<\/p>\n
For the last few weeks, Blizzard has been going big<\/em>. Blizzard Showcase brought together the four key titles \u2013 Overwatch, Diablo, World of Warcraft, and Hearthstone \u2013 and gave the space to bring their updates, announcements (and some surprises!) in their own ways. It\u2019s all a part of the road to BlizzCon 2026: the year of Blizzard\u2019s 35th anniversary, not to mention the 30th anniversary of Diablo, and the 10th anniversary of Overwatch. This is the perfect space in time to look back at the universes that have brought us together and<\/em> look forward to the future.<\/p>\n For Blizzard President, Johanna Faries \u2013 speaking on the Official Xbox Podcast\u00a0 \u2013 the Showcase has been a combination of careful planning and happy serendipity:<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve been really thoughtful about [giving] our players what they\u2019re hoping for, and hopefully delight them and surprise them in some big ways. I think those have landed. And we\u2019ll just continue to sort of prime what we hope to be a very, very big year as we continue on here in 2026.<\/p>\n \u201cOur franchise teams, and our game teams within those franchises, think a lot about, \u2018What do we want to do next year? What do we want to do five years from now?\u2019 Maybe, \u2018What do we want to do 10<\/em> years from now?\u2019 And we\u2019ve organized our thinking and our strategic planning to make sure that comes together in a really thoughtful way. It\u2019s very intentional how we\u2019ve slate planned into the future.<\/p>\n \u201cAt the same time, the inorganic part was we sat back well over a year ago, and I said, \u2018Look, there\u2019s something bigger going on here, and I think we can marry this. I think we can make this a party on behalf of all of Blizzard Entertainment.\u2019 And hopefully if you\u2019re a fan of Blizzard, you\u2019re gonna feel something bigger than just, \u2018Oh, I got what I needed from Overwatch\u2019 or, \u2018I got what I needed from Diablo.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n That idea \u2013 that this is a celebration of momentum across Blizzard, not just a series of game announcements \u2013 comes with a key extra detail: this is going to be a massive year. Showcase represents what Blizzard has to show us now, but its 2026 is far from over \u2013 not least with a return to the legendary BlizzCon later this year.<\/p>\n \u201cRight now, we have a huge swath of announcements that our games have just brought forward. And why I say that is I think we\u2019re pretty excited to say: There\u2019s still BlizzCon coming in this calendar year, right? Imagine what else we\u2019re stacking up.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve got to execute on that. We\u2019ve got to make sure we\u2019re delivering in a big way. But I think the teams are cooking. They\u2019re very excited to bring some major announcements, maybe some surprises.\u201d<\/p>\n We certainly haven\u2019t seen everything Blizzard, and its games, will have to offer this year \u2013 but the wider point of this moment is to set the table for the future of the company. Blizzard is celebrating 35 years of existence by preparing for the next <\/em>35 years.<\/p>\n \u201cI think there\u2019s just an energy around this moment and how this is sort of a launching pad for a big future. It\u2019s very fulfilling to be able to come into work and feel busy in that way, pressure in that way, stakes in that way. I think we\u2019re all really proud of being able to try and pull it off. But again, it\u2019s many years in the making.\u201d<\/p>\n As Faries makes clear, that long-term thinking is being applied per-franchise, and per-game \u2013 making sure that it\u2019s not just Blizzard\u2019s future being considered, but how each individual title can thrive:<\/p>\n \u201cWhat do we want the next 35 years to look like? What\u2019s the vision? What\u2019s the direction? We\u2019ve set a lot in motion with respect to that, making sure we\u2019re clear on it, making sure we\u2019re coordinated on it, making sure that every year from this moment forward, there\u2019s sort of a reliability that players can depend on us to launch in big ways, launch in surprising ways. Maybe take some zags!<\/p>\n \u201cNot everything\u2019s going to hit. That\u2019s gaming. But in many ways, let\u2019s understand where we are going \u2013 not only as a company, but by franchise, by game, right? I think at minimum, if you were to ask any of our major teams right now, \u2018Hey, what\u2019s your plan for the next three-, four-plus years?\u2019, they have a very clear answer.<\/p>\n \u201cI think this is just very much the beginning \u2013 I know you often kind of hear that \u2013 but I think \u201926, in many ways, really represents a long road ahead of us in terms of things to be excited about.\u201d<\/p>\n You can hear much more from Johanna Faries about Blizzard Showcase, BlizzCon, and Blizzard\u2019s games on the Official Xbox Podcast right now<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" For the last few weeks, Blizzard has been going big. Blizzard Showcase brought together the four key titles \u2013 Overwatch, Diablo, World of Warcraft, and Hearthstone \u2013 and gave the space to bring their updates, announcements (and some surprises!) in their own ways. It\u2019s all a part of the road to BlizzCon 2026: the year<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4682,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[4380,1313,1876,920],"class_list":{"0":"post-4681","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-console-gaming","8":"tag-beginning","9":"tag-blizzard","10":"tag-massive","11":"tag-showcase"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4681","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4681"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4681\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4682"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4681"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4681"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4681"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}