Anticipation was equally weighted against expectation coming into BlizzCon 2023. It's been four years since the company's last celebration was held in-person, with Blizzard Entertainment having suspended the event as a result of both the COVID-19 pandemic and litigation related to alleged workplace harassment. It's now back with thousands of fans of the Diablo, Overwatch, StarCraft, and Warcraft franchises making the pilgrimage to Anaheim California in an effort to put voices to faces and gain a better understanding of the new worlds that Blizzard is building.
Ahead of the Opening Ceremony, kicking off the two-day BlizzCon 2023 schedule, players on the ground point back to the strength of the 2019 showcase as reason to get excited. World of Warcraft: Shadowlands was announced, alongside reveals of Overwatch 2 and Diablo 4 – the latter landing with an early build playable on the showfloor. Given that ticket prices had increased by almost 30% since, there was some expectation that the 2023 event would hold similar promise, particularly with the shadow of a completed Microsoft Gaming acquisition looming large over proceedings.
Depending on where your allegiances lie, BlizzCon 2023 either surpassed expectations or missed them entirely. Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer was indeed on the scene, but only to offer vague platitudes, stating that the "future of Blizzard is brighter than ever", while offering little insight into the conversations occurring behind the scenes. There was also some belief that Blizzard would use this as an opportunity to properly reveal its new open-world fantasy survival game – a AAA-quality production for PC and Console, which the studio quietly unveiled in early 2022 as part of a recruitment drive. Codename: Odyssey proved to be as elusive as the long-awaited return of StarCraft.
World of Warcraft reigns supreme
These missed opportunities to lay down a marker for the future were of course disappointing, although I don't imagine many players will care based on the strength of the final third of the showcase and the subsequent franchise deep-dives. Blizzard's biggest mistake was not leading BlizzCon with the triumphant return of Chris Metzen – a key architect of the World of Warcraft franchise, returning from retirement as executive creative director to guide one of the best MMOs of all-time through a trilogy of expansions. The Wondersoul Saga is significant, and probably the most overtly exciting thing to happen to WoW in a decade.
Hearing Metzen lead rallying cries for the Alliance and the Horde for the first time in seven years was enough to lift the spirits of even the most jaded lapsed players. He has a way of selling the World of Warcraft fantasy unlike any other spokesperson; his presence, combined with shrewd insights from general manager John Hight and executive producer Holly Langdale, help push World of Warcraft into an enviable position. The 20th anniversary is on the horizon, and between The War Within, Midnight, and The Last Titan expansions there's plenty to get excited about.
The excitement was palpable at BlizzCon 2023 when Metzen hit the stage, and his enthusiasm and clear vision helped drive excitement into other Warcraft announcements. Key quality of life improvements arriving alongside The War Within expansion in 2024, like Warbands – which has already enraptured the community and members of the development team – to the impending return of Cataclysm to World of Warcraft Classic. The franchise is in a really good place right now, and I'm struggling to resist the call to return to Azeroth – no matter how damaging it may prove to be to my personal life.
The strength of the Warcraft presentation at BlizzCon has even got me thinking about returning to Hearthstone, or at least downloading Warcraft Rumble ahead of my flight back to GamesRadar+ HQ. I'm not going to lie, news that Hearthstone is set to celebrate its 10th anniversary almost turned my bones to dust, but I was pretty damn impressed by what the team put forward – carefully striking a balance between appealing to new, lapsed, and legacy players. That's a trifecta of enduring problems that every Blizzard studio faces at one time or another, but Hearthstone is navigating those waters deftly with a new co-operative game mode, fun seasonal content, and catch-up card packs.
Community cry
Outside of core Warcraft announcements, BlizzCon has proven to be something of a mixed bag. I think that the Overwatch 2 development team has certainly taken some important steps forward in the last 12 months, but I'm still not getting a clear sense of where the game is going next. Game director Aaron Keller says that the "Overwatch team has never had such clarity of vision for the future," but there's a lot of talk and not a lot of detail. A rework to competitive systems has been promised, so too has a rework of a classic Overwatch map and the release of three new heroes in 2024. It's intriguing, but lacks enough definition to quell the loudest detractors.
Diablo 4 faces a similar problem. Its development team seems to be feeling the strain of fighting so many simultaneous battles. Iterating the experience quickly to stay ahead of a rolling avalanche of player feedback, the release cadence of a new season of themed content every three months, and then there's Vessel of Hatred – the first Diablo 4 expansion set to release in 2024, continuing the core narrative and introducing a class that's entirely new to the Diablo franchise. Again, a lot of what the Diablo team is putting forward sounds promising, but it's a case of tell rather than show, and the Campfire Chat occurring on the afternoon of November 4 is expected to focus more on the evolution of Season of Blood and the incoming Malignant Ring items than the new expansion.
Ultimately, I hope that my presiding memory of BlizzCon 2023 isn't the missed opportunities to lay down stronger waypoints for the future, or my disappointment at the lack of news surrounding that elusive Blizzard survival game, but rather the repeated rallying cries from the community. Let me share a personal anecdote as an example. When I was en route to interview Holly Langdale about, among other things, what the Cataclysm expansion means for World of Warcraft Classic, I happened to bump into somebody I haven't seen or really spoken to in over a decade – a former housemate who I spent many a long night playing World of Warcraft: Cataclysm with when it originally released back in 2010, when we should have been studying for our final year of university. An incredible moment, and one that feels right for BlizzCon.
Take a step back from all of the noise and announcements, not to mention the truly incredible art installations celebrating each of Blizzard's core franchises, adorning each of the convention center halls, and you'll see a lot of these only at BlizzCon moments emerging organically. That's what I want to remember. The group of impeccably dressed Overwatch cosplayers weaving between photo requests to get in-line to try Mauga, the new Overwatch 2 tank arriving this December. I want to remember the trio of fans I met who queued for hours to get matching Diablo 4 tattoos, all in celebration of their friendship forged in the fires of hell back in 1996.
But most importantly, I want to remember the 20 or so World of Warcraft players I encountered who were having a very loud argument outside the convention center about their Guild failing repeatedly at a raid they played from hotel rooms the night before. The Healers insistent that it was the fault of the DPS players standing in shit, the damage dealers incandescent at the mere suggestion, and the Tanks trying desperately to mediate. All in, the conversation made me nostalgic for a time in my life where I played World of Warcraft religiously. And as a former Fire Mage who is apparently responsible for ruining quite a few 40-man raids in my time, this encounter at BlizzCon 2023 made me finally confront a horrible truth. Something I should have admitted years ago. Yes, I could see the damage tick the entire time, and no, casting Pyroblast is never a valid excuse for failing to strafe out of an AOE attack. You know what, it feels good to finally get that off my chest – I just hope my old Guild never finds out.
GamesRadar+ is on the ground in Anaheim, California to cover BlizzCon 2023 live. For all of the latest news, as well exclusive reports and interviews, be sure to keep an eye out for our BlizzCon 2023 coverage coming this week.
