Diablo 4s Release Date Revealed, But Development Teams Are In Jeopardy
Fans are used to waiting a few years between each diablo.
For example, it took 12 years between Diablo 2 and Diablo 3, and nine years for Diablo 2: resurrected.
This is why the release date of Diablo 4, revealed just four years after his announcement on Blazon 2019, surprised many players.
However, this short time may mean that developers are having an extra dose of work.
Blizzard is always involved in controversy
Fifteen old and current anonymous employees gave a long interview to Washington Post journalist Shannon Lao to inform Blizzard’s mismanagement of Diablo 4 development, and other complaints.
The Washington Post reported that Diablo 4 team was literally bogged down at uncontrollable working hours, that Blizzard would encourage in exchange for questionable advantages and inadequate benefits.
In fact, according to employees, who depressed on anonymity, the times-they can reach more than 12 hours daily \ would be rewarded by some Blizzard actions after the game’s release, or even $25 from Door Dash
(a dining delivery service) Here and there, benefits that employees describe as petty.
Unattainable deadlines, managerial indecision and worrying script revisions have led to overall resentment and Blizzard’s high turnover.
I used to ruin the relationships I was in, […] No one wants to date someone who barely has time for them for months, at least once a year, if not anymore, said a current Blizzard Albany employee.
This affected my health and relationships, both familiar and romantic. It affected my ability to appreciate things, he told The Washington Post, describing typical symptoms of ‘exhaustion’.
We are at the point where they no longer want to delay the game, so we all have to deal with it and find out how willing to hurt ourselves to make sure the game is good enough.
In addition to affecting employees and their mental and physical health, it may be that these crushed methods which Blizzard supposedly has become adept, as well as large corporations in general, as they seem to be affecting the quality of the game.
Blizzard responds
The company spoke.
Blizzard Entertainment spokesman Andrew Reynolds responded to the Washington Post article with the following statement:
As you should know, the development of games in general, and Diablo 4 in particular, follows an iterative process that extends over time. Game production is going extremely well.
Extra hours are voluntary and limited to specific teams. We regularly ask the team about their professional well-being and the latest results are the most positive in years.
As for certain narrative elements, Blizzard continues, referring to the disturbing revisions of the script mentioned in the Washington Post article, the story in question was presented over three years ago, under another management, such as a character story and
Not as a game content. At the time it was considered inappropriate, and we took another direction. We are still confident in the teams are building something amazing and received much positive feedback from the players.
These disturbing and inappropriate creative decisions, allegedly attributed in part to Sebastian Stephen, former Creative Director of The Witcher 3 and Cyberpunk 277 screenwriter, allegedly rewritten the entire script for Diablo 4, creating what many employees called Rape version For repeated references to a female character whose main description boils down to ‘The Raped Woman’ according to The Washington Post. All these allegations add to a long list of sexual harassment complaints.