Blizzard will be sharing more details on Diablo 4’s live-service trappings as part of a newly announced Developer Update Livestream airing next week.
As per Blizzard’s announcement post, things gets underway next Wednesday, 10th May, at 7pm BST/11am PDT via Twitch and YouTube, with Diablo franchise general manager Rod Fergusson, associate game director Joseph Piepiora, product management director Kegan Clark, and associate director of community Adam Fletcher all confirmed to appear.
The conversation this time around will focus on Diablo 4’s heavy heap of, somewhat contentious, live-service elements, including its seasons model, optional battle pass, and cosmetics.
Blizzard has touched on all these things previously – director Joe Shely and lead class designer Adam Jackson chatted a little about Diablo 4’s three-month long seasons and battle pass in conversation with Eurogamer last year, for instance – but it sounds like we can expect a deeper dive on monetisation and seasonal structure during next week’s show.
While questions relating to Diablo 4’s live-service ambitions remain, we are, at least, starting to get a much firmer sense of its campaign side as Blizzard’s succession of betas continues in the run-up to release on 6th June. Eurogamer’s Jessica Orr, Marie Pritchard, and Robert Purchase all shared their thoughts on Diablo 4’s early access beta back in March this year.