Blizzard's upcoming action role-playing game, Diablo 4, has been in development for quite a while already. The game is scheduled to release next year, and every few months, the development team offers fans something new in terms of game updates. This latest Diablo 4 quarterly update dives into post-release content, including Seasons and cosmetics - and reassures in various ways that monetization isn't going to include pay-to-win aspects.
Seasons were a feature introduced to first Diablo 3 and later to the remastered version of Diablo 2, Diablo 2: Resurrected. According to Blizzard, Seasons are making a comeback in a bigger way than ever. The development team promises up to four Seasons each year, each with its unique quests, enemies, items, and even features. In addition to Seasons, Blizzard is going to offer paid content, like cosmetics and enhanced Seasons experience with Diablo 4 Season Pass.
Diablo 4 Seasons
Like in the predecessor, the Seasons let players create a new character each time to compete with others from the same starting line. In addition to regular characters, Diablo 4 relies a lot on live-service play and has an option to join a time-limited progression play. Everyone starts from zero at the start of the Season, although creating characters during the season and trying to make up for the lost time is possible. It seems that the basics of Seasons haven't changed from Diablo 3, but if promises are kept, it should be even better.
Each Season has its challenges, and no one knows which Diablo 4 classes, builds, and equipment are going to propel them to the top. According to the development team, every Season also comes with a new gameplay feature, in addition to a new questline, enemies, items, challenges, and an overall leveling experience. The questline is going to expand the world of Sanctuary and paint a more complete picture of each class with new and returning NPCs.
In addition to expanding the storyline of Diablo 4, there are ways to achieve additional cosmetic rewards. Blizzard will also bring back Season Journey for those who want more out of Seasons. It features additional challenges with each Season and is free for all to play. Even if one doesn't want to purchase a Season Pass, Season Journey can provide some progress towards rewards, like cosmetics and premium in-game currency. After the Season ends, and a new one begins, the characters from the previous Season are moved to the Eternal Realm, where they are playable in a regular fashion.
Meta and Improvements
One of the most interesting aspects of Diablo has been the min-maxing characters. Beating Diablo 4 isn't necessarily important to everyone; sometimes it's beating everyone else. The meta-game determines what combination of classes, abilities, and equipment reigns supreme. Blizzard is also taking this aspect seriously and wants to keep Diablo 4 entertaining and challenging even for the end game. The promise to keep the tuning between the classes is an important one. There needs to be precise balance while also providing possibilities for creative and unique builds. This is why Blizzard is going to be refreshing the meta-game every so often with the addition of new items, including legendaries and unique items, as well as paragon boards and glyphs.
However, improving the game comes not only from the balance between Diablo 4 playstyles; Blizzard recognizes that. With Seasons, the game develops naturally as new content comes available, but Blizzard promises to listen to players in a more general way, too. The game experience will be improved by monitoring player feedback, and new quality-of-life updates will drop based on that engagement.
Another ever-changing content type is Live Events. Diablo 4 has living environments not unlike what Diablo Immortal offers that include challenges that pop up at specific times. In these Live Events, players can become part of quests or events in progress. Blizzard's examples for Live Events include an invasion of the Drowned, lasting a weekend, and a strange peddler that is visiting the Dry Steppes. The Live Events can provide rewards that aren't found elsewhere and even portals to new adventures.
Paid Content
Microtransactions are likely one of the most controversial aspects of the Diablo franchise ever since Diablo Immortal. Monetization is something that can instantly turn off a fan or, if done right, turn a gamer into a fan. With Diablo 4, Blizzard is leaning heavily towards additional content after the initial, full-price purchase of the game. However, the company is repeatedly promising that Diablo 4's paid content will provide "no in-game power or advantage over other players."
Diablo 4 will offer a few types of paid content for those who wish to gain exclusive items, such as the Season Pass. Season Pass lets players gain Premium Tier rewards in addition to regular, free-to-play rewards. While Free Tier rewards may give players game boosts that can, for example, help them level up faster, the paid Premium Tier only awards players with cosmetics and premium currency. The latter can be used in the shop to buy further cosmetics and does not allow the purchase of game boosts; those need to be earned even with Tier purchases.
Blizzard is making transmogrification, character customization, more important in this latest release of Diablo 4. Without any gameplay-affecting boosts or equipment with game stats available in the shop, everything has to do with cosmetic character customization. In addition to not including any pay-to-win aspects to the shop, Blizzard promises that some of the best-looking transmog equipment can also be found from in-game drops. The shop is for more variety, not quality, Blizzard affirms. Also, all shop transmogs can be used by all characters of the gear's class. Altogether, this is a completely different direction from the controversial Diablo Immortal, which is a good omen for Diablo's future
Diablo 4 is scheduled to release in 2023 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
