new interview with the Xbox podcast confirming that nothing from the publisher’s catalog will arrive in 2023.

Thank You, PS Plus, For Making My Backlog Even Bigger

The expectation-setting comes after un-sourced rumors began to spread that Microsoft might be planning a surprise shadow drop of Activision Blizzard games coming to Game Pass to celebrate the closing of the deal. While the Activision Blizzard account recently tweeted that it did “not have plans” to bring its games to the Netflix-like subscription service before the end of the year, some fans still held out hope that a game or two from the back catalog might pop up before 2024.

“The regulatory process took so long and frankly there was a lot of uncertainty in that process up until, really, a week before we closed, or really the week of, when the CMA finally came down to their decision, that we weren’t able to get in and work with mostly Activision Blizzard in this case on that back catalog work,” Spencer told the Official Xbox Podcast on October 17. “I would love it if there was some kind of secret celebration drop that’s coming in the next couple of weeks—there’s not.”

That’s in contrast to when Microsoft closed its $7.5 billion deal to buy ZeniMax and its Bethesda Game Studios games, including Fallout 3 and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, were triumphantly rolled out on Game Pass soon after. Spencer called it a disappointment that fans would have to wait the extra months in the case of Activision Blizzard.

Elsewhere in the interview, Spencer confirmed that Call of Duty will continue to aim for 100 percent parity between the Xbox Series X/S versions and those on other platforms, meaning no exclusive skins or special content deals, as has recently been the case on PlayStation 5. Call of Duty Modern Warfare III arrives on November 10, and will have a Lockpick Operator DLC pack that’s exclusive to Sony’s console, a holdover from Activision’s existing agreement with the PS5 maker prior to the sale.

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