Thursday, March 28, 2024

Diablo: Immortal — Everything you need to know

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diablo-immortal-hero.jpg?itok=1-NT-Jzm

Blizzard is bringing the Diablo series to your mobile phone, and we cannot wait.

While Blizzard was announcing Diablo IV at Blizzcon this year, they also dropped a lot of information about Diablo: Immortal. Immortal will be a fully-fledged Diablo game, with a few awesome extras, and designed from the ground up to be mobile.

Here is everything we know about the game so far.

  • What is Diablo?
  • What type of game is Diablo: Immortal?
  • What Classes are there?
  • Are there microtransactions?
  • What is the control system like?
  • When will you be able to play Diablo: Immortal?

What is Diablo?

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Diablo is a game franchise made by Blizzard and centered around the world of Sanctuary. In previous games, you have fought off hordes of demons to collect loot and defend the fragments of the destroyed Worldstone.

Diablo: Immortal takes place between the events in Diablo II and III and puts you in the role of a hero, joining forces with other factions and even other players to stem the tattered invasion force left behind from Diablo II. Skarn, one of Diablo’s strongest lieutenants, is rallying the demons that invest the land, and it’s your job to stop it.

Hell unleashed

Diablo: Immortal

diablo-immortal-icon.png?itok=Dcf4lO89

See at Google Play

Diablo: Immortal is a fully realized entry to the Diablo series. With the added benefit of an MMO experience, Immortal looks set to be amazing.

What type of game is Diablo: Immortal?

Like almost all Diablo games, Immortal is an isometric, top-down, hack-and-slash where you battle hordes of minions and use magic and might to win the day. What’s different about Immortal is that it is fully designed to run on phones, as well as adding a large multiplayer component.

Blizzard assures us that the game will still have a substantial single-player story, but Diablo: Immortal is a true MMORPG with shared social spaces, four-player dungeons, and even guilds. I think Blizzard is hoping this approach will make monetizing the game easier as the content will continue to grow over time.

What classes are there?

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Like all good fantasy fiction stories, there are a lot of classes to choose from. There are three of the standard melee-style classes to choose from, including Barbarian, Monk, and Crusader — essentially Diablo’s version of a Paladin. The Necromancer and Wizard classes use magic to do their damage, so they have a completely different feel to the other three types, and then there is the Demon Hunter.

The Demon Hunter is a ranged melee character, so it’s a happy mix of all the classes. You can dual wield crossbows that fire multiple arrows as a demon hunter which looks like a lot of fun. All your classes will be upgradable as well as your character levels up, and it’s likely we will see more classes as microtransactions in the coming months.

Are there microtransactions?

We’re focused on building a great Diablo game first. That said, we know the business model is top of mind for lots of people out there, and we’re taking the time to get it right.

Blizzard is clearly aware of how having a bad IAP ecosystem can negatively impact your game performance in the long term. Blizzard is saying all the right things right now to make us feel like these microtransactions won’t be terrible, but we all know what developers say rarely coincides with what it does.

Microtransactions have to walk the fine line of being attractive enough for you as a player to want to buy and not bringing inbalance by adding a pay-to-win scenario. Just being able to drop a load of cash and become the most powerful hero around can ruin multiplayer games, so hopefully, Blizzard will consider that.

What is the control system like?

On screen control

Because Diablo: Immortal is a mobile game, it naturally has on-screen buttons for its control scheme. You can see in the GIF above that they aren’t too obtrusive though if you are using a smaller phone, they may get in the way of the action. You can see that the right thumbstick almost disappears completely when not in use, which is a nice touch, though it’s all the attack icons that take up the most space.

Hopefully, Blizzard will add controller support as well as on-screen buttons. Most phones these days are compatible with various controllers, and the game experience will be much better if you can see more of the game rather than the icons.

When will you be able to play Diablo: Immortal?

Unfortunately, Blizzard is not giving us a time factor for the release of Diablo Immortal. It is already available to pre-register, which suggests the game is less than six months away, but honestly, it could arrive at any time.

Blizzard will want to make sure it gets this game right. With phones becoming more and more powerful, and the money that can be made by doing mobile games right, Blizzard will want to cash in as hard as possible.

Hell unleashed

Diablo: Immortal

diablo-immortal-icon.png?itok=Dcf4lO89

See at Google Play

Diablo: Immortal is a fully realized entry to the Diablo series. With the added benefit of an MMO experience, Immortal looks set to be amazing.

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