Blizzard canceled first Diablo IV in 2016 and is working on new version

Blizzard canceled the first version of Diablo IV in 2016 and is now working on a successor, claims Kotaku. The company had already planned to announce the game this year, but the developer has delayed the announcement.

The project was codenamed Hades and was a Diablo game with many Dark Souls influences, says Kotaku in a story based on interviews with eleven employees and former Blizzard employees. In doing so, players would look over the main character’s shoulder, which gives a very different perspective than the image in previous Diablo games.

Blizzard canceled Hades, having previously discontinued the second expansion for Diablo III. After Reaper of Souls, there was supposed to be a second expansion pack, but that eventually fell through. The interviewed employees suspect that the management had come to see Diablo III as a failed project due to the problematic release in 2012.

In the meantime, according to the story, Blizzard is working on a new Diablo game that would follow more the line of the previous parts. This would be a dark game with the social component from Destiny for multiplayer. Current builds retain the isometric perspective of previous Diablo games, but looking over the shoulder would still be a consideration.

It would be at least a few more years before the new Diablo comes out. Blizzard had already wanted to announce the game, but there is no playable demo or trailer ready yet. Blizzard did announce the new mobile game Diablo Immortal, which, according to Kotaku’s information, is mainly for the Chinese market. Immortal comes from NetEase and not from the team working on the next Diablo game.

Blizzard declined to comment on the story. It did say before that it is still working on Diablo projects. It is unknown if and when the developer would like to announce the next Diablo game.

Image from Diablo III: Reaper of Souls