Blizzard has announced plans to bring more collaborations for Diablo 4 and aims to involve well-known franchises. The very first collaboration comes with a bang: Berserk. The manga is immensely popular and is considered a cult classic. Still, fans are not entirely sure if they really want this.
What kind of manga is this?
- Berserk tells the story of the swordfighter Guts, who finds himself in a never-ending battle against demonic beings in his quest for revenge. Betrayal is a significant theme in the story.
- The manga is regarded as the best manga of all time (via MyAnimeList) and has served as an inspiration for games such as Dark Souls (via Reddit and GameRant). The tone is dark and grim.
- The original creator of Berserk passed away before he could complete his work. However, there have been previous collaborations between Berserk and video games. Now it’s Diablo’s turn.
What does the collaboration involve? In the roadmap for Diablo 4, Blizzard has already teased that they are aiming for “new IP collaborations.” IP stands for “Intellectual Property,” meaning intellectual property or simply franchises.
After previous crossovers between World of Warcraft and Diablo, Berserk is now the first collaboration with a non-Blizzard IP. According to community manager Adam Fletcher, the collaboration will apply to both Diablo Immortal and Diablo 4 (via X.com).
What exactly the collaboration will bring is still unknown, but new skins for the shop are highly likely. Armor and mount skins as well as trophies were already a focus during the WoW collaboration. In Diablo 4, for example, there were rather expensive skins of Arthas, Illidan, and co., while Diablo Immortal received the sword Frostgram as a weapon.
“I will pretend this doesn’t exist”
On Reddit, users are already discussing the upcoming collaboration, and most appear to be skeptical. If the event is only meant to sell expensive skins, they feel it would be better to skip it.
Cosmetics in Diablo 4 have absurd prices at times, which deter many players from making purchases. If the Berserk skins are similarly priced, many users would prefer not to reach for their wallets.
Others love Berserk but are unsure about the collaboration. Particularly the possibility of playing as Lilith in Call of Duty makes fans cautious about crossovers.
However, not all fans have a negative stance. Some hope that the collaboration will include revamped Hellflights in the style of Berserk, although the likelihood seems quite low.
The reaction to the Berserk collaboration reflects only a small part of the community and is likely to mainly involve fans of the manga. A good portion of Diablo players have no problem with cosmetics, even if they are more expensive: Blizzard sells pets for 25 euros in Diablo 4, and players are quite okay with that
