Most Diablo Immortal players are new to Diablo and Blizzard

More than half of our players are new to Blizzard, new to Diablo. So that means Diablo Immortal is literally the first Diablo game they have ever played. Whether that be PC or console or mobile, they should be able to play all three and it should be seamless. And so I feel like that is where the industry is going to go. The barriers between each of the platforms will fall. Hello and welcome to the game business show with me Christopher D. This is part of the game business live, our event that we held in Los Angeles this week. This session is with two leading names at Blizzard. Senior director of mobile marketing Shannon Williams and executive producer MV and VP Yao who discussed the challenges and successes of bringing a PC and console game like Diablo to the mobile space. Enjoy. Thank you. Well, welcome to the show. Hopefully those mics are working. Um, so a little bit of introductions. Um, tell us about

what you do at Blizzard. Shannon, do you want to go do go first? Yeah. Hi, my name is Shannon Williams and I lead um all the marketing for Diablo Immortal. And for the past three years, we've been delivering some pretty cool experiences for our players uh to a global audience, player first. And uh really excited to be here. Thank you. Shannon is being humble and mobile marketing. Don't forget. Uh hi, I'm Paywin. I'm the executive producer for Diablo Immortal from Blizzard. Uh I've been with Blizzard for three years. Uh starting when Immortal was not even live and now it's been three years. Thank you for having us here. Very excited to talk about the game. Oh no, thank you for coming. Well, let's go back to the start. Um what was the goal you set yourselves when you wanted to bring Diablo to to mobile? That's a very good question. Uh I think when we first started thinking about Diablo as a franchise, as a IP, uh Diablo is famous for um it's very rich

story, AAA quality visuals, uh dungeon grinding, the top-notch dungeon grinding, demon slaying experience. And what we are thinking and the vision of the Diablo Immortal is literally make it more accessible, bring it to more players into their hands. And the mobile is a very very obvious choice. You know, it's accessible, convenient, and our vision has been bring the AAA experience uncompromised but on a mobile device that player can enjoy anytime, anywhere. That is the vision. Adding to that, Pwin uh what Pwin said, every day we show up in a mortal equal to the mainline games. We immortal is not an expansion. It's a standout and standalone product that has an enormous amount of investment uh and a fantastic player base. So, we're really, you know, we we take it very seriously. It's not a brand expansion. Three years in now. Is that right? Yeah. How's it going? Fill us in on the story so far. I think it's

going great. I think better than ever. Uh sentiment's incredibly high. Engagement is incredibly high. We just released uh an IP collab that um set our a new watermark for engagement in a game. I mean looking back three years has been fantastic for the team, for the company and we have evolved so much. I think back to the vision question uh it's doing exactly what we have envisioned. More than half of our players are new to Blizzard, new to Diablo. So that means Diablo I model is literally the first Diablo game they have ever played which is fantastic. That's what we envisioned them to do. And the team has evolved from making a delivering aa game to a live service mode. We have been very stable, you know, shipping every two weeks with four major updates a year plus anniversary, you know, end of the year events. Uh just tons of content that we have shipped and very very proud of the team.

I'm curious, what are the biggest markets for Diablo Immortal? Where are your players? That's a great question. What we really proud of Diablo Immortal and very unique is that we're a global success game. Uh there's no single market dominate this game. Uh other than obviously our root place North America. Uh we see huge engagement, strong engagement from APAC region like Korea is our you know fan base. Uh also um Southeast Asia player love this kind of game. Uh we also saw a lot of uptake from EMA area. Yeah. I mean while you know the US and and China are are really core to the business uh we do find that you know worldwide we have really consistent engagement. uh you know we have players from around the world actually flying to us this week to join us at an on-site to experience uh you know what's up next uh you know we're really excited and um as

as payment said it's very much a global product and out of interest you mentioned this that it's bringing in new players into Diablo but are you are there much crossover maybe of PC and console players that are also playing this or is is it a completely different audience So what we found over the past three years looking at the data is that it is primarily a different audience. So we are bringing in um the majority of the players are as as Pay1 said new to Blizzard or new to the franchise. So we're really excited about this you know audience expansion and our ability to serve u you know you know players the first experience to um these wonderful worlds we create. Yeah, I think immortal is you know immortal is crossplay right we have players play on both PC and mobile you know different proportion what we have observed is that they play PC and the mobile version different ways uh when they want to enjoy dungeons big maps

beautiful graphics or like a long time with their friends they choose to play on PC when they you know want a convenience you know they want to play short session stuff they go on mobile sometimes both but you know that's like where we find the primary difference on the platform choices. H okay. The game quite famously didn't go down well with fans uh uh when it was first revealed or certainly from Western audiences, right? Because I think maybe you got a different reaction from other markets particularly in the east where mobile is perhaps their primary way of engaging even with what we call hardcore games. um how have you managed to navigate that sort of western skepticism with that sort of eastern enthusiasm I guess it might be the term so you know mobile is core in many different regions it's not necessarily just an east or west you know decision so you know while mobile does have that uh you know attraction you worldwide in the west as you said you know we have to

take a slightly different approach that approach is you know just leaning into advocacy leaning into our creators in our press building up those relationships and delivering an experience that is really undeniably Diablo and undeniably, you know, a quality experience. Yeah, I very much agree with Shannon. This is not a choice of western eastern. It's actually like we're super proud of this game is being globally successful. Uh you know, we see audience from both sides. That's because we have a very very talented global team here with our partner Net. uh when we look at you know western eastern or core Diablo audience versus new to Diablo world we're looking for their common grounds from like game game game design game perspective we're looking for common grounds what we find over the years is people love the lore you know they come back because we have new story update we have new content update uh they love uh the dungeon grinding experience so make sure their

gears their jobs are you know really really cool and fun to play the monsters are really really cool. Uh and we differentiate uh I think the biggest thing we differentiate from you know the typical Diablo game is social elements. You know immortal is our player feels immortal is a community build. You know they come back every day because there are clients there. They have appointment that they need to meet you know and they play either competitively or collaboratively and we deliver so many features to you know meet their needs. So that's what we're primar looking for is you know looking for common ground that everyone loves no matter eastern western PC or mobile and looking for differentiator that people can feel very very united in this game and have fun together. Premium console and PC players have a sort of different expectation perhaps is the way of saying it or certainly tolerance of monetization um than you compared to what the traditional mobile gamer um sort of has. Um, how have you found managing that when adapting Diablo to immortal or

Diablo to mobile? Sorry. Although the because the audience so different, does it does it even matter? Well, I think it still matters because we still have a core Blizzard audience that is very passionate about these worlds we create, passionate about the franchise and and very vocal and u which is a fantastic thing. I I love it. Um, but I think one of the things that really draws me to mobile is the fact that you have to earn a player's trust every single day. If they're not in our game, we want them on our channels interacting with each other and then we go back, we want to bring them back to the game. But the idea here is that um we have to deliver a quality experience. We that leads with engagement and then um you the monetization comes second. We know that if we deliver that incredible experience that um we've got a hit. I think when we set this game on mobile uh to be free and that comes with

that determines our prioritization determines our focus. There are a couple things that we are focusing on. One is what Shannon mentioned is you have to keep the game very very active alive. That's why we end up to be doing two weeks updates. Uh, every quarter we have major updates. We have tons of new content all the time for players. That way they can constantly come back. You know, every day they come back. There's new events going on. There's new content. Uh, there's things that, you know, our franchise have never done. We did the first. You know, Blood Night was the first new class we released. Those are all things that we take the highest priority and we work very very hard on every single day. Yeah. And one thing to add um we like publicly declaring our commitment to our players through things like a roadmap asset. We commit um yearly to uh you know 12 months of content. Uh and that allows us to really

show up for our players and give them you know a sense that we're meeting them where they are. we're we're meeting their needs and um I'll have to say the first time Shannon came to me and asked me to release road map it really freaked me out. I think for mobile generally we like to take a very kind of like agile approach you know we look at what's going on we look at what player likes they don't like and we decide what to make it in the future uh but you know I really like the idea and turns out the road map release become the biggest topic point for the year and that is also a commitment for us to kind of think really core on how much content we're delivering to player and the key is that all those content are free that's how We are able to tell player, hey, these are the things we planned for the year. We have delivered hundreds maybe thousands hours of content. They are all free. All the game player free, all the content, boss, class, everything. I think that's the key that we want people to remember and the

experience we want people to enjoy in the immortal. How do you how do you judge what it is the fans really want when you're doing these sort of updates and additions? Uh what drives the decision- making around that? Well, I mean, our dev team is on social media all the time. You know, we listen to our player anywhere, you know, any way we can. And that's also what I love what Shannon brings to the table. You know, her team is very, very close with the player. Maybe you can talk about what you guys do in be behind the scenes. Well, behind the scenes, absolutely. So, we have smaller, you know, intimate focus groups. We'll bring creators into, you know, an on-site campus like we're doing, you know, in the next couple of days. Um, we have broadscale surveys. We we take a look at all of the community forums and we let you know what the players are, you know, excited about really drive some of the content in the external promotions, but we also when a player is, you know, a little bit grumpy about something that we've put out, we we put that on a list and we we focus on fixing it. You know what I love the most

is um I remember there was a player on Reddit and he posted um after a major expansion he posted a list of quality of life updates for the year. He says, "Hey, here is the quality of life improvements that Diablo model released for the year. Thank you. You guys are amazing. Love the game. Everything around that we just I look at the list. Some of them I even forgot like we released those things like they remember. all the players remember and that's what we love that's what we want to stay close with the players you know we want to do everything we can to make them happy and I want to hear their feedback and Shannon's team is supporting that now Shannon how do you approach market and maybe you don't know but how do you approach marketing a mobile game that has a more potentially a more hardcore audience versus what other mobile publishers might have to do when it comes to their slightly more perhaps casual games great question um absolutely different uh what we look for in marketing a core mobile game is we're

looking for a player that wants depth. They want community. They want leadership. They want opportunities to connect with um the developers. They want to feel seen. They want to feel heard. That requires an integrated marketing plan. That requires a deep commitment to our players and our press um and a community first mindset effectively. So, we know when we're marketing to our our our players, our players are our greatest source of strength. They make us better marketers. They make us better game makers. Have you seen any shifts in terms of what audience behaviors in terms of what audience is doing with Diablo on mobile? You seen any sort of shifts in terms of how the players are behaving with that game? Uh I think when it comes to Diablo Immortal uh it we because this game is mobile and we set to be mobile and we try to bring the Diablo experience to mobile and that kind of set the tone of there are primarily two segments of players. One is the Diablo core players and one is new to mobile. uh they play I

think one they come to the game for a very very common reason which is the lore which is the Diablo wars the triple equality they do play slightly different I think I touched base a little bit earlier is that PC or you know the core audience they love sitting down they have a very immersive environment they can play the game with their players and the mobile players they tend to anecdotally I have a lot of friends are not in the industry they don't play a lot of game but they will come to me they say hey I don't have a lot of time to play game anymore but Diablo Immortal is the game I pick up I can play and I feel like I'm still back to my young days that I can play games which is really cool those stories just really touching to me because I feel like Immortal on mobile really give them a different style of play they don't need to locked on the seat in front of PC but they can play anywhere that they can uh we have a lot of short session gameplay like rifts or some PvP stuff uh you know

uh like a brow style games that we play uh game modes we play that you can easily pick up on the phone. I also want to call out what you mentioned um a couple of questions ago about social. So, as the game evolves, social clan play um community becomes even more important and we see more players kind of gravitating to those. Um so that we're you know taking a look at those systems and making sure they're as um you know you know as as awesome an experience as everything else, but we do see that you know that natural progression to um that social play. I'm going to ask some board questions now. Where do you see mobile gaming heading? particularly when we're talking about these traditionally console and PC IP and brands. I think for me um at some point um the platform becomes um fades into the background. I think is I

think for our core audience especially they're looking for flexible experience something that's uncompromising in quality something that's consistent. Uh you know whether that be PC or console or mobile uh they should be able to play all three and it should be seamless. And so I feel like that is where the industry is going to go. It what the the barriers between each of the platforms will um will fall. Yeah, I think our audience certainly benefit from being crossplatform. I I don't know if I can answer this million-dollar question about the trend, but uh just working on Diablo Mortal, I think I've been working free-to-play games for like 14 years. I have thought about if without Diablo as IP would our launch would our game will be as successful. I don't know. I feel like the IP plays a huge part of it. Um right now we have over tens of millions

of players played or have been playing our game. Uh I think IP plays a huge part of it. when we first launched the uptick of the traffic, uptake of the download, we were I still have this picture in my room is um we have uh on the billboard in New York Times number one downloaded app in the world. Uh I don't know if we can achieve that without Diablo IP. So I think IP especially in such competitive markets based for mobile IP could be your really winning strategy there. The core is to balance between your core IP players and the new players who come to your game because of the IP. Uh that's what Immortal team has the immortal team has been constantly balancing, constantly working on. You talk about crossplatform there. Um is it influencing what you're doing as a company in terms of your approach? So I think that when we take a look at our games, we want to make sure that we meet players where they are no matter what

platform they're playing on. Um it's really important to us to deliver the the high quality experience that Blizzard's been known for um across anywhere really anywhere we choose to publish. Yeah, I think it's always come from the game first. Uh I think platform is uh a consideration, crossplatform is a consideration. Uh Blizzard has so many IPs and we constantly think about you know what really attracts players in terms of its IP like using Diablo as exper as example right like the reason we think you know Diablo I model is so successful because it inherited all the core lore of the Diablo uh franchise Diablo uh universe and had delivered the AAA experience. When I came on board, I remember my team gave me a build, a test build, and I look at it. So Diablo II is it was my first Diablo experience. So when I look at the game on my phone, my

memory of playing Diablo II back 10, 20 years ago, I'm like, "Oh my god, this is a Diablo II experience on my phone. What's going on? What are you guys making?" So I think this like really speaks to me a lot is that you know you just have to make sure you still deliver the IP what player loves and you know adapt to the platform accordingly you know live service content for free those are the major requirement for mobile and that's what we are doing basically. Okay I'll ask one final question and it's it's one that I'm sure you'll be excited to answer. What's next for Diablo Immortal? Great question. If you have been following our road map for the year, well, first of all, I know. Well, first of all, we just uh kicked off our our anniversary, Diablo anniversary. Uh so, every June is our anniversary for the year as Diablo. Uh there's a tons of events in the game right now happening. Uh and in couple weeks, uh we're going

to have our most anticipated class release. Uh I'm not going to tell you what because Shannon is going to kill me. But uh yeah, I think class we have been doing class three years in a row and uh this has been class content has been the most popular one and by the end of the year uh we're going to review our major villain for the year. Last year it was Diablo. Uh Diablo Invasion, you know, player had a blast playing Diablo as a as a major villain. And this year we have another one coming out. And I can't tell you what who that is, but if if you play every season uh the zone, the dungeon, the story, and of the class we're going to release is going to spell a little bit about what that is. Absolutely. It's uh I'm going to double click on the road map uh asset again. Um what we've laid that all out, so go out take a look at it. But um what has been interesting, you you touched on the Diablo um you know, boss battle and that

end to a three-year story arc. So this year we're kicking off yet uh kind of our our the start of our yearly story story story arc. So this year is going to have a complete new story arc that is um starting um in January or has started in January and um we'll finalize in um December and then we get to do it all over again next year. Sounds exhausting. Um, we're out of time. Thank you, P. Thank you, uh, Shannon. It's been a pleasure to have you on the show. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. That's it for today's episode of the Game Business Show. Stay tuned for more live versions of our interviews in the days to come. Until then, thank you for tuning in.