Diablo IV Closed Beta Announced that Will Focus on the End Game
Sep. 20, 2022Diablo IV Closed Beta Announced that Will Focus on the End Game
Diablo IV gets a surprise announcement that a Closed Endgame Beta will be available soon. Select participants will be invited to join.
Surprise, heroes of Sanctuary! The development leads of Diablo IV, Rod Fergusson, and Joe Shely have announced that a Closed Beta will be coming soon. This update is quite a surprise, as the developers have usually stuck to a regular Quarterly Update Schedule. In these types of updates, they’ve focused more on things like thepost-launch monetization,seasons, theNecromancer class, theenvironmental art, orlegendary items. They have rarely talked about the endgame, until now.
The endgame of ARPGs has long been a staple for the genre, more so in the Diablo games. Who can forget the variousMephistoorUberruns inDiablo 2? Or farming Greater Rifts like there’s no tomorrow? Or how aboutPath of Exile’s various endgame systems that become increasingly complex?
The team did want to reiterate that this is a closed end gamebeta. This means that they will initially be picking a small set of players according to game data. Folks who have been quite active in Diablo III and Diablo II Resurrected’s End Games are more likely to be selected. It won’t necessarily mean that content creators automatically get a pass. The closed beta will also be confidential, and feedback can only be coursed through Blizzard at the moment.
Diablo IV’s Closed Beta will consist only of the endgame aspects this time around. No campaign will be in sight, at least during this period. This is because the developers do not wish to unveil Lilith’s story just yet. It looks like there might be some twists and turns awaiting the players.
Another reason for this is that they acknowledge that the endgame is something that the majority of hardcore fans will sink their teeth into. And thus, the experience needs to be as smooth and fulfilling as possible. They will need to accept feedback from the most hardcore of players to see how well all their systems work.
Things like the new Paragon Board, Legendary Items, and other intricacies need to be tested and see how fun they make the game overall.
Diablo IV’s Endgame Closed Beta was also announced to have a few systems that players will have access to. These are Helltide, Nightmare Dungeons, Whispers of the Dead, Fields of Hatred, and the previously mentioned Paragon Boards.
The new Helltide is a region-wide server event that can randomly occur. Players who have obtained World Tier Three: Nightmare Difficulty are eligible to have the Helltide event occur. In this nightmarish occurrence, monsters all across the region are buffed. This provides heroes with greater rewards, but at the expense of a greater challenge.
Enemies empowered by the Helltide will drop the Cinders currency, which is used to open special Helltide-specific chests. The heroes of Sanctuary must take care, however, as dying while carrying Cinders will cause this precious resource to drop to the ground.
It looks like individual dungeons will be receiving a difficulty level, unlike the previous implementations of the Diablo game. Nightmare Dungeons are just that, dungeons with Nightmare-leveled difficulty. These unlock as soon as players receive a lucky drop called a Nightmare Sigil.
Nightmare Sigils act as keys to specific dungeons that are hidden in the world and have certain properties attached to them. The monsters within the opened dungeon will receive modifiers based on the Sigils that were used to open their lair.
In practice, this could mean anything from having foes have more affixes, drop a specific type of loot, or more enemy spawns.
Different Nightmare Dungeons and their respective Sigils will start unlocking for players the higher level they get.
The dead never truly die, and that is especially true for the beings in the Diablo series. Players will be able to hear and track down the whispers of the dead, beckoning them to grant their last wishes. Finding and completing these mini-quests will grant players the Grim Favor currency.
Grim Favors can be traded in at the Tree of Whispers for different kinds of loot. This endgame system will be locked behind a specific quest line in the main game. Closed Beta players will have access to the Tree of Whispers right away.
Players who are a bit more bloodthirsty and miss the exhilaration ofPVPwill feel right at home at the Fields of Hatred. Born from the anger of the Lord of HatredMephistohimself, the Fields of Hatred are a PvPvE zone wherein players must fight demons and each other to collect special Seeds of Hatred.
This new resource will be required to be smashed into Red Dust at nearby Altars of Extraction. Seeds of Hatred drop on death, and as such you must be wary of any hostile player lurking nearby. Red Dust can be used to purchase various cosmetics and mounts from a special PvP item vendor.
Auberon
Writer at Fextralife. I really like vanilla ice cream.
