At the IGN FanFest 2023, Blizzard showed new information and images for Diablo 4, including the first cutscene of the game. This tells a bit of the story of the action RPG and shows your own character.
What kind of scene is this? The intro cinematic of Diablo 4 shows your character riding a horse through a snow-covered mountainous landscape until he is surprised at night. He loses his horse and must seek shelter.
For nearly 4 minutes, a narrator tells you a bit more about the story of Diablo 4 and what it’s actually about. The hero finally fights his way to a cave to spend the night there. When he awakens, the scene ends and the game apparently begins.
In the scene, you see not a placeholder, but your own character. Diablo 4 offers an extensive character editor for each of the 5 starting classes of the game, unlike previous parts of Diablo.
According to lead designer Joe Shely, this kind of thing is supposed to happen more often in Diablo 4. Your character repeatedly appears in cutscenes, as is standard in modern RPGs.
Intro-Cinematic of Diablo 4 – Available for everyone starting in March
When can I play myself? The scene was first shown during the IGN FanFest on February 18, 2023. Shely also directly announced the start of the open beta on March 17 for pre-orders and a week later for everyone.
You can watch the opening scene yourself from then on, or at the latest when it releases on June 6. The beta includes the entire prologue with the first act, but it is limited to level 25. Some additional information about the game:
- There will be no sets at release – they will come later, if at all
- Co-op should be possible at all times, regardless of how far you are in the story
- Each class has special mechanics that set it apart from other classes and allow for more customization
Overall, Diablo 4 is said to take 180 hours to reach maximum level – so it will take quite a while longer than what is possible in the beta. After that comes the actual endgame. However, we cannot yet say how many cutscenes will appear during this time.
What else you need to know about Diablo 4 can be found in our overview of the upcoming game:
Diablo 4: Everything about the release, classes, beta, and gameplay
