Diablo 4 Season 4’s massive Loot Reborn update may have been just what the doctor ordered, as fans are praising it as the “best season start so far” for Blizzard’s ARPG.
It’s been a bumpy road up until this point. Despite fairly positive reviews upon release, player sentiment on Diablo 4 took a downturn by the time the game’s first season came out, with players criticizing how its gear progression worked and its lack of endgame content. While new seasons did introduce changes alongside various new systems and mechanics, they still left players underwhelmed. When Diablo 4 launched on Steam in October 2023, it quickly found itself with a “Mixed” average user review rating.
That doesn’t appear to be the case with Season 4, which dramatically reworked the game’s loot to make it more powerful, upgradable, and easier to acquire and customize than ever before. The result is praise on places like Reddit and “Mostly Positive” recent reviews on Steam, which was not the case for previous season launches.
“They did it, they fixed the game,” user Frockyyy wrote in their positive Steam review posted after the Season 4 update.
Many on Reddit seem to agree, with users praising the new season for its improvements to Helltides, which are now playable at lower World Tiers and much more lucrative, and how its various itemization updates have removed much of the inventory “hassle” that previously took up too much of Diablo 4 players’ time. One user said it’s the “best season start so far” and is “Diablo 4 as it should have originally been released.” Another stated the game in Season 4 is “hardly recognizable” compared to launch, and that they are “having a lot more fun.”
Part of the positive reception may be the fact that Season 4 was the first Diablo 4 season to be extensively playtested by the community on the game’s on a public test realm, something that is used in other Blizzard games like World of Warcraft and Diablo 3 but wasn’t used for Diablo 4 in previous seasons. That feedback then made its way into Season 4 from the start as opposed to weeks later like in previous seasons. Despite the positive effect the PTR seems to have had, Blizzard stated in a recent interview with GameSpot that it doesn’t have concrete plans to do PTR testing for every future season.
That being said, players do have a few complaints. The first is that some think the game is too easy at lower levels post-Season 4 update. Others are pointing out that new Tempering recipes, used to add affixes to gear, can be easily missed once they drop on the ground and should be more visible. Another complaint is that the Salvage button now salvages all items, including Legendaries and Uniques, which wasn’t the case before. That means more than a few players have likely been burned and lost some powerful items before learning about the change.
Despite the complaints, it does seem that Diablo 4’s latest season is a major step forward. As Reddit user Netsuko puts it, “S4 feels like it is exactly the direction this game needs to be taken,” and that it makes them “hopeful for the expansion.”
It’s not the first time an entry in the Diablo franchise has seen a dramatic overhaul. Diablo 3’s launch was a disaster, plagued by technical issues and complaints about its real-money auction house. It would take years for player sentiment to turn around following major updates and the release of Diablo 3’s first and only expansion, Reaper of Souls.
Diablo 4 recently released on Game Pass. It’s first expansion, Vessel of Hatred, is slated to release in late 2024.
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