With all of the drama surrounding the Microsoft + Activision Blizzard situation, people had high expectations of what could truly happen to Blizzard titles once the merge was complete. One of them was regarding Diablo 4’s availability through the Game Pass, something that was previously unthought of.
Will Diablo IV be Available on Game Pass? – Answered
Diablo IV will be hitting the Game Pass on March 28, 2024. After months of speculation and rumors surrounding its actual fate, the game will finally be playable through the Microsoft gaming service as a direct result of the companies successfully merging back in October 2023.
The official announcement was made during the Xbox Podcast, and later confirmed on social media. As the game features Crossplay elements, players will be able to immediately team up with veterans who own the game on different platforms and start their journey on the Sanctuary. A new Season will start roughly two weeks later, so newcomers might as well wait a bit longer before jumping in.
A previous declaration by Rod Fergusson, overseer of the Diablo franchise, affirmed that there were previously no plans to bring the title to Game Pass, but it was made almost a whole year before the official announcement. The market has largely changed from back then, and it seems that Blizzard is executing some new plans on the board.
This was contradicted by an older blog post by Microsoft on September 2022 that stated their intentions to implement some of Activision Blizzard’s games into the services. The exact quote was:
We intend to make Activision Blizzard’s much-loved library of games – including Overwatch, Diablo and Call of Duty – available in Game Pass and to grow those gaming communities.
While these other games are still nowhere to be seen in the Game Pass, it might just be a matter of time until they finally decide to slowly introduce more titles, with Diablo being the chosen one to test those new waters.
