Blizzcon 2019 in a nutshell

About 2 weeks ago I made a couple of predictions about what will be announced at this years Blizzcon. Now that Blizzcon has come and gone, we don’t need to speculate anymore. Let’s take a look at what was actually announced.

Diablo 4

In my previous post I mentioned that Diablo 4 will almost certainly be announced this year, and sure enough it was. Diablo 4 will be an online only ARPG. From what I can see in the videos, it looks more like Diablo 2 that Diablo 3. It looks much darker and eerier than Diablo 3. I am not going to lie, I’m not the biggest fan of Diablo 3, so this is a welcome change.

Blizzard said that there will be 5 playable classes, and three were announced at Blizzcon. These three are the Barbarian, the Sorcerers and, wait for it, the Druid. Apparently the game will also have a large MMO/social element. The open-world is shared by other players, and you will run into them occasionally. This doesn’t however mean that you have to play with them. You can still solo the game, or play it co-op.

Now the question on everyone’s lips. When will the game be launched? Well, according to Blizzard, “not anytime soon”. In Blizzard speak, that means years. So be excited, but not too excited.

Overwatch 2

I thought that Overwatch 2 won’t be announced this year, but rather an expansion. I was right… Sort off. Overwatch 2 was announced, but it is not a typical sequel.

Overwatch 2 will add PvE single-player and co-op missions, as well as more multi-player maps and new heroes. So why do I say that it isn’t a typical sequel? All the multi-player content will be added to Overwatch 1 as well. So from a multi-player perspective, the games will co-exist. The single-player content however will be exclusive to Overwatch 2.

From the panels and interviews that I read it seems that Blizzard wanted an opportunity to tell the story of Overwatch and expand on the lore of the game. They tried to do this with the Hero Archives, but single-player content really gives an opportunity to better explore the characters. The PvE content will be divided into “Story” and “Hero” missions.

Story missions will see old and new Overwatch heroes team up to fight the Null Sector. You can select from a pre-defined set of heroes for each mission. These missions will be co-op missions played with other players.

The Hero missions on the other hand is played with only single hero, and is made to be highly re-playable. In this mode you can level up your hero and add or customize the hero’s abilities.

To me, this sounds great. It would be a welcome addition to the franchise, and I think that the single-player content would be a lot of fun. When will it launch? My guess is not soon. It is still in early development, so again, for Blizzard that my means years.

Hearthstone

I thought there would be a massive announcement from the Hearthstone team. I was, maybe foolishly, hoping for a brand new Hearthstone client. Hearthstone 2.0. But, unfortunately Hearthstone 2.0 was not on the cards (yes, pun intended) for this year. There is however something new coming to Hearthstone, besides the usual expansion. A new game mode!

Lets start with the new expansion. Descent of Dragons is the last expansion for the Year of the Dragon. The League of E.V.I.L. has unleashed Galakrond, the big bad dragon. But fear not, Ysera, Malygdos, Nozdormo and the other aspects will fight alongside the Saviors of Uldum to save the day.

As for the new game mode, it seems that Blizzard will use Hearthstone to enter the auto battler genre. Battlegrounds is the new game mode, and it is essentially an auto battler in the Hearthstone universe. Honestly, I don’t know why Blizzard chose to go this route. They have the perfect IP for a great auto battler. Why they would rather do it in Hearthstone than as a stand-alone game is beyond me. But let me not get ahead of myself. Maybe this will be great. Time will tell.

The expansion goes live on 10 December, and if you pre-purchase the expansion bundles, you can get early access to the Battlegrounds from 5 November to 12 November.

World of Warcraft

WoW also gets their traditional expansion. This time around it is Shadowlands. I am not a WoW player, so I’m not really sure what to say here. But the trailer is great so here it is.

What wasn’t announced?

I was really hoping for a brand new game. I suspected that Blizzard would publish an auto battler, but I would never have thought they would have done it as a Hearthstone game mode.

Also, I thought that Diablo Immortal and Warcraft 3: Reforged would be launched at Blizzcon. But alas, it seems that Blizzard is keen on giving me a lesson on patience. At least there was an update from Blizzard regarding Diablo Immortal.

Overall it was a good Blizzcon. It seems that good things are happening at Blizzard and that we can look forward to some great games… In a couple of years.