As the gaming industry progresses and new consoles are released, the question of when to move on from supporting last gen consoles becomes increasingly relevant. Rod Fergusson, the boss of the Diablo series, recognizes that the time will come to transition away from the PS4 and Xbox One, but asserts that that time is not now. He believes that there is still life left in the older hardware, especially when it comes to the development of Diablo 4.
Fergusson acknowledges that there is always a time and a place to discontinue support for a platform, but for now, they are not at that point. Diablo 4 has a long road ahead, and decisions regarding features must take into account the capabilities of older consoles. While the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S are currently in the middle of their life cycles, many games, particularly those in the live-service space, continue to support last-gen hardware. In the case of Diablo 4, technical features like ray tracing may be exclusive to current-gen consoles, but content-wise there is parity across all platforms, posing a creative challenge for the development team.
Diablo art director John Mueller emphasizes the team’s ability to find fallbacks in order to ensure that their vision for the game can be realized on all platforms. While there may be limitations imposed by older hardware, the team sees it as an opportunity to innovate and find creative solutions. Mueller explains, “We’ll figure out a way to do a fallback, like if there’s something really awesome we want to do. I don’t think we’ve been gated by it. We’ve generally leaned into it, and it’s been a creative challenge to figure out, okay, how do we accomplish that on gen eight? So the two things will look slightly different depending on the platform.”
While Fergusson and Mueller’s statements remain somewhat vague, it hints at the possibility that Diablo 4 may eventually outgrow the capabilities of the PS4 and Xbox One, leading to a drop in support for last-gen consoles. Several other games have followed a similar trajectory, such as Square Enix ending Final Fantasy 14’s PS3 support in 2017 and the discontinuation of PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of GTA Online in 2021. The decision to move on from older consoles is always part of the development conversation, with the team constantly evaluating whether new features are feasible based on the current platform support.
While the time may come for Diablo 4 to transition away from last-gen consoles, it is not a decision that can be made lightly. The team at Blizzard must carefully consider the technical limitations and creative challenges that come with supporting multiple platforms. As the game continues to evolve, it will be interesting to see how the developers navigate this delicate balance between innovation and accessibility.
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