In an interview with AusGamers, Blizzard confirmed that Diablo 4 will be using a new game engine. While the team did not reveal any specific details, it did state that the game now uses Physically Based Rendering.
What this means is that the team can render things in a more realistic way. In other words, metal, skin, blood, fur, or hair will now look way more realistic than before.
Furthermore, and thanks to this new engine, Blizzard can now experiment with the top-down/isometric viewpoint. As such, the team can now have real-time cut-scenes, during which they can use the camera in a more cinematic way. The camera can also automatically zoom out during World Bosses so it can show a larger area.
Another area from which Diablo 4 will benefit from its new engine is its dynamic weather and the day-night cycles. As Diablo 4’s Art Director John Mueller said:
“When you cast Cataclysm [as the Druid], no matter what is going on in the world it brings the rain and storms with it. Having the ability to dynamically change weather based on abilities is fun because there are a lot of things that we can do with that.”
Lastly, Blizzard was also able to improve environmental destructibility and the game’s animations thanks to the new engine. The game will now feel smoother thanks to some new animation techniques.
“We’ve added a lot of animation technology. Blending animation and having stop animations and having different animations make the movement feel very different than Diablo III. It’s all increasing the resolution. And in action it makes the movement but feel more fluid, with stuff like character turns looking better than ever.
When you cast Cataclysm [as the Druid], no matter what is going on in the world it brings the rain and storms with it. Having the ability to dynamically change weather based on abilities is fun. As such, there are a lot of things that we can do with that.”
There is currently no ETA on when Diablo 4 will come out. However, we’ll be sure to keep you posted!
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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