6. Itemization
Johanna Faires: So for many of us players, that hunt for the perfect item is the true heart of the experience. What can you share with us today about gear, inventory, and itemization? I know a lot of people here are very curious about that.
Joe Shely: Some of you have probably been waiting to get to some of the crunchier bits. And it was important, even though we’re just announcing the game today, that we talk a little bit about itemization. So we’ve got an inventory screen here. This is concept art. This is not final. But it really shows the pillars of itemization for Diablo. Depth, clarity, and identity.
Diablo V will filter feature item tiers. Items will start simple and then grow and go on a journey with you. Sort of like they did in Diablo II. Also, you may have noticed that there are multi-slot items in the inventory screen behind you. This is part of our approach with Diablo V to really nail the items’ identity. When you think about how an item is represented in the game, you see it on the ground, and then you see it in your inventory. Once you put it on, maybe you have a totally different look for it.
John Mueller: The art team’s loving the larger icons and also kind of like the familiarity of that.
Joe Shely: And we have some really great solutions for any controller players who might be worried about manipulating those items in their inventory. Finally, we are bringing back gear-based sets. We love what the talisman did in Lord of Hatred. But we want to attach that set concept to gear again. Because it kind of gives you this quest. You pick it up from the ground. You see you’ve got this piece of something, and if you can just collect the other things, you can complete that idea.
And we have some incredible ideas for how to make sure that the set items broaden the number of builds that are available rather than shrinking them. Finally, we are experimenting a bit with stat requirements on items. So not sure if that’s final. But I like to think of itemization as kind of a city. Think about New York City. It’s this enormous metropolis, but you can immediately go to Times Square and find something cool. And that’s kind of how I think about our set items. But then, once you really sort of dig in and start to master it, you learn where the best deli is, where the best pizza is, and you really get into that crunchy opportunity to define your own builds. And that’s what we want to do with Diablo V.
Johanna Faires: So after 30 years, Diablo has both longtime and new players. How’s the team thinking about developing for this next era for such a broad community?
Matt Zitterman: I think for us, it’s super important that Diablo V feels unmistakably Diablo, in particular for our longtime players.
And again, that kinda starts with what I talked about at the beginning. Understanding who Diablo players are at their core: what do they want, what do they need out of a Diablo game? Whether they just started playing Diablo in Diablo IV or they have been playing since Diablo I and Diablo II. And getting feedback from those players is critical to our ability to really understand that. I mean, we’re all players; we all have our own thoughts and feelings about it. But when you’re building a game, you need other people to look at your work and give you that critical feedback.
And so, we want to get that feedback now, as early as possible. That’s why we’re announcing today. That’s why we’re excited to bring the community into the process of making the game along the way towards our launch date. For me, as a fan growing up with games, it was always so amazing for me to have those kinds of authentic interactions with developers. I’m really excited about blue posts or a ViDoc or a blog post.
It was a way for me to kind of see and feel the passion of the Dev team firsthand, and I’m excited for us to be able to do that on our journey to shipping Diablo V. Really, this today, the information we’re sharing, this is just the start and you can expect that we’re going to be giving regular updates about how development is going and what we’re excited about to get that feedback from all of you starting in 2027.
Johanna Faires: Awesome. So before we wrap, I just want to bring this back to what makes Diablo so special. It means so many different things to so many different players. It’s the loot chase. It’s the theorycrafting. It’s the darkness. It’s the story and the characters. For Diablo V, it’s our chance, certainly, to honor all of that, but also to begin a new conversation as each of you has shared today. I’d love to just close by hearing a personal thought from each of you.
Matt Zitterman: I mentioned I joined the dev team a couple of years ago. I’ve been a lifelong fan of Diablo since Diablo I. It’s really truly been an honor to join such a deeply knowledgeable and passionate team. And that was something that became really clear to me very early on, is just how knowledgeable and passionate this team is about ARPGs and about Diablo. I mean, there are people working on Diablo V who have been working on Diablo games for decades for more than a decade, decades. There’s a really deep well of knowledge here and passion that goes with it, and those things create a sense of energy on the dev team. You can feel it when you join a team like that. I have had the honor to work on with some really talented developers and some really talented development teams in my career, and when I joined this team, I felt that energy with those teams, I can feel it here. This team is really ready to mkae something truly fantastic, and I’m really honored to be a part of it.
Jennifer Brandes Hepler: As someone new in a project with this much history and as big a fanbase and so many people who love it, who it’s so important to, it’s frankly kinda intimidating, but this team has been just such an amazing group of people to be part of. Everybody is so talented and has so much passion for Diablo, for Sanctuary, for the Eternal Conflict. Every single day, one the campaign team, somebody has a great new idea, and we’re all like: “Yes, absolutely. We got to change everything. We’ve got to fit that in.” And I’m sure after we start seeing all the reactions to what we’ve shared here today, we’re going to come back with a ton of new inspiration.
Tiffany Wat: First and foremost, I do have to slip in a happy birthday to my daughter, because it is her birthday tomorrow. And I hope that she is watching me at home right now, but maybe not watching all of our content because she’s turning four. But what I’m excited about is Diablo is finally back. It’s been over a decade since we’ve been able to tell a story where he is at the center of it. He is the reason, I think, that we all were compelled to start picking up the keyboard or controller and play Diablo to begin with.
And it’s so exciting as a member of the community myself, a developer, a player, to be able to be a part of the journey of Diablo. It’s been 30 years. I can’t believe I’ve been playing for almost that entire time and being able to come in and collaborate with my friends, my teammates, every single day and share what we love about Diablo together. It has just been such a great opportunity, and I feel very blessed.
John Mueller: I think for the art team it is liek the world is just such a playground for us. We had so much fun making Diablo IV and this really feels like we just have such a clear mandate. I think working with the narrative team but also bringing breathing life into these characters of the caravan. I think it is really going to be a very special thing about this game, and I can’t wait to show more next year.
Joe Shely: We talked about how Diablo V will let you define your identity, discover builds, chase memorable loot, but more than that, our job is to build the game that players want, that you want. Not what we think you should want. We want to build the best Diablo game, and that means listening to you. Listening to your feedback and allowing it to shape the game.
Johanna Faires: Hear, hear. Well, thank you so much. And BlizzCon, of course, is just the start of this conversation. Cannot wait. And we’ll keep listening and we’ll keep sharing. But thank you for everyone for attending this, and listening in, and alongside our community, we’ll make a wonderful Diablo V together. So thanks, everybody. We’ll see you again soon.
[Editor]: Thanks for reading this transcript. I have posted panel transcripts of 8 BlizzCon events since 2013 for free. Transcripts are useful to fans. Especially for fans who don’t understand English and can use tools to translate the panels (I understand your need. I’m latino), or for people with disabilities (I have a few disabilities myself). If you are appreciative of my work and time investment and wish to support me: whether for a donut, a meal, or to help with the monthly hosting costs to keep this space online as a resource for the community, you can do so via PayPal here. Thank you from the bottom of my heart!
| BLIZZCON 2026 DIABLO V: FORGING A NEW ERA PANEL TRANSCRIPT | ||||
| 1. Intro | 2. Story | 3. Art | 4. The World | 5. Classes |
| 6. Itemization | 7. Characters | 8. Environment | ||
