Experiencing BlizzCon 2026 and the returns of Starcraft, Diablo, and Warcraft

Blizzard has made up for the recent absence of BlizzCon by announcing a ton of new games, as they try to prove it’s business as usual as a Microsoft subsidiary.

Last weekend thousands of Alliance, Horde, Overwatch, Diablo and Starcraft fans poured into the Anaheim Convention Center, and it became immediately apparent that Blizzard’s famously devoted fanbase has lost none of its passion, despite the fact that, for various reasons, the convention hasn’t been held since 2023.

The return of BlizzCon felt like a particularly potent cocktail of nostalgia and new beginnings from the very start of the opening ceremony. Blizzard is celebrating 35 years of making games, Overwatch is hitting its tenth anniversary, and some of its oldest franchises are suddenly looking remarkably lively again.

After years of wondering what Blizzard’s future would look like, following its acquisition by Microsoft, there is finally a sense that the company is interested in finding new ways to use the worlds it has spent decades building. Although, naturally, it can’t resist a whole lot of nostalgia along the way, with one of the biggest reveals being World Of Warcraft: Forever, a vanilla era World Of Warcraft that instantly had fans excited.

World Of Warcraft: Forever is returning players to the Vanilla era but with an enormous twist. Rather than simply recreating the original game, Blizzard is expanding that version of Azeroth with three new zones, more than 1,000 quests, nine dungeons, and two raids, alongside a new playable Skyborne race.

It is essentially the World Of Warcraft that fans remember, except someone has finally given the developers permission to mess with the timeline. Perhaps the most remarkable thing is that it isn’t some distant promise. The beta begins September 17, with the full game arriving November 4.

I spoke to Nora Mills, lead software engineer, and Tim Jones, lead classic designer about the newly announced version of the game.

‘I feel like World Of Warcraft has such a huge legacy and so much history, but this is a perfect time for someone new to come in and join the journey. You’re starting from scratch, from level one, and creating your own character. You have a choice of different races and classes, and you can really dive into the fantasy of the world,’ said Mills.

‘But while you’re exploring, there are also all these other people exploring the world alongside you. They might talk to you, help you, or you might become friends. I think that’s one of the things that makes World Of Warcraft so magical. We’re in a place in the world where making friends can sometimes be challenging, and I’ve heard so many stories this weekend about people who met through the game. I have friends from Peru, Chile, the UK, and all over the world that I never would have met without World Of Warcraft.

‘Those friendships can last for years. What makes this moment particularly exciting is that we’re starting this new offering from zero. It’s day one, and you get to be part of that excitement. There’s a whole new community waiting for you. So if you like adventure and want to be part of a community, I’d definitely give it a go.’

‘I would add that World Of Warcraft was the game that, a little over 20 years ago, changed the world. It was the MMO that broke through and became a global sensation. What’s amazing is seeing how it has evolved over time. What we’re offering now is essentially a fresh start – an experience that harkens back to that original adventure, but refreshes it and builds something new as though we were back 20 years ago. It’s for players who want to live in this space forever,’ says Jones.

‘And, like a lot of Blizzard games, it’s very simple to pick up and play. You don’t have to have played a video game before. You learn as you go, and you can meet other people in the game if you want to. It’s simple to pick up, but deep to master. It’s incredibly fulfilling. This is also the first time you’re going to be able to play World Of Warcraft with a controller. That’s particularly exciting with handheld gaming becoming such an important and growing market. If you have a handheld, you can experience the game there too.’

This same strange combination of history, reinvention and déjà vu could be seen elsewhere across the convention. Warcraft 3: Reforged is getting a major new update, including a graphics overhaul and World Editor improvements. But the real shock was The Forsaken Kingdom, a brand new story campaign set around the fall of Lordaeron and the creation of the Undercity. More than two decades after Warcraft 3 originally launched, Blizzard is making new story content for it. That is not something you could have safely predicted a few years ago.

But it was Starcraft that got perhaps the biggest reaction from the crowd, even if they didn’t expect it to return as an open world shooter. Set in the Koprulu Sector, the new game is due in spring 2030, so it’s going to be a long wait.

Diablo is celebrating its 30th anniversary next year and Blizzard decided the appropriate way to mark three decades of killing demons was to announce that the next numbered sequel. Coming in spring 2029, Diablo 5 begins from perhaps the bleakest possible premise: Diablo has won, Sanctuary has fallen and the heroes have failed.

It is an unusually bold place to start a Diablo game and gives Blizzard the opportunity to explore what happens after the apocalypse, rather than spending another campaign desperately trying to prevent it. Until then, Diablo 4 controversially isn’t getting any new expansions but will be getting its own anniversary celebrations with Season of Hell’s Legacy, bringing back Diablo, Mephisto, and Baal – alongside a host of rewards inspired by the history of the franchise.

And if you somehow still haven’t had enough demons, an animated Diablo series is also in development for Netflix. Blizzard is clearly keen to ensure that its universes are no longer confined to the games themselves, no doubt inspired by the likes of Cyberpunk: Edgerunners and Arcane: League Of Legends.

That expansion of the Blizzard multiverse was particularly apparent with Overwatch, which is celebrating 10 years with a mixture of new heroes, reworks, and some extremely unexpected experimentation. The newest hero, Doctrine, is a vampire-inspired support character who arrives armed with life-draining abilities, a sceptre, and bat-like drones.

Hearthstone, the beloved Blizzard digital card game, is going backwards in time for its next expansion. Reign of the Black Empire takes players into ancient Azeroth, back to an era when the Old Gods ruled the roost and sanity was apparently considered an optional character trait. The expansion introduces the Assemble keyword, allowing cards to merge together into something more powerful, while Battlegrounds is getting a new minion type and Hearthstone is finally adding the Monk as a new playable class in March 2027. Pandas are so back!

And then, almost unbelievably, there was Heroes Of The Storm. A dead game you say? Never to me… the long-neglected Blizzard MOBA isn’t being left entirely in the Nexus. Xal’atath is becoming its newest hero, arriving September 28. For fans who have stuck with Heroes through the years when new content became increasingly rare, the announcement felt less like another character reveal and more like Blizzard finally acknowledging the game’s community.

Speaking of community, the cosplayers remain one of the great spectacles of BlizzCon, with Azeroth, Sanctuary, and the wider Blizzard universe seemingly spilling into every corridor. Illidans, Jaina Proudmoores, Arthases, Murlocs, and enough enormous foam weapons to cause serious concern at airport security competed for attention.

BlizzCon has always been as much about the people playing these games as the games themselves and after the long gap between conventions, the sheer enthusiasm was impossible to miss. Then Blizzard best and brightest developers, such as Holly Longdale and Ion Hazzikostas, took to the stage and promptly demonstrated that three years is enough time to accumulate an absolutely ridiculous number of announcements.

Blizzard is taking some risks for sure, Starcraft as an open world shooter is a huge gamble when all most fans wanted is a new real-time strategy game. Diablo 5 is still a while off, with no new expansions to tide fans over, while Warcraft players are being asked to simultaneously care about the distant future, the distant past, and more elves.

But standing inside the Anaheim Convention Center, surrounded by thousands of people who have spent decades following these worlds, I find their enthusiasm is difficult to argue with. BlizzCon is back and after being away for so long, Blizzard has clearly decided that it has a lot of catching up to do.

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