Blizzard Fans Aren't Buying 'Bleak' Overwatch, Diablo, And WoW Leaks
An anonymous poster on 4Chan claims to have the inside scoop on a number of Blizzard projects, including major franchises such as "World of Warcraft" and "Overwatch," and fans aren't buying into what this person is selling. According to a post that's gained quite a bit of traction this week, Blizzard has been through much more of an upheaval in recent years than we knew. The first tidbit claims that Blizzard is hoping to walk back many of the gameplay and balance changes made with "Overwatch 2" by launching a soft reboot called "Overwatch Next." "Diablo 4" is also supposedly going through a similar retooling after losing much of its behind-the-scenes staff. The 4Chan user also claims the "World of Warcraft: Dragonflight" expansion began life as an unrelated mobile game, only to have the "Wow" license slapped onto it late in development. Furthermore, Blizzard is allegedly planning to debut a battle pass-style service for "WoW" in the near future. Perhaps bleakest of all, the post says that Microsoft plans to essentially dismantle Blizzard as we know it now, dividing the company's various IP among multiple developers once Microsoft's planned acquisition of Activision Blizzard goes through.
Another Blizzard 4chan leak (bleak if true)
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u/coAmbassad0r in
Asmongold
Despite multiple reposts on a number of forums, it seems this supposed multi-leak is doing very little to impress or convince fans of Blizzard's big franchises. Instead, the 4Chan leaks have mostly been met with snide comments, jokes, and good old fashioned skepticism. Most fans seem to think that these leaks were made up wholesale, for the express purpose of riling up the fanbase. As Reddit user DMPancake put it, "Bait used to be believable."
Blizzard gamers blast 4Chan leaks
In the most popular response to this particular leak, Reddit user deltronaverse dunks on the current state of "Overwatch 2," quipping, "This is certainly untrue. You can tell because it says they are working on Overwatch 2. They would never." This matches the tenor of most of the responses, which aren't giving this 4Chan leak the time of day. Some are arguing out that the very fact that these leaks were posted to 4Chan is proof enough that they're probably not legitimate. Others are taking issue with what appear to be contradictory statements throughout the post. Reddit user joschilol notes, "Overwatch is rebooted without a battlepass system and WoW is killed by the introduction of one?" A few fans have also called into question this 4Chan user's understanding of video game development, particularly due to their claims about "Dragonflight" development.
That's not to say that everyone is crying foul over this post, however. One Redditor, who claims to be a former Blizzard employee, says that there could be a grain of truth here: "This all sounds pretty realistic and plausible and lines up with what I knew about major projects when I left." Of course, without an official statement from Blizzard, it's impossible to entirely dismiss these claims. Still, most hardcore Blizzard fans don't seem to be too shaken by the alleged leaks.