Overwatch 2 game director Jeff Kaplan says the team will begin to get more communicative after BlizzCon 2021 – and adds they're already discussing releasing new information in March and April. Speaking to IGN in a lengthy Overwatch 2 interview, Kaplan explained that, "When we announced Overwatch 2, we were very explicit with the audience. I don't know if everybody remembered this but we literally said we're going dark, and we said we're going to talk about this at the next BlizzCon. I think part of what happened was the pandemic situation, the fact that there wasn't a BlizzCon in November 2020, and things got kind of pushed off until February – but we were very explicit. Like, 'Hey, we're not talking after this BlizzCon we just need to focus on the game.'" "Our strategy for after BlizzConline in February is to be more communicative. I don't know if I can officially commit to monthly updates on Overwatch 2, but we definitely want to be more communicative. And our plan is not to go dark for an extended period of time. In fact, we were discussing as recently as yesterday the opportunity of there maybe being some cool stuff we could talk about in March or April to keep people updated and to keep people going. So it's very front-and-center in our mind to communicate more." [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/overwatch-2-55-new-details"] So, we can seemingly expect more Overwatch 2 news, more frequently than we've seen so far. But that's not to say we'll be getting huge sets of new information every time. "We also want to be careful," Kaplan made clear. "I think there's a right time to get the audience hyped and build to launch. And there's also a time where it's like, 'Hey, that was kind of not cool of you because it was too early and we're not ready to have this yet.' So I think we want to be very transparent with people. "I'm really glad that the discussion happened of, 'Hey, don't expect Overwatch 2 or Diablo 4 this year,' because I think that helps set people's expectations. So if we do say something in March or April, they're not like, 'Oh my God, that means we're beta in May and then release in June.' It's like, 'No, it's out there that that's not happening. So let's all get our expectations aligned.' But we definitely want to be more communicative and more transparent with the development of Overwatch 2 as we get into the closing out of the game." Today's behind-the-scenes video for Overwatch 2 dropped a huge number of new details about the game, from brand new maps, to a huge upgrade to PvE hero progression, to new campaign and story details, to major overhaul experiements for PvP. If that wasn't enough for you, we also spoke to Jeff Kaplan about all of the above, and more besides. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.

Overwatch 2 game director Jeff Kaplan says the team will begin to get more communicative after BlizzCon 2021 – and adds they're already discussing releasing new information in March and April. Speaking to IGN in a lengthy Overwatch 2 interview, Kaplan explained that, "When we announced Overwatch 2, we were very explicit with the audience. I don't know if everybody remembered this but we literally said we're going dark, and we said we're going to talk about this at the next BlizzCon. I think part of what happened was the pandemic situation, the fact that there wasn't a BlizzCon in November 2020, and things got kind of pushed off until February – but we were very explicit. Like, 'Hey, we're not talking after this BlizzCon we just need to focus on the game.'" "Our strategy for after BlizzConline in February is to be more communicative. I don't know if I can officially commit to monthly updates on Overwatch 2, but we definitely want to be more communicative. And our plan is not to go dark for an extended period of time. In fact, we were discussing as recently as yesterday the opportunity of there maybe being some cool stuff we could talk about in March or April to keep people updated and to keep people going. So it's very front-and-center in our mind to communicate more." [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/overwatch-2-55-new-details"] So, we can seemingly expect more Overwatch 2 news, more frequently than we've seen so far. But that's not to say we'll be getting huge sets of new information every time. "We also want to be careful," Kaplan made clear. "I think there's a right time to get the audience hyped and build to launch. And there's also a time where it's like, 'Hey, that was kind of not cool of you because it was too early and we're not ready to have this yet.' So I think we want to be very transparent with people. "I'm really glad that the discussion happened of, 'Hey, don't expect Overwatch 2 or Diablo 4 this year,' because I think that helps set people's expectations. So if we do say something in March or April, they're not like, 'Oh my God, that means we're beta in May and then release in June.' It's like, 'No, it's out there that that's not happening. So let's all get our expectations aligned.' But we definitely want to be more communicative and more transparent with the development of Overwatch 2 as we get into the closing out of the game." Today's behind-the-scenes video for Overwatch 2 dropped a huge number of new details about the game, from brand new maps, to a huge upgrade to PvE hero progression, to new campaign and story details, to major overhaul experiements for PvP. If that wasn't enough for you, we also spoke to Jeff Kaplan about all of the above, and more besides. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.

BlizzConline (also known as BlizzCon 2021) has officially begun. This two-day event not only marks the 30th Anniversary of Blizzard but will also play host to all the latest news about its games. To keep you in the know, we’ll be rounding up all the announcements and reveals from the opening ceremony and panels right here.

Blizzard Arcade Collection Announced

Blizzard is bringing back some of its classic games with the Blizzard Arcade Collection. Launching today on PC and consoles, the collection features The Lost Vikings, Blackthorne, and Rock N Roll Racing both their classic and newly enhanced formats. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/blizzard-arcade-collection-reveal-trailer"]

World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Patch 9.1 Chains of Domination Announced

Patch 9.1 dubbed Chains of Domination will be coming to World of Warcraft: Shadowlands and bringing players to a new location called Korthia. With the new location comes new quests, a new 10-boss raid, an eight-boss mega-dungeon, and more. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/world-of-warcraft-shadowlands-chains-of-domination-trailer"]

World of Warcraft - The Burning Crusade: Classic Expansion Announced

Blizzard continued its trip down memory lane during the opening ceremony with The Burning Crusade: Classic, an expansion coming later this year. Initially leaked by a press kit ahead of BlizzConline, The Burning Crusade introduces a number of new changes (apparently even more than World of Warcraft Classic)  and features including a level cap of 70, two new races, flying mounts, and more. What’s more, the developers told IGN they’re not against making Wrath of the Lich King Classic if that’s what the WoW community wants. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/world-of-warcraft-burning-crusade-classic-trailer"]

Hearthstone Forged in Barrens Expansion and Mercenaries Mode Revealed

At BlizzCon 2021 it was revealed Hearthstone is getting its very own Warcraft-themed expansion called Forged in the Barrens, and a new mode called Mercenaries. The upcoming expansion brings 135 new cards and will kick off the Year of the Gryphon. As for the new Mercenaries mode, Blizzard says it will feature roguelike missions and strategic RPG gameplay. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/hearthstone-forged-in-the-barrens-reveal-trailer"]

Diablo 4 Rogue Class Trailer Revealed

Just in time for Blizzard’s usual quarterly developer update, we were given our first look at Diablo 4’s Rogue class with an eerily dark cinematic trailer. IGN interviewed game director Luis Barriga who went into more detail about the newly revealed class and Diablo 4's PvP. We also spoke with art director John Mueller about mounts and riding around the world in style. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-4-rogue-cinematic-trailer"]

Diablo 2 Resurrected Announced

BlizzCon 2021 has even more nostalgia for us, this time announcing Diablo 2 Resurrected and confirming it will launch on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch. IGN spoke with Diablo franchise executive producer Rod Fergusson and Vicarious Visions design director Robert Gallerani about the process behind remastering the classic action-RPG. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-2-resurrected-reveal-trailer"]

New Details About Overwatch 2 and Our Big Jeff Kaplan Interview

A plethora of new information was revealed about Overwatch 2 at BlizzCon 2021 including new campaign details, two new maps, a Hero Missions mode, changes to PvP, and more. IGN also interviewed Jeff Kaplan and he told us fans can expect more regular Overwatch 2 updates soon. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Felicia Miranda is SEO Editor at IGN. You can find her on Twitter @FeliciaVagabond.

BlizzConline (also known as BlizzCon 2021) has officially begun. This two-day event not only marks the 30th Anniversary of Blizzard but will also play host to all the latest news about its games. To keep you in the know, we’ll be rounding up all the announcements and reveals from the opening ceremony and panels right here.

Blizzard Arcade Collection Announced

Blizzard is bringing back some of its classic games with the Blizzard Arcade Collection. Launching today on PC and consoles, the collection features The Lost Vikings, Blackthorne, and Rock N Roll Racing both their classic and newly enhanced formats. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/blizzard-arcade-collection-reveal-trailer"]

World of Warcraft: Shadowlands Patch 9.1 Chains of Domination Announced

Patch 9.1 dubbed Chains of Domination will be coming to World of Warcraft: Shadowlands and bringing players to a new location called Korthia. With the new location comes new quests, a new 10-boss raid, an eight-boss mega-dungeon, and more. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/world-of-warcraft-shadowlands-chains-of-domination-trailer"]

World of Warcraft - The Burning Crusade: Classic Expansion Announced

Blizzard continued its trip down memory lane during the opening ceremony with The Burning Crusade: Classic, an expansion coming later this year. Initially leaked by a press kit ahead of BlizzConline, The Burning Crusade introduces a number of new changes (apparently even more than World of Warcraft Classic)  and features including a level cap of 70, two new races, flying mounts, and more. What’s more, the developers told IGN they’re not against making Wrath of the Lich King Classic if that’s what the WoW community wants. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/world-of-warcraft-burning-crusade-classic-trailer"]

Hearthstone Forged in Barrens Expansion and Mercenaries Mode Revealed

At BlizzCon 2021 it was revealed Hearthstone is getting its very own Warcraft-themed expansion called Forged in the Barrens, and a new mode called Mercenaries. The upcoming expansion brings 135 new cards and will kick off the Year of the Gryphon. As for the new Mercenaries mode, Blizzard says it will feature roguelike missions and strategic RPG gameplay. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/hearthstone-forged-in-the-barrens-reveal-trailer"]

Diablo 4 Rogue Class Trailer Revealed

Just in time for Blizzard’s usual quarterly developer update, we were given our first look at Diablo 4’s Rogue class with an eerily dark cinematic trailer. IGN interviewed game director Luis Barriga who went into more detail about the newly revealed class and Diablo 4's PvP. We also spoke with art director John Mueller about mounts and riding around the world in style. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-4-rogue-cinematic-trailer"]

Diablo 2 Resurrected Announced

BlizzCon 2021 has even more nostalgia for us, this time announcing Diablo 2 Resurrected and confirming it will launch on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, and Nintendo Switch. IGN spoke with Diablo franchise executive producer Rod Fergusson and Vicarious Visions design director Robert Gallerani about the process behind remastering the classic action-RPG. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-2-resurrected-reveal-trailer"] [poilib element="accentDivider"] Felicia Miranda is SEO Editor at IGN. You can find her on Twitter @FeliciaVagabond.

Blizzard Entertainment and Vicarious Visions, the former Activision-Blizzard subsidiary that was recently folded into Blizzard proper, have announced Diablo 2 Resurrected, the long-rumored remaster of the 2000 action-RPG classic. It's due out in 2021 for PC, PS5, Xbox Series X, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch Resurrected will include all of the content from the Lord of Destruction expansion pack, including the Assassin and Druid player classes. The announcement was the climactic moment of BlizzCon 2021, aka “Blizzconline,” Blizzard’s virtual celebration of its company’s games and community after the COVID-19 pandemic caused the cancellation of last year’s event. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-2-resurrected-reveal-trailer"] “It’s a great time to bring back Diablo 2,” Diablo franchise executive producer Rod Fergusson told IGN, referencing last year’s 20th anniversary of Diablo 2 and this year’s 30th anniversary of Blizzard itself. And, he was clear, “it’s a remaster, not a remake. We wanted the game.” Diablo 2 Resurrected has a modern 3D layer on top that features particle-based rendering, dynamic lighting, and, where appropriate, upgraded visuals and sound. On PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X, the remaster will run at 4K and 60fps. PC will also support ultra-wide monitors and gamepads. On the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 families of consoles along with the Nintendo Switch, it will run at lower resolutions. Cross-progression will be supported on any platforms that choose to enable it, according to Blizzard. Underneath, though, is the original game, at 800x600 resolution. And like Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary and LucasArts’ Special Editions of Monkey Island 1 and 2, you can press a button to switch back and forth between the original game and the remastered version. Cinematics, however, can’t simply be up-rezzed. Blizzard and Vicarious Visions are “fully remaking every minute” of Diablo 2’s cinematics, which amounts to roughly 27 minutes of pre-rendered video. [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=You%20can%20press%20a%20button%20to%20switch%20back%20and%20forth%20between%20the%20original%20game%20and%20the%20remastered%20version."] “It's like video game archaeology, learning how these things work,” said Vicarious Visions design director Robert Gallerani. “Because we're using that old system to drive things forward, we keep everything the same. Since it's not a remake, we don't have to rebuild [anything]. It's basically like we're changing the oil, making sure it runs smoothly, but we're not rebuilding everything. We are literally combing every single piece of code.” And, he noted with a smile, “when we do fix a bug we have to be very careful because everything is interconnected.” What he means by that, Fergusson explained, is that the Diablo 2 Resurrected team is “embracing the quirks.” That means some of the now-antiquated (read: goofy by modern standards) animations are still there. But some quality-of-life additions have been made. Some are just baked in, such as new ambient noises like wind rustling the leaves in trees and a shared stash so that you no longer have to make a mule character. Others will be opt-in, such as auto-pickup for gold and loot drops for those that don’t want to have to click on every single piece of loot on the ground. [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=Blizzard%20has%20added%20a%20shared%20stash%20so%20that%20you%20no%20longer%20have%20to%20make%20a%20mule%20character."] On PS5 and Xbox Series X, the team is “taking advantage of what's there” on the new consoles, such as the aforementioned higher framerates and resolution as well as the faster loading times the SSD drives afford. Blizzard is looking at adding things like raytracing effects, but Fergusson was clear about not promising anything and suggested that if any specific next-gen upgrades are added, they’ll come along after the game’s release later in 2021. Finally, with regard to multiplayer, couch co-op hasn’t been added – Fergusson called it “a bridge too far” for this faithful remaster effort – but all of Diablo 2’s original eight-player online functionality is still here. And you’ll now have the option to store characters on Battle.net for dedicated-server play. “It's more secure” when it comes to bots, item duping, and other cheating-related issues that ran rampant in Diablo 2 back in the day, Gallerani said. A technical alpha test is planned for the near future on PC only. Sign-ups will happen on the official Diablo website, and testers will be randomly chosen – not unlike how it went with the original Diablo 2 beta back in early 2000. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s Executive Editor of Previews. Follow him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan, catch him on Unlocked, and drop-ship him Taylor Ham sandwiches from New Jersey whenever possible.

Blizzard Entertainment and Vicarious Visions, the former Activision-Blizzard subsidiary that was recently folded into Blizzard proper, have announced Diablo 2 Resurrected, the long-rumored remaster of the 2000 action-RPG classic. It's due out in 2021 for PC, PS5, Xbox Series X, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch Resurrected will include all of the content from the Lord of Destruction expansion pack, including the Assassin and Druid player classes. The announcement was the climactic moment of BlizzCon 2021, aka “Blizzconline,” Blizzard’s virtual celebration of its company’s games and community after the COVID-19 pandemic caused the cancellation of last year’s event. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-2-resurrected-reveal-trailer"] “It’s a great time to bring back Diablo 2,” Diablo franchise executive producer Rod Fergusson told IGN, referencing last year’s 20th anniversary of Diablo 2 and this year’s 30th anniversary of Blizzard itself. And, he was clear, “it’s a remaster, not a remake. We wanted the game.” Diablo 2 Resurrected has a modern 3D layer on top that features particle-based rendering, dynamic lighting, and, where appropriate, upgraded visuals and sound. On PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X, the remaster will run at 4K and 60fps. PC will also support ultra-wide monitors and gamepads. On the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 families of consoles along with the Nintendo Switch, it will run at lower resolutions. Cross-progression will be supported on any platforms that choose to enable it, according to Blizzard. Underneath, though, is the original game, at 800x600 resolution. And like Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary and LucasArts’ Special Editions of Monkey Island 1 and 2, you can press a button to switch back and forth between the original game and the remastered version. Cinematics, however, can’t simply be up-rezzed. Blizzard and Vicarious Visions are “fully remaking every minute” of Diablo 2’s cinematics, which amounts to roughly 27 minutes of pre-rendered video. [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=You%20can%20press%20a%20button%20to%20switch%20back%20and%20forth%20between%20the%20original%20game%20and%20the%20remastered%20version."] “It's like video game archaeology, learning how these things work,” said Vicarious Visions design director Robert Gallerani. “Because we're using that old system to drive things forward, we keep everything the same. Since it's not a remake, we don't have to rebuild [anything]. It's basically like we're changing the oil, making sure it runs smoothly, but we're not rebuilding everything. We are literally combing every single piece of code.” And, he noted with a smile, “when we do fix a bug we have to be very careful because everything is interconnected.” What he means by that, Fergusson explained, is that the Diablo 2 Resurrected team is “embracing the quirks.” That means some of the now-antiquated (read: goofy by modern standards) animations are still there. But some quality-of-life additions have been made. Some are just baked in, such as new ambient noises like wind rustling the leaves in trees and a shared stash so that you no longer have to make a mule character. Others will be opt-in, such as auto-pickup for gold and loot drops for those that don’t want to have to click on every single piece of loot on the ground. [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=Blizzard%20has%20added%20a%20shared%20stash%20so%20that%20you%20no%20longer%20have%20to%20make%20a%20mule%20character."] On PS5 and Xbox Series X, the team is “taking advantage of what's there” on the new consoles, such as the aforementioned higher framerates and resolution as well as the faster loading times the SSD drives afford. Blizzard is looking at adding things like raytracing effects, but Fergusson was clear about not promising anything and suggested that if any specific next-gen upgrades are added, they’ll come along after the game’s release later in 2021. Finally, with regard to multiplayer, couch co-op hasn’t been added – Fergusson called it “a bridge too far” for this faithful remaster effort – but all of Diablo 2’s original eight-player online functionality is still here. And you’ll now have the option to store characters on Battle.net for dedicated-server play. “It's more secure” when it comes to bots, item duping, and other cheating-related issues that ran rampant in Diablo 2 back in the day, Gallerani said. A technical alpha test is planned for the near future on PC only. Sign-ups will happen on the official Diablo website, and testers will be randomly chosen – not unlike how it went with the original Diablo 2 beta back in early 2000. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s Executive Editor of Previews. Follow him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan, catch him on Unlocked, and drop-ship him Taylor Ham sandwiches from New Jersey whenever possible.

Blizzard Entertainment has announced that the Rogue class will be one of the five playable characters in Diablo 4, joining the Barbarian, Sorceress, and Druid, who were all revealed when Diablo 4 was first announced at Blizzcon 2019. In an interview with IGN, game director Luis Barriga likened her to a jack of all trades, but noted that she can master certain things should players choose to push their build that way. He likened the Rogue to a “choose your own dexterity class” in that you can mold her how you want to fit your playstyle. You can go old-school Diablo 1-style and double-down on the bow and arrow. However, you can also tailor her to other ranged weapons or also melee weapons. “Players that are looking for range are going to be happy,” Barriga said, “and they’re probably going to be surprised at how the other versions of the Rogue are going to surprise them.” [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-4-rogue-cinematic-trailer"] Barriga also explained that the Rogue has a specialization system. Not unlike the guild quests in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, if you choose to work with different Rogue groups and do special quests for them, you’ll unlock a unique combat style that suits that group. You can only pick one at a time, however. When asked if the other classes would have a similar specialization system, Barriga said no and explained with a smile that “every class has their own thing that other classes get to be jealous about.” [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%E2%80%9CPlayers%20that%20are%20looking%20for%20range%20are%20going%20to%20be%20happy%2C%E2%80%9D%20game%20director%20Luis%20Barriga%20said%20of%20the%20Rogue."] Meanwhile, Barriga and art director John Mueller spoke about mounts and noted that players of any character class will have access to them. “We want you to be able to get around in style,” Mueller said, also noting that the mounts are all horses because of Diablo’s gothic medieval roots; the team didn’t want to stray too far into the fantasy Warcraft-style world. You can earn modular pieces of armor to add to your mounts, as well as wearable trophies you get for completing certain pieces of content. “Making your character and your mount match is a pretty compelling aesthetic,” Barriga said. And each class also gets its own unique combat dismount, with the Rogue launching Rain of Arrows, which tends to catch PvP opponents off-guard, according to Barriga. Meanwhile, on the PvP front, Blizzard says you’ll never get caught off-guard if you’re only looking for a PvE experience. “So for us [the solution] was to create these ‘Fields of Hatred’ that are cursed by Mephisto and have become active again,” Barriga explained. So if you don’t want PvP you’ll be safe, but if you enter the Field of Hatred, the PvP is clearly enabled and the looting rules are different and there are objectives within that. “Once you enter, it’s almost like [Diablo 2] rules,” Barriga said. “It’s really dangerous, particularly when Hardcore [difficulty] comes into it.” PvP, Barriga noted, “is going to be an acquired taste” but “no one should be worried about that” because “it’s purely optional.” [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%E2%80%9CWe%20want%20you%20to%20be%20able%20to%20get%20around%20in%20style%2C%E2%80%9D%20said%20art%20director%20John%20Mueller%20about%20player%20mounts."] Finally, Camps are another open-world element in Diablo 4. They are effectively the opposite of PvP. Narratively, they held significance long ago. Diablo 4 happens after the world was decimated, and so some of the Camps have a “post-apocalyptic vibe,” according to Barriga. Camps can be old churches, lighthouses, forests, etc. that have tormented souls and ghosts within them, but if you complete the mini-puzzle there, you’ll have cleansed that area and it flips back to being a small town/safe zone. “It’s another way to gain progression,” Mueller noted, because as you unlock waypoints you can get anywhere, thus giving you a non-gear power advantage over other players. “It’s all in a big open world and you can opt-in to this content as you adventure around.” Don’t expect Diablo 4 in 2021, but stay tuned to IGN for much more on the latest entry in the legendary action-RPG series as development continues. In the meantime, stay tuned today and tomorrow for more Blizzcon 2021 coverage. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s Executive Editor of Previews. Follow him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan, catch him on Unlocked, and drop-ship him Taylor Ham sandwiches from New Jersey whenever possible.

Blizzard Entertainment has announced that the Rogue class will be one of the five playable characters in Diablo 4, joining the Barbarian, Sorceress, and Druid, who were all revealed when Diablo 4 was first announced at Blizzcon 2019. In an interview with IGN, game director Luis Barriga likened her to a jack of all trades, but noted that she can master certain things should players choose to push their build that way. He likened the Rogue to a “choose your own dexterity class” in that you can mold her how you want to fit your playstyle. You can go old-school Diablo 1-style and double-down on the bow and arrow. However, you can also tailor her to other ranged weapons or also melee weapons. “Players that are looking for range are going to be happy,” Barriga said, “and they’re probably going to be surprised at how the other versions of the Rogue are going to surprise them.” [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/diablo-4-rogue-cinematic-trailer"] Barriga also explained that the Rogue has a specialization system. Not unlike the guild quests in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, if you choose to work with different Rogue groups and do special quests for them, you’ll unlock a unique combat style that suits that group. You can only pick one at a time, however. When asked if the other classes would have a similar specialization system, Barriga said no and explained with a smile that “every class has their own thing that other classes get to be jealous about.” [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%E2%80%9CPlayers%20that%20are%20looking%20for%20range%20are%20going%20to%20be%20happy%2C%E2%80%9D%20game%20director%20Luis%20Barriga%20said%20of%20the%20Rogue."] Meanwhile, Barriga and art director John Mueller spoke about mounts and noted that players of any character class will have access to them. “We want you to be able to get around in style,” Mueller said, also noting that the mounts are all horses because of Diablo’s gothic medieval roots; the team didn’t want to stray too far into the fantasy Warcraft-style world. You can earn modular pieces of armor to add to your mounts, as well as wearable trophies you get for completing certain pieces of content. “Making your character and your mount match is a pretty compelling aesthetic,” Barriga said. And each class also gets its own unique combat dismount, with the Rogue launching Rain of Arrows, which tends to catch PvP opponents off-guard, according to Barriga. Meanwhile, on the PvP front, Blizzard says you’ll never get caught off-guard if you’re only looking for a PvE experience. “So for us [the solution] was to create these ‘Fields of Hatred’ that are cursed by Mephisto and have become active again,” Barriga explained. So if you don’t want PvP you’ll be safe, but if you enter the Field of Hatred, the PvP is clearly enabled and the looting rules are different and there are objectives within that. “Once you enter, it’s almost like [Diablo 2] rules,” Barriga said. “It’s really dangerous, particularly when Hardcore [difficulty] comes into it.” PvP, Barriga noted, “is going to be an acquired taste” but “no one should be worried about that” because “it’s purely optional.” [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%E2%80%9CWe%20want%20you%20to%20be%20able%20to%20get%20around%20in%20style%2C%E2%80%9D%20said%20art%20director%20John%20Mueller%20about%20player%20mounts."] Finally, Camps are another open-world element in Diablo 4. They are effectively the opposite of PvP. Narratively, they held significance long ago. Diablo 4 happens after the world was decimated, and so some of the Camps have a “post-apocalyptic vibe,” according to Barriga. Camps can be old churches, lighthouses, forests, etc. that have tormented souls and ghosts within them, but if you complete the mini-puzzle there, you’ll have cleansed that area and it flips back to being a small town/safe zone. “It’s another way to gain progression,” Mueller noted, because as you unlock waypoints you can get anywhere, thus giving you a non-gear power advantage over other players. “It’s all in a big open world and you can opt-in to this content as you adventure around.” Don’t expect Diablo 4 in 2021, but stay tuned to IGN for much more on the latest entry in the legendary action-RPG series as development continues. In the meantime, stay tuned today and tomorrow for more Blizzcon 2021 coverage. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Ryan McCaffrey is IGN’s Executive Editor of Previews. Follow him on Twitter at @DMC_Ryan, catch him on Unlocked, and drop-ship him Taylor Ham sandwiches from New Jersey whenever possible.

During BlizzCon 2021’s opening ceremony today, the Hearthstone team announced a raft of updates coming to Blizzard’s hugely popular card-slinger, including a brand new mode called Mercenaries, which is built around strategic RPG gameplay and roguelike missions and will launch later in 2021, and the next expansion, the Warcraft-themed Forged in the Barrens, which will bring 135 new cards to the game and mark the beginning of the Year of the Gryphon. As we’ve previously reported, the next Hearthstone year will herald in the most sweeping set of changes in Hearthstone’s history. Not only will several sets of cards leave the Standard format, including Rise of Shadows, Saviors of Uldum and Descent of Dragons, but the cards that form the baseline for the Standard format will also change. Previously, Hearthstone’s Basic cards and Classic sets were the evergreen underpinning of the game, but soon they’ll be out and a new 235 card core set (which is a mix of new and existing cards) will be in, and free for all players, ensuring everyone has the building blocks required to build half-decent decks. Each year will see a new core set rotate in, and thus create the foundation for the year, giving the game’s designers more opportunities to shape the play patterns for each class and keep the game fresh. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/hearthstone-forged-in-the-barrens-reveal-trailer"] The first core set will go live alongside the new expansion Forged in the Barrens, which is themed around the iconic World of Warcraft location in central Kalimdor. You might say this expansion is being made… FOR THE HORDE! This won’t be a standalone expansion, however, as the Year of the Gryphon will play host to a story that runs across the entire year and touches many facets of the game – including Mercenaries mode. Kicking this off, Forged in the Barrens will introduce ten legendary mercenary minions – one for each class – and we’ll follow their adventures for the whole year. The set also introduces a new keyword, Frenzy, which is a one-time effect that triggers the first time a minion survives damage. Lastly, Forged in the Barrens will have spells that can rank up based on how much mana the player has in total. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=hearthstone-forged-in-the-barrens-reveal-cards&captions=true"] There’s a lot coming in the immediate future, then, but arguably the most exciting new announcement made at Blizzcon won’t be with us until later this year, and that’s the new mode Mercenaries. As we’ve seen with the hugely popular Battlegrounds and the Dungeon Run-inspired PVP action of Duels, new modes can completely reshaped Hearthstone’s gameplay, so it’s going to be exciting seeing what this mode has to offer. For now we know that players will assemble a team of characters both new and iconic – including the likes of Sylvanas Windrunner and Ragnaros the Firelord – each of which has a unique set of abilities and can level up into increasingly powerful versions of themselves. Each run will be comprised of a new set of randomly generated encounters, with players choosing who from their team will take part before each fight, then teeing up their actions at the same time as their foe and watching it play out. Your characters’ levels and progression will be persistent across the mode as a whole. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=hearthstone-mercenaries-map-character-progression-art&captions=true"] Blizzard is only really teasing Mercenaries right now, but despite that, the team has already put a lot of time into it. They’ve been working on it for almost 18 months, according to Production Director Nathan Lyons-Smith. “We started with a handful of pitches and ideas to explore,” he explains. “One of the things that gets asked about from the community, and that the team is passionate about trying to figure out, is some form of 2v2, and that was actually one of the original pitches. But as we went through, we settled on… character progression, roguelike RPG [elements]… as the thing that we wanted to add to Hearthstone. And we've been prototyping and building and growing that team over the last, I'd say, really 11, 12 months to then have a timeline of, ‘This year, we're expecting to release.’” The Mercenaries team within the Hearthstone team is currently 15 or so dedicated to the project, but with plenty of other staff also hopping in to help out across different disciplines as needed. “The designer that's been taking the lead is Paul Nguyen,” Game Director Ben Lee tells me. “He's the original creator of the Dungeon Run - the Dungeon Run was his pitch and his ideas, obviously [with] tons of talented people [who also] helped make all of those Dungeon Runs across the years. And there's a really great, awesome core [team] working on the Mercenaries mode, but Paul's been spearheading this endeavour and doing really awesome, fantastic work.” Dungeon Run – and the many PVE adventures that have riffed on it within Hearthstone – already offers something of a roguelike experience, so what sets Mercenaries apart? Does it have more of a Slay the Spire feel? Or perhaps take inspiration from something like Thronebreaker? “It's more in the Slay the Spire vein, just for simplicity’s sake,” Lee explains. “It's our own take on it - I think that's our MO, we do our own takes on these things, like Battlegrounds was our take on the auto battler genre. And this is our take on a mixture of strategic RPG and combat elements, and also some wrapping of roguelike levels and progression.[poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%22It's%20more%20in%20the%20Slay%20the%20Spire%20vein%2C%20just%20for%20simplicity%E2%80%99s%20sake.%20It's%20our%20own%20take%20on%20it%E2%80%A6%22%20-%20Ben%20Lee"] “In Thronebreaker there's an overworld and lots of exploration and that's a big part of it, but the narrative is the real driver there. There's narrative here, but it's pretty light - in Hearthstone, our narrative is more in the fun and whimsical sense rather than the deep, lore-based narrative. We're dipping a little bit into that, but I think if you're familiar with how we've been telling stories with Book of Heroes, I think you can expect things in a similar vein. We want to be true to our license and our lore, but we don't take ourselves too seriously with Hearthstone either.” Like Slay the Spire, each run – or level - will have a randomly generated series of events – usually regular fights, sometime elite encounters and sometimes not combat at all – for players to work through, with a handful of branching paths to choose between along the way. Each run will culminate in a boss – perhaps King Mukla or King Krush. Unlike Slay the Spire – or Dungeon Run, for that matter – this isn’t a deck building game. All the gameplay hinges around the mercenaries in your squad and their abilities. “A mercenary is self-contained,” says Lee. “If you have Thrall, let's say, Thrall has his abilities, and you unlock them through various different means, you actually unlock abilities through levelling up. Then those abilities themselves can be levelled up to be more powerful, equipment can be obtained through drops in levels, and also some other means as well.” [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/03/15/how-a-tavern-brawl-became-hearthstone-battlegrounds"] “Progression is all permanent, so you get to take it home with you at the end of a run of your level,” says Lee. “And then you go to the next level and the next level and so on and so forth, and eventually you get into the end game content, which is – in the normal game flow you’re levelling up your characters from level 1 to, say, 30. The end game is enhancing your abilities, your skills, finding the cool builds, the synergies, the way to beat those really hard levels. So there’s a big PVE element to this, but there’s also PVP as well, so you can take your team of characters and fight in cool, strategic combat against other players.” “Once you reach a certain point,” Lee elaborates, “you're going to want to do those levels on Heroic and maybe even more difficulty levels… And there is a point where some of that content, you're deliberately going to be repeating it to earn different equipment drops or different items, and the ability to level up the skills of your characters. So there's a level grinding portion, that's what roguelikes are to some degree, it's repetition and generation… the essence there is that you're going to be levelling up your characters and you'll get new characters, and then you'll want to level them up because they have new abilities that are better against different enemy types or different bosses. A lot of the endgame gameplay is figuring out, ‘Who are the characters that I should take with me to beat Jaina Proudmoore or to beat the Lich King,’ or whoever the boss might be.” [caption id="attachment_2475708" align="alignnone" width="1920"] The sweet key art for Mercenaries.[/caption] As I mentioned earlier, in any encounter both sides of the fight queue up their moves for all their characters at the same time, then watch them play out. “The fun and engagement there is like, ‘How can I get character A and B to synergise to do cool things that riff off each other, that make them more powerful, or to defeat the enemies?’" says Lee. This also makes for some interesting differences between PVE and PVP. “In PVP, there's a lot of... mind games because you don't know what the opponent's going to do,” explains Lee. “When you're playing against the AI, we actually tell you what's going to happen before. It's also tapping into some puzzle elements, so if you know that this character is going to attack you and might damage you, you might be able to channel all your attacks to take that character out, so there's a lot of decision-making in it. So the PVE is also tapping into puzzle elements, which I think a lot of roguelikes do anyway, and the PVP is more tapping into the bluffing and mind games sphere a little bit.”[poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%22Hearthstone%20isn't%20a%20game%20that%20only%20makes%20card%20expansions%2C%20we%20do%20a%20lot%20more%20than%20that%20these%20days.%E2%80%9D%20-%20Ben%20Lee"] It sounds exciting, even if it is just a tease at this year’s show. And for Ben Lee, Nathan Lyons-Smith and the team, using the BlizzCon (virtual) stage to announce Mercenaries also serves another purpose – to highlight how much more dynamic Hearthstone is now. “The real big part of… revealing this at BlizzConline is, there's big stuff coming to Hearthstone, there's always big stuff coming to Hearthstone,” says Lee. “We have this huge platform that many, many people are going to watch, and we want them to know that Hearthstone isn't a game that only makes card expansions, we do a lot more than that these days.” Indeed, Hearthstone is no longer a single game, but a platform. “You can come in, and we're going to have a bunch of different types of gameplay for you, using Hearthstone's card game mechanics and the gameplay that you see,” says Lyons-Smith. “We've been exploring that since about the time Battlegrounds shipped.” We’ll have more on both Mercenaries and Forged in the Barrens soon. And be sure to also check out our chat with Ben Lee and Nathan Lyons-Smith discussing all the reveals around Hearthstone’s new core set. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Cam Shea is IGN's AU Studio Lead and has a serious soft spot for rave era breakbeat . He also played more Breath of the Wild than any other game last year. Catch him on Twitter. Maybe.

During BlizzCon 2021’s opening ceremony today, the Hearthstone team announced a raft of updates coming to Blizzard’s hugely popular card-slinger, including a brand new mode called Mercenaries, which is built around strategic RPG gameplay and roguelike missions and will launch later in 2021, and the next expansion, the Warcraft-themed Forged in the Barrens, which will bring 135 new cards to the game and mark the beginning of the Year of the Gryphon. As we’ve previously reported, the next Hearthstone year will herald in the most sweeping set of changes in Hearthstone’s history. Not only will several sets of cards leave the Standard format, including Rise of Shadows, Saviors of Uldum and Descent of Dragons, but the cards that form the baseline for the Standard format will also change. Previously, Hearthstone’s Basic cards and Classic sets were the evergreen underpinning of the game, but soon they’ll be out and a new 235 card core set (which is a mix of new and existing cards) will be in, and free for all players, ensuring everyone has the building blocks required to build half-decent decks. Each year will see a new core set rotate in, and thus create the foundation for the year, giving the game’s designers more opportunities to shape the play patterns for each class and keep the game fresh. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/19/hearthstone-forged-in-the-barrens-reveal-trailer"] The first core set will go live alongside the new expansion Forged in the Barrens, which is themed around the iconic World of Warcraft location in central Kalimdor. You might say this expansion is being made… FOR THE HORDE! This won’t be a standalone expansion, however, as the Year of the Gryphon will play host to a story that runs across the entire year and touches many facets of the game – including Mercenaries mode. Kicking this off, Forged in the Barrens will introduce ten legendary mercenary minions – one for each class – and we’ll follow their adventures for the whole year. The set also introduces a new keyword, Frenzy, which is a one-time effect that triggers the first time a minion survives damage. Lastly, Forged in the Barrens will have spells that can rank up based on how much mana the player has in total. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=hearthstone-forged-in-the-barrens-reveal-cards&captions=true"] There’s a lot coming in the immediate future, then, but arguably the most exciting new announcement made at Blizzcon won’t be with us until later this year, and that’s the new mode Mercenaries. As we’ve seen with the hugely popular Battlegrounds and the Dungeon Run-inspired PVP action of Duels, new modes can completely reshaped Hearthstone’s gameplay, so it’s going to be exciting seeing what this mode has to offer. For now we know that players will assemble a team of characters both new and iconic – including the likes of Sylvanas Windrunner and Ragnaros the Firelord – each of which has a unique set of abilities and can level up into increasingly powerful versions of themselves. Each run will be comprised of a new set of randomly generated encounters, with players choosing who from their team will take part before each fight, then teeing up their actions at the same time as their foe and watching it play out. Your characters’ levels and progression will be persistent across the mode as a whole. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=hearthstone-mercenaries-map-character-progression-art&captions=true"] Blizzard is only really teasing Mercenaries right now, but despite that, the team has already put a lot of time into it. They’ve been working on it for almost 18 months, according to Production Director Nathan Lyons-Smith. “We started with a handful of pitches and ideas to explore,” he explains. “One of the things that gets asked about from the community, and that the team is passionate about trying to figure out, is some form of 2v2, and that was actually one of the original pitches. But as we went through, we settled on… character progression, roguelike RPG [elements]… as the thing that we wanted to add to Hearthstone. And we've been prototyping and building and growing that team over the last, I'd say, really 11, 12 months to then have a timeline of, ‘This year, we're expecting to release.’” The Mercenaries team within the Hearthstone team is currently 15 or so dedicated to the project, but with plenty of other staff also hopping in to help out across different disciplines as needed. “The designer that's been taking the lead is Paul Nguyen,” Game Director Ben Lee tells me. “He's the original creator of the Dungeon Run - the Dungeon Run was his pitch and his ideas, obviously [with] tons of talented people [who also] helped make all of those Dungeon Runs across the years. And there's a really great, awesome core [team] working on the Mercenaries mode, but Paul's been spearheading this endeavour and doing really awesome, fantastic work.” Dungeon Run – and the many PVE adventures that have riffed on it within Hearthstone – already offers something of a roguelike experience, so what sets Mercenaries apart? Does it have more of a Slay the Spire feel? Or perhaps take inspiration from something like Thronebreaker? “It's more in the Slay the Spire vein, just for simplicity’s sake,” Lee explains. “It's our own take on it - I think that's our MO, we do our own takes on these things, like Battlegrounds was our take on the auto battler genre. And this is our take on a mixture of strategic RPG and combat elements, and also some wrapping of roguelike levels and progression.[poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%22It's%20more%20in%20the%20Slay%20the%20Spire%20vein%2C%20just%20for%20simplicity%E2%80%99s%20sake.%20It's%20our%20own%20take%20on%20it%E2%80%A6%22%20-%20Ben%20Lee"] “In Thronebreaker there's an overworld and lots of exploration and that's a big part of it, but the narrative is the real driver there. There's narrative here, but it's pretty light - in Hearthstone, our narrative is more in the fun and whimsical sense rather than the deep, lore-based narrative. We're dipping a little bit into that, but I think if you're familiar with how we've been telling stories with Book of Heroes, I think you can expect things in a similar vein. We want to be true to our license and our lore, but we don't take ourselves too seriously with Hearthstone either.” Like Slay the Spire, each run – or level - will have a randomly generated series of events – usually regular fights, sometime elite encounters and sometimes not combat at all – for players to work through, with a handful of branching paths to choose between along the way. Each run will culminate in a boss – perhaps King Mukla or King Krush. Unlike Slay the Spire – or Dungeon Run, for that matter – this isn’t a deck building game. All the gameplay hinges around the mercenaries in your squad and their abilities. “A mercenary is self-contained,” says Lee. “If you have Thrall, let's say, Thrall has his abilities, and you unlock them through various different means, you actually unlock abilities through levelling up. Then those abilities themselves can be levelled up to be more powerful, equipment can be obtained through drops in levels, and also some other means as well.” [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/03/15/how-a-tavern-brawl-became-hearthstone-battlegrounds"] “Progression is all permanent, so you get to take it home with you at the end of a run of your level,” says Lee. “And then you go to the next level and the next level and so on and so forth, and eventually you get into the end game content, which is – in the normal game flow you’re levelling up your characters from level 1 to, say, 30. The end game is enhancing your abilities, your skills, finding the cool builds, the synergies, the way to beat those really hard levels. So there’s a big PVE element to this, but there’s also PVP as well, so you can take your team of characters and fight in cool, strategic combat against other players.” “Once you reach a certain point,” Lee elaborates, “you're going to want to do those levels on Heroic and maybe even more difficulty levels… And there is a point where some of that content, you're deliberately going to be repeating it to earn different equipment drops or different items, and the ability to level up the skills of your characters. So there's a level grinding portion, that's what roguelikes are to some degree, it's repetition and generation… the essence there is that you're going to be levelling up your characters and you'll get new characters, and then you'll want to level them up because they have new abilities that are better against different enemy types or different bosses. A lot of the endgame gameplay is figuring out, ‘Who are the characters that I should take with me to beat Jaina Proudmoore or to beat the Lich King,’ or whoever the boss might be.” [caption id="attachment_2475708" align="alignnone" width="1920"] The sweet key art for Mercenaries.[/caption] As I mentioned earlier, in any encounter both sides of the fight queue up their moves for all their characters at the same time, then watch them play out. “The fun and engagement there is like, ‘How can I get character A and B to synergise to do cool things that riff off each other, that make them more powerful, or to defeat the enemies?’" says Lee. This also makes for some interesting differences between PVE and PVP. “In PVP, there's a lot of... mind games because you don't know what the opponent's going to do,” explains Lee. “When you're playing against the AI, we actually tell you what's going to happen before. It's also tapping into some puzzle elements, so if you know that this character is going to attack you and might damage you, you might be able to channel all your attacks to take that character out, so there's a lot of decision-making in it. So the PVE is also tapping into puzzle elements, which I think a lot of roguelikes do anyway, and the PVP is more tapping into the bluffing and mind games sphere a little bit.”[poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%22Hearthstone%20isn't%20a%20game%20that%20only%20makes%20card%20expansions%2C%20we%20do%20a%20lot%20more%20than%20that%20these%20days.%E2%80%9D%20-%20Ben%20Lee"] It sounds exciting, even if it is just a tease at this year’s show. And for Ben Lee, Nathan Lyons-Smith and the team, using the BlizzCon (virtual) stage to announce Mercenaries also serves another purpose – to highlight how much more dynamic Hearthstone is now. “The real big part of… revealing this at BlizzConline is, there's big stuff coming to Hearthstone, there's always big stuff coming to Hearthstone,” says Lee. “We have this huge platform that many, many people are going to watch, and we want them to know that Hearthstone isn't a game that only makes card expansions, we do a lot more than that these days.” Indeed, Hearthstone is no longer a single game, but a platform. “You can come in, and we're going to have a bunch of different types of gameplay for you, using Hearthstone's card game mechanics and the gameplay that you see,” says Lyons-Smith. “We've been exploring that since about the time Battlegrounds shipped.” We’ll have more on both Mercenaries and Forged in the Barrens soon. And be sure to also check out our chat with Ben Lee and Nathan Lyons-Smith discussing all the reveals around Hearthstone’s new core set. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Cam Shea is IGN's AU Studio Lead and has a serious soft spot for rave era breakbeat . He also played more Breath of the Wild than any other game last year. Catch him on Twitter. Maybe.