With the upcoming remasterDiablo 2: Resurrectedon the horizon, some fans are calling into question Blizzard’s history with remasters.Warcraft 3: Reforgedreleased last year and disappointed many fans of the game. Not only was the launch plagued by technical issues, missing original features, and contained minor upgrades visually, but the game replaced the original’s client. On release, the original game’s multiplayer client was closed andmany players were angered by the release ofWarcraft 3: Reforged.
With the recent history in mind, it’s no surpriseDiablo 2fans are anxious about the final product ofDiablo 2: Resurrected. The good news is that a different team is in charge of theDiablo 2: Resurrectedrelease. In fact, the current head of theDiablofranchise, Rod Ferguson, wasn’t even at Blizzard at the timeWarcraft 3: Reforgedreleased. He recently sat down with PC Gamer to field questions about the direction of theDiablofranchise, and address concerns of worried fans.
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According to Ferguson,Diablo 2andDiablo 2: Resurrectedwill be separate games, and the release of the remaster won’t affectDiablo 2. He also went on to assure fans thatDiablo 2is going to remain untouched. While he did point out that theWarcraft 3release happened before his time at the company, it was apparent that Blizzard wants to avoid a repeat of those mistakes. It’s a very promising sign that the team wants tokeep theDiablo 2experience authentic.
In his interview with PC Gamer, Ferguson said: “One of the things we wanted to verify was thatD2original stayedD2original. We were going to make sure that that game stayed there. Keeping the two games separate was a big part of that." Since the original game isn’t being altered, the multiplayer functionality will also remain untouched.Diablo 2: Resurrectedwon’t support all of the mods the original game does, but they will still be available on the original game.
Blizzard is looking into options forDiablo 2: Resurrectedto support cross-platform play at some point, but players should not expect it at launch. Blizzard has also been looking into making more of its games cross-platform, with rumors about bothOverwatchandOverwatch 2being in line for them to at least look into it. With the power of the newer consoles, more games are consideringcrossplay between consoles and PCs.
Diablo 2: Resurrectionis slated to launch sometime in 2021, and willinclude the Lords of Destruction DLC package. The two-decade-old title is getting its much-requested re-release, with quite a few updates. Hopefully, the game stays true to the original, as has been promised by the development team.
Diablo 2: Resurrectedlaunches later this year for PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
