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A remake of the 2000s Diablo 2 has been in development, though the team currently working on it is the former Activision subsidiary Vicarious Visions, now part of Blizzard Entertainment, Bloomberg reported over the weekend.
The plot of Bloomberg’s report is twofold: first, that the Diablo 2 the remake is underway, and second, the ramshackle launch of Warcraft 3: Reforged a year ago may have played a role in the leadership of the company by taking the remake, called Diablo 2: resurrected, from the hands of Blizzard.
Blizzard Team 1 was responsible for the Diablo 2 remake, but after a post-launch internal analysis of Warcraft 3: Reforged, Activision Blizzard removed this project from Team 1. Last week, Vicarious Visions, based in Albany, merged with the development operations of Blizzard, based in Irvine, Calif.
The dissolution of Vicarious Visions and its consolidation with the development of Blizzard was first reported on January 22 by GamesIndustry.biz. GamesIndustry.biz also reported that Jen Oneal, director of studio Vicarious Visions, is now executive vice president of development for Blizzard and reports directly to Blizzard boss J. Allen Brack.
Bloomberg called the move a further consolidation of control of Blizzard by disclosing the executives of Activision Blizzard Inc. as a whole. Blizzard and Activision have been together since a merger in 2008 that brought Vivendi Games, then Blizzard’s parent company, on board Activision. Blizzard continued to work independently, developing games like Overwatch and World of warcraft internally and largely remaining separate from the Activision publishing realm of Call of Duty, Destiny, and other mega franchises.
Bloomberg reports that the 2018 departure of Blizzard co-founder Mike Morhaime “largely marked the beginning of the Activision takeover.” Two months after Morhaime left, Blizzard effectively shut down Heroes of the Storm then, in October 2020, the company announced that it was ending all development on Starcraft 2, launched in 2010.
Both HOT and StarCraft 2 were Blizzard Team 1 projects. Starcraft 2The retirement was announced the same day Team 1 was reorganized internally, Bloomberg said.
Warcraft 3: Reforged, a remake of the fantastic real-time simulation of 2002, was a critical flop, with most critics and players deeply disappointed with the prevalence of bugs and glitches and the lack of expected features. A week after launching on January 28, 2020, Blizzard apologized for ReforgedThe Launch Status, promised that post launch support would fix issues, and offered refunds to anyone dissatisfied with the purchase.
Diablo 4 was announced at BlizzCon in November 2019. It doesn’t have a launch date or window yet.
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