The franchise of Diablo has been around for decades, and the series is among the most popular that Blizzard ever realized. Although the software house has not been immune to the controversies, in particular related to the launch problems of Diablo 3 and to the announcement of Diablo Immortal, there are many players still tied to the Diablo franchise. And luckily for them, one of the most popular chapters of the saga, Diablo 2, could soon have a resounding comeback. According to a report by Jason Schreier of BloombergIn fact, the remake of Diablo 2 is in the works at Vicarious Visions, the developer of Pro Skater 1 + 2 by Tony Hawk, and more recently by Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy, and will be titled Diablo 2: Resurrected.
Blizzard said today that it's absorbing Vicarious Visions. What it didn't say:
- VV has been working on a Diablo II remake
- Team 1, Blizzard's "classic team," was quietly dismantled last fall
New from me, including some insight on WC3 Reforged: https://t.co/VGczypoBPi
- Jason Schreier (@jasonschreier) January 22, 2021
Or at least, the remake comes from developers formerly known as Vicarious Visions, since today Activision announced that the studio would be acquired by Blizzard Entertainment, and would no longer be the lead developer of the projects. Schreier then stated that the software house has been working on Blizzard projects "for months now". In the same article Schreier also states that among the projects to which Vicarious Visions has been contributing for Blizzard since last year there would be a remake of Diablo 2, news also confirmed by people closely linked to the project. The Diablo 2 remake was originally supposed to be developed from Team 1 of Blizzard, which he was already busy with Warcraft 3: Reforged. However, the team would have been dismantled, and the works then moved on to the Team 3, currently working on Diablo 4, which would have been joined by the boys of Vicarious Visions, who will help them in the realization of Diablo 2: Resurrected.
It is possible that Blizzard is waiting to officially announce the project at its next Blizzcon event, to be held digitally due to the coronavirus pandemic. However, it appears that the game is still in the early stages of development, so it's possible that fans won't have any updates for a long time.
