‘Diablo 4’ developer says game is “not intended to be played forever”

Blizzard Entertainment has confirmed that Diablo 4 is “not intended to be played forever,” and the upcoming action role-playing game (ARPG) will feature an “extraordinarily challenging” boss fight for players who have perfected their characters.

As part of a group interview covered by Gamesradar, Diablo 4‘s associate game director Joe Piepiora confirmed there is a limit to how much the game will scale its difficulty to players’ levels and gear.

Although Diablo 4‘s Nightmare Dungeons – which tweak the game’s existing dungeons with new modifiers – will scale beyond level 100, Piepiora said Diablo 4 is still “not intended to be played forever”.

“There are creatures that you will continue to fight at higher and higher difficulties [beyond level 100], but this is content where you’ll be kind of pushing yourself to see how far you can take your build, rather than trying to reach some endless grind of rewards as time goes on beyond level 100,” explained Piepiora.

When players hit level 100 and optimise the “maximum power” of their gear, they will be offered a chance to take on the Nightmare Dungeons’ final boss.

“At level 100, we do have a pinnacle boss encounter we want players to engage with that’s been balanced so that it’s extraordinarily, extraordinarily challenging,” he shared, adding that even level 100 players will have an “extremely difficult time” defeating the boss.

“The expectation is that you take your class, you understand your build, you’ve maximized everything that you possibly can about it, and you really have learned encountered very well. And that’s going to be the way that you can maybe take it down.”

Piepiora described the boss as being an “aspirational piece” for players to work toward defeating. However, beating the unnamed enemy will offer cosmetics and “other” rewards besides improved gear, as by that point players are expected to already have the best available equipment.

Back in March, Diablo franchise head Rod Fergusson told NME why Nightmare locations will revisit the game’s existing dungeons rather than offer new areas to explore.

While Diablo 4 doesn’t launch until June 6, Blizzard has confirmed that a final beta for the game will take place in May.