This week, Blizzard released Diablo IV: Vessel of Hatred, an expansion to the wildly popular fantasy action-role-playing game that tasks players with

The Diablo IV Nobody Ever Saw

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2024-10-08 18:30:06

This week, Blizzard released Diablo IV: Vessel of Hatred, an expansion to the wildly popular fantasy action-role-playing game that tasks players with slaughtering masses of screeching demons and collecting the randomized gear that they leave behind.

Since coming out last year, Diablo IV has been a big success for Blizzard, earning more than $666 million (yes, really) in its first week. But before that release came years of fits and starts, including a predecessor that was perceived within Blizzard as an embarrassment and an iteration that was so drastically different, people began wondering if it was really still Diablo anymore.

Today, Diablo is one of Blizzard’s most important franchises. But to at least one Blizzard executive who was around in its early days, it wasn’t even a “real game.”

My new book, Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future of Blizzard Entertainment, chronicles the entire 33-year saga of the video game company, from the early hit-making days of Warcraft and StarCraft to its merger with Activision to last year’s $69 billion acquisition by Microsoft. This WIRED-exclusive excerpt tells the story of a canceled Diablo III expansion and the Diablo IV that never happened.