Despite setting a new record as the fastest-selling Blizzard game, Diablo 4 is stuck in a storm of controversy. As soon as the game came out, fans queued up by the millions, collectively purchasing over 10 million units in June. Yet, the mighty title seems to have taken a fall from grace.
Diablo 4 is currently under siege from angry fans, as seen in the catastrophic dive of its Metacritic user score, plummeting to an abysmal 1.9.
The review bombing of games, a pattern noticed over the recent months, has created a substantial issue for Metacritic. This nefarious practice has now targeted Diablo 4, much to the dismay of its creators. The barrage of negative reviews came in a day (or even less) following the release of a patch that, unfortunately, nerfed all the available classes in the game. This decision left many fans fuming, particularly those who had a penchant for the weaker classes.
Hardcore fans are distressed that the endgame has become a mountainous challenge, almost impossible to conquer – not because of its difficulty but because of the lack of promise. There’s little to no reason to grind to get the endgame content outside of subjecting yourself to punishment. This noted lack of endgame community, which only got worse in the past week, has seen players threaten to uninstall the game.
Accusations are rife that Blizzard is skewing the game towards being more of a grind, a sentiment echoed by several of the recent reviews. This perception of Blizzard’s lack of touch with its community and the lack of care for their concerns has stirred up discontent amongst gamers.
The review bombing resulted in the user score for the PS5 version free-falling to 2.6, but the negativity doesn’t end there. To make matters worse, more than 2,500 of the 3,000 or so user reviews are now in the red because of the latest patch.
Perhaps the signs that Blizzard was going to fumble the ball were always there. From long queue times at launch to server disconnects causing the death of the first player to reach level 100 and the issues with microtransactions, Diablo 4 has had a litany of problems from the beginning. The only difference at the time is that the community was much more forgiving. After all, it’s a new installment in a storied franchise that showed promise and had potential. Over a month later and it’s becoming clear now that Blizzard might not have planned as well ahead as expected in its first venture into the live-service genre, at least as far as Diablo goes.
Amidst the storm of negative reviews and fan outcry, Blizzard is stepping up. The developers plan to hold a campfire chat on Friday to discuss the controversial update. Blizzard has even started reversing some of the recent changes to calm the outrage.
Then again, the numbers speak for themselves. And, while the Diablo 4 community seemingly looks like it’s up in arms from the onset, the difficulty getting inside the game due to a long line of players wanting to play suggests that Blizzard’s latest patch isn’t as troubled as some are making it out to be. Then again, just because Diablo 4 remains quite popular doesn’t mean that the latest update isn’t without its criticism, either.
While a complete reversal of the changes, as some are suggesting, isn’t likely, Blizzard’s upcoming open forum implies that it’s, at the very least, aware that Diablo 4 needs work.
Now that everyone’s finished playing the campaign and waiting for whatever the meaning of that post-credits scene was – not to mention, the Secret Cow Level hunters have exhausted all their leads – the lack of rewarding endgame content has become apparent. Blizzard needs to find a better approach that doesn’t involve making it more difficult to get there.
With the campfire chat looming, the Diablo 4 fandom is eager for some substantial updates. Players are hoping Blizzard’s response will address their concerns, and they can return to the game they paid for and once enjoyed. Until then, the review bombing effort continues, and the tension remains high.
One thing is clear: the launch of Season 1 has left the Diablo 4 community in a state of unrest and disappointment.
