Blizzard News Articles
Tuesday15th Jul 2025
Report Activision Blizzard's King Team Sees Axed Job Roles 'Replaced' By AI
200 jobs have been cut at the studio
We apologise in advance for bringing another AI story to you today, but a fresh report from MobileGamer suggests that Activision Blizzard's King team is a part of the Microsoft Gaming business seeing human job roles shift to AI. It had previously been reported by the likes of Bloomberg that
Monday30th Jun 2025
News Ex Blizzard Boss Thinks Microsoft Should Pick Its Xbox Strategy And 'Stick To It'
"Tough to see Xbox confused"
Over the last year, year and a half, Microsoft has certainly changed things up in terms of its Xbox strategy - mainly by focusing more on software and launching some of its biggest in-house games on other platforms. This took some time getting used to at the beginning, and even though things are much clearer now, some...
Tuesday11th Mar 2025
News Activision Blizzard Aims To 'Meaningfully Elevate' BlizzCon When It Returns In 2026
"Something is coming...ready yourself"
Xbox studio Blizzard has announced that its BlizzCon event is taking another year off this year after skipping 2024 - and the convention's 2026 edition will "meaningfully elevate this iconic celebration", according to the team. Addressing followers in a fresh announcement post, the World of Warcraft maker says...
Wednesday12th Feb 2025
News EA Missed Out On Buying Blizzard & Some Big Activision Franchises, Says Former CCO
"EA saw all those first and passed"
Activision Blizzard has some absolutely massive game series' under its belt these days such as Call of Duty and World of Warcraft, but they weren't always guaranteed to be ABK franchises. Speaking in a new interview on the Grit podcast, former Electronic Arts CCO Bing Gordon claimed that EA passed on some huge...
Tuesday7th Jan 2025
News Call Of Duty's Crazy Development Budgets Revealed In New Report
Xbox will be spending a pretty penny
As game development budgets continue to rise, it's perhaps no surprise that churning out a big AAA shooter every year is a pricey endeavour. For well over a decade, Activision's Call of Duty has been the biggest AAA shooter of them all - and a new report details some of the eyewatering budgets that have gone into...
Thursday2nd Jan 2025
News Two More Xbox Game Pass Additions Seemingly Leaked For January 2025
From a reliable insider
As we enter into the new year, we've got lots of Xbox Game Pass updates coming our way right now - and a new rumour from reliable insider eXtas1s suggests January's Game Pass lineup is about to get even better. According to the well-known leaker, Blizzard's first Diablo game is set to come to PC Game Pass this month,
Tuesday17th Dec 2024
News Xbox Is Reportedly Working On A 'Cross-Platform Interface' Called Project Rainway
Inspired by Blizzard's Battle.net
Following on from Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella's recent comments about the future of Xbox, outlet Windows Central has dug into the Xbox owner's plans - subsequently revealing a new cross-platform initiative apparently going on at the Redmond company. According to the site, in particular reporter Jez Corden,...
Saturday16th Nov 2024
News Xbox Could Have A Major 'Open-World Shooter' In The Pipeline, But It's Still Early Days
The team at Blizzard is now recruiting
Xbox's development teams already deliver some of the best first-person shooters on the market, and now, it seems the talent at Blizzard could be looking to adapt another blockbuster IP to this genre. Following recent rumours about a supposed StarCraft shooter being in development, Blizzard is now recruiting...
Friday15th Nov 2024
News Surprise! Xbox's Avowed Has Been Confirmed For Another Platform
Even Blizzard's digital service "is an Xbox"
Well, here's a bit of a surprise. Xbox has today revealed it's bringing Obsidian Entertainment's upcoming fantasy RPG Avowed to not only Xbox Series X|S, Windows, and Steam platforms, but also Blizzard's Battle.net launcher on PC. This was confirmed in an announcement today on Xbox Wire. While we've seen...
Wednesday13th Nov 2024
News Despite The ActiBlizz Deal, Xbox Remains 'In The Market' For New Dev Teams
"We definitely want to be in the market"
Well all know the trials and tribulations that Xbox went though to acquire Activision Blizzard last year, but the whole ordeal doesn't seem to have put Microsoft off from potentially bringing more teams on board. In a new interview with
Tuesday12th Nov 2024
News Blizzard Announces 'Overwatch: Classic' As A Limited-Time Event In Overwatch 2
And it starts TODAY!
A couple of years ago now, Blizzard released Overwatch 2 as a free-to-play successor to the ever-popular Overwatch. The sequel made come core changes to the experience, namely switching to a 5v5 setup - a change that will be reversed in an upcoming limited-time event in OW2. Yep, starting today, the team is bringing 'Overwatch:...
Wednesday6th Nov 2024
Rumour Blizzard Could Be Remastering Another RTS Classic
Warcraft 2 looks to be getting a makeover...
Following the release of StarCraft and StarCraft 2 on Game Pass yesterday, there's now some news about Blizzard potentially remastering one of its older real-time strategy games. As
Friday25th Oct 2024
News Microsoft Boasts About Owning '20 Franchises That Have Generated Over $1 Billion'
Including ActiBlizz and Bethesda games of course
Microsoft's Satya Nadella has certainly been in the headlines today and not always in the most positive light, but one section of the CEO's recent annual company update at least talks about some of Xbox's more positive achievements in recent tim
Wednesday16th Oct 2024
News Xbox Settles Lawsuit With 'Gamers' Who Tried To Sue Over Activision Blizzard Deal
It had been ongoing for nearly two years
Right, where to begin with this one?! If you cast your mind all the way back to December of 2022, you may remember a story here at Pure Xbox about a group of random "gamers" who were suing Microsoft over the company's attempt to acquire Activision Blizzard. Basically, the lawsuit claimed that the...
Friday4th Oct 2024
Roundup Diablo 4: Vessel Of Hatred Gets Great Reviews Ahead Of Xbox Launch
Base game on Xbox Game Pass
Diablo 4's huge Vessel of Hatred DLC expansion arrives next week, and the team's review embargo is now up, which means a selection of early impressions are becoming available online. We'll run through a bunch of these early reviews and round them up down below, but the general gist here is that folks are liking this...
Thursday26th Sep 2024
News StarCraft Remastered & StarCraft 2 Coming To PC Game Pass This November
Surprise!
Xbox has opened its Tokyo Game Show livestream with a bombshell today - StarCraft Remastered and StarCraft 2: Campaign Collection are coming to PC Game Pass later this year. Yep, announced by Phil Spencer himself as the broadcast kicked off, these two Blizzard classics are finally being made available on the Game Pass service...
Friday20th Sep 2024
News Blizzard's Diablo 4 Gets Extensive Free Trial On Xbox This Weekend (September 19-23)
Completely free up to level 20!
Despite an absolutely massive Free Play Days week that contains 10 games to try out in total, Xbox and ActiBlizz are unleashing yet another free trial this weekend - Diablo 4 is completely free-to-play across all platforms until Monday, September 23rd. Now, there is a level 20 cap on the team's free trial (meaning...
Friday6th Sep 2024
News Xbox's Tokyo Game Show 2024 Broadcast Airs Later This Month
Updates from Xbox, Activision, Blizzard & Bethesda
Microsoft has announced its Xbox Tokyo Game Show 2024 Broadcast will take place later this month on Thursday, September 26th. Content from Xbox Game Studios, Activision, Blizzard Entertainment and Bethesda will be shared. Xbox will also be showcasing an "exciting lineup of games from third-party...
Wednesday21st Aug 2024
News Blizzard's New Diablo 4 Expansion Trailer Welcomes Back Mercenaries
The requested feature returns
Diablo 4's new expansion 'Vessel of Hatred' will introduce mercenaries to help you out on your quest, and at Gamescom Opening Night Live, Blizzard shared a new trailer featuring these helpers. Here's a bit more about these recruits via Blizzard's official website: "Discover and recruit new Mercenaries to join you on...
Wednesday14th Aug 2024
News Blizzard's Overwatch 2 Is Integrating With Xbox Game Pass Next Month
Get a bunch of rewards at no extra cost!
Blizzard has unveiled Overwatch 2 Season 12 today, and it brings a brilliant bonus for Xbox Game Pass subscribers. Starting September 17, Game Pass members will be able to claim a bunch of extra content for Overwatch 2, including six "awesome" hero skins and more! To claim this content, players will have to...
Wednesday7th Aug 2024
News Diablo 4's 'Season Of The Infernal Hordes' Now Live On Xbox, Here's What's Included
It's available to Game Pass subscribers, too
Ahead of the launch of Vessel of Hatred in October, Blizzard has launched a new season for the Xbox, PC and Game Pass title Diablo 4. In case you missed it, it's officially titled 'Season of the Infernal Hordes', and comes with new features, new powers, a new questline and new micro-dungeons. Here's the...
Friday2nd Aug 2024
Report Xbox Has Formed A New Team To Build 'Games Based On Existing IP' At Blizzard
They'll apparently be "AA" experiences
A fresh report from Windows Central has landed today that sheds light on a brand-new team that's supposedly been formed at Blizzard Entertainment. According to Jez Corden's reporting, a new team has been built at the Diablo developer "to work on smaller 'AA' games based on existing IP". What that IP will turn...
Friday19th Jul 2024
News Diablo 4 Shares First Gameplay Footage Of New Expansion Class
The Spiritborn arrives this October
Ahead of the launch of the Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred expansion on Xbox this October, Blizzard has officially revealed the first gameplay footage of the new expansion class known as the Spiritborn. This class calls upon the unique strengths of "Jaguar, Gorilla, Eagle, and Centipede Spirit Guardians", as you can...
Monday24th Jun 2024
News Diablo 4 Season 5 Is Bringing A Wave-Based Horde Mode To Xbox Game Pass
"Slay the infernal hordes"
Diablo 4 has been out on Xbox Game Pass for a few months now, but as Blizzard's dungeon crawler is very much an ongoing game, you can expect it to change and evolve lots over time. One of those changes is a major new addition coming to the game in Season 5, with the team confirming that a wave-based horde mode will make...
Monday10th Jun 2024
News Xbox: 'You Are Going To See More Of Our Games On More Platforms'
"We just see that as a benefit to the franchises we're building"
In case you missed it, during a chat about DOOM: The Dark Ages with IGN, Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer snuck in a brief comment about more of Xbox's games going to "more platforms" in the future. Unsurprisingly, it's raised some eyebrows on social media and other corners of the...
News Diablo 4's Xbox Game Pass Release An 'Incredible' Boost Ahead Of Expansion
The 'Vessel of Hatred' expansion will arrive this October
We've already heard a little bit about Diablo 4's growth since its debut on Xbox Game Pass at the end of March, and today during an IGN Live segment, the game's production director Tiffany Wat spoke about how Microsoft's subscription service boosted player numbers. She described it as...
Friday7th Jun 2024
News Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 Listing Further Hints At Huge ActiBlizz Xbox Game Pass Drop
We are READY
Okay, so, at this point we're all pretty much expecting a massive Activision Blizzard Xbox Game Pass drop to happen in and around the Xbox Games Showcase this weekend, and another few hints at such an event have cropped up online today. First off, as part of Microsoft's new 'Next Week On Xbox' round
Tuesday14th May 2024
News Overwatch 2 Meets Porsche In Bizarre Xbox Custom Console Collaboration
"Is that an Xbox, a mech, or a Porsche?!"
We've seen some weird and wonderful custom consoles over the years, and while this latest design is quite modest in comparison to some, it's certainly not a collaboration we expected to see on a random Tuesday afternoon in May. But, here it is. Microsoft has detailed its latest Xbox Series X sweepstakes...
Sunday12th May 2024
News Ex-Blizzard President On Xbox's Future: 'Xbox Can Find A Path To Great Success'
"For their teams and players around the world"
It's been a wild week for Xbox following the announcement of four studio closures, and while the video game giant is currently facing a lot of criticism, many ex-Microsoft and Xbox employees still believe the brand can overcome this difficult period. Following
Friday10th May 2024
News Xbox Reiterates Every First Party Title Is Coming To Game Pass 'Day One'
A recent report suggested Call of Duty could be excluded
Following a recent report claiming Xbox was considering not including new Call of Duty releases on Game Pass, it seems Microsoft's gaming division remains committed to "day one" releases. Xbox president Sarah Bond has mentioned at the Bloomberg Technology Summit this week how "day one"...
