DIABLO 4 released earlier this month to rave reviews, but players have started noticing big problems with the game.
Diablo 4 is a dungeon crawler game made by Blizzard Entertainment for PC, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PS5, and PS4.
It can takes hundreds of hours to level a hardcore Diablo character up to level 100
It’s the fourth game in a long-running series that has been a staple of PC gaming for over 25 years, as players were drawn to its dark atmosphere and addictive gameplay loop.
While the initial reception to the game was good, the cracks in the armour have started to show, as more and more players begin to notice big issues that have yet to be addressed.
Players first started noticing issues with the game around launch, Diablo 4’s microtransaction pricing was revealed, including horses that cost up to £10 each.
Another issue popped up when Blizzard revealed a Diablo 4 competition that was won before the game was even released, as players who paid for the more expensive version of the game got early access.
The competition had players competing to reach the maximum player level in the game – level 100 – while playing on hardcore, a mode that deletes your character when you die.
Hardcore mode has been the topic of much discussion since launch, since players discovered that server disconnects cause hardcore characters to die.
This happens regardless of whether the disconnect is the fault of the player or the server itself, which occasionally goes down for maintenance.
It can also happen in situations where it’s out of the player’s control, such as when internet service providers have issues or when there’s a power outage.
Diablo 4 requires a constant internet connection to play, and if the servers go down for even a second while players are using a hardcore character, their character could be killed.
Blizzard thankfully has a plan to fix this issue, but some players aren’t happy about how it will work, and how long it’s going to take for the fix to roll out.
Blizzard plans to have hardcore players automatically use a Scroll of Escape when they get disconnected from the server, so their character is safely transported to a town instead of dying.
Scrolls of Escape are a very rare item though, and some players are worried that their rare and limited scrolls will be used up when the problem is on Blizzard’s end.
According to a developer chat stream, the fix could take months to get here too, as it’s currently planned to roll out sometime during the game’s second season.
Diablo 4’s first season has yet to start, but is expected to begin in mid-July and last for three months.
With that timeline in place, it could be October before hardcore players can safely traverse the wilds without fear of having their character deleted due to a random disconnect.
Written by Oliver Brandt on behalf of GLHF.
