Blizzcon Recap

Wes Carpenter, Entertainment Editor

Blizzcon 2019 has just wrapped up and with it came some amazing announcements about future Blizzard games and a response to the recent controversy about the Hong Kong protest that lead to protests of blizzard. Blizzcon is Blizzard’s annual convention held in the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California every year around the beginning of November. Blizzcon is where fans of the games can go and meet the people possible for creating the games and it also gives blizzard a stage to announce their upcoming games and tease future games to their audience.

In gaming news Blizzard announced that Diablo IV is now in production for PC, PS4, and Xbox One. Many believe that blizzard will be releasing Diablo IV around the launch of the next generation of consoles. Along with the announcement of Diablo IV came the announcement of Overwatch 2. Overwatch 2 is still in the early stages of development which likely rules out and early 2020 release but however Blizzard has announced that the game will feature a story mode and hero missions along with the original 6 vs 6 pvp modes unlike the first Overwatch; also skins that you have bought or earned in Overwatch will transfer over to Overwatch 2.

Blizzard then took some time to comment on the recent controversy revolving around the protests in Hong Kong and about the protesters outside the convention center. Blizzards President J. Allen Brack started off the night by apologizing about what had happened and then went on and said “ Blizzard had the opportunity to bring the world together in a tough Hearthstone esports moment about a month ago. We did not. We moved too quickly in our decision-making and then to make matters worse, we were too slow to talk to all of you.” If you do not know what happened a professional hearthstone player was banned for supporting the Hong Kong protests and was given a year-long ban, many fans were outraged at this and began to protest Blizzard. Blizzard has since shortened the ban to only 6 months but some see this as still to long of a ban for standing up for something you believe in.

All in all it was a good conference, Blizzard addressed the protests and the controversy to clear up some of the untrue rumors and lies and also announced two very popular games, many people are still upset about the banning of the pro league player and hope to that Blizzard will remove the ban. Blizzard certainly did the right thing by addressing the controversy and taking responsibility for their actions. On a lighter note what are you most excited for, Overwatch 2 or Diablo IV.