Whoops, Looks Like Blizzard Announced Them Both Too Early
If you were looking forward to Overwatch 2 and Diablo IV, we have some bad news: neither of these games will be launching in 2021. The earliest we can expect to see them is next year. An earnings call this week discussing Q4 of 2020 gave us some insight into where progress is for at least one these titles: Overwatch 2 passed a major internal milestone in December and is now undergoing critical testing. Meanwhile, things are quiet on the Diablo IV front, with the franchise now pushing the mobile Diablo Immortal front and center. Whether or not this will work out for Blizzard remains to be seen. At least the announcement cinematics are still nice.
Despite originally launching in 2015, Overwatch is still incredibly popular and remains a major force in the competitive gaming scene. No wonder Blizzard is eager to release the next installment, especially with the Overwatch League starting up in April. Diablo IV also has a lot of news surrounding its customization options, story, and gameplay teasers. However, it’s also possible that there were less innocent reasons behind the early announcements. Dualshockers observes that: “Many players hold the notion that Blizzard’s initial announcement was more damage control than anything else. Both titles were pushed heavily around the time of the Hong Kong controversy.”
If the intent was to try and rehabilitate Blizzard’s failing image, then we can’t say we’re impressed with how things have turned out. If you want to use new games as a smokescreen, you do need to actually release those games. But hey, at least Blizzard hasn’t pulled another Warcraft III: Reforged yet.
Overwatch 2 and Diablo IV are expected to launch in 2022. Diablo Immortal is expected to hit mobile later in 2021.
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