Åbne verdener i spil kan være meget, meget forskellige. Der findes verdener som den i L.A. Noire, der udelukkende tjener et kontekstuelt formål, og så er der The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, hvor alt er dynamisk og sammenhængende.
Diablo IV lader til at være noget ind imellem. I et interview med IGN (via PC Gamer) fortæller instruktør Joe Shely, at den åbne verden i spillet primært tjener et narrativt formål:
"One of the concerns about putting 'open world' in a big neon sign and flashing that sign is that people have that notion of the Breath of the Wild kind of, 'Oh, it's completely organic and I can go anywhere and do anything and eventually I can figure it out for myself.' That's not really our story. Our story allows for non-linearity, but there is a story. We wanted to have a beginning, middle, and end. We wanted to start a certain place, we wanted to end at a certain place."
Du kan se den seneste gameplay trailer herunder, der blandt andet viser den verden.