Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred finally goes live after some launch delays but Steam users review bomb to 'Mostly Negative' due to the issues

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Diablo 4 Vessel of Hatred had some teething problems at launch leading to a 5 hour delay in which time Steam reviewed the game at Mostly Negative

Diablo 4 Spiritborn
(Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment)

What you need to know

  • Diablo 4 Vessel of Hatred and Season 6 are slightly delayed from the planned launch time
  • They were supposed to go live in just over an hour at 4 p.m PDT / 7 p.m EDT
  • There appears to be a technical issue and we are awaiting further updates from Blizzard, but they hope to still launch later today
  • UPDATE: The game is now live and launched at 9 p.m. PDT / 12 .a.m. EDT but Steam users review bombed to Mostly Negative in the wait. Hopefully it recovers.
Recent updates

UPDATE Oct. 7 @ 1:23 AM PT: The game is now live on all platforms as issues were solved this morning at  9 p.m. PDT / 12 .a.m. EDT. However, the game currently sits at Mostly Negative on Steam due to the launch issues and Steam users reporting log-in difficulties.

Recent updates

UPDATE Oct. 7 @ 6:36 PM PT: Fletcher says players will need to wait a couple more hours or more for Vessel of Hatred. 

Recent updates

UPDATE Oct. 7 @ 4:38 PM PT: Steam players are now able to login. At the Blizzard forums, Fletcher advises that players should expect to see "a login/license error when logging in." He further says, "we will have an update shortly on some timing soon." 

Recent updates

UPDATE Oct. 7 @ 4:17 PM PT: Diablo's community lead, Adam Fletcher, says the developer has "begun locking logins and removing players from the game" as a means to get ready for Vessel of Hatred. He also says that, "Steam users should be able to download the 2.0.2 patch in preparation for launch." 

If you've pre-downloaded Diablo 4's Vessel of Hatred expansion already and are sat eagerly awaiting the go live time of 4 p.m PDT / 7 p.m EDT today — we have some bad news. You may be waiting just a little bit longer as Blizzard greases the wheels

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With many awaiting the game launch in just over an hours time, the Diablo 4 Global Community Director just put out a post stating that "We are tackling a small issue on the backend which is going to cause us to miss that 4pm PDT time." They still expect to have the game live later this evening but we are awaiting further update.

The post on X coincided with a post over on Blizzard forums which states:

Hello Wanderers -

We have some late breaking news for our launch for Vessel of Hatred.
We are looking at a small delay for launch due to a small technical issue on our end. We are still expecting Vessel of Hatred to launch this evening, but we will need some additional time to ensure we have every player start at the exact same time across all platforms.

At 4pm PDT, we will begin locking out new logins for Diablo IV. Players already logged in prior to 4pm PDT will still be in-game on Patch 1.5.2, but they should expect to lose connection to the game over time while we do additional work to get the simultaneous launch prepared.

We apologize for the late breaking news on the time shift, but this is an important step we need to make to ensure every player can start their journey through Nahantu together.

We will be providing updates in this thread as they become available.

On a comment on another users post on X who asked to "define small delay please" Fletcher responded "Im hoping just a couple hours at most, but we shall see.

[UPDATE Oct. 7 @ 4:17 PM PT]

Update: We have begun locking new logins and players will start to disconnect from Diablo IV services while we prepare for launch.

[UPDATE Oct. 7 @ 4:38 PM PT]

Steam players can download the 2.0.2 patch right now.

Separately, players should be seeing a login/license error when logging in. This is to be expected.

We will have an update shortly on some timing soon.

[UPDATE Oct. 7 @ 6:36 PM PT]

Latest update – it looks like it will be about upwards of two hours until we launch Vessel of Hatred. Additionally Battle.net 1.1k players will need an additional sizable update before playing. We will let you know when this update is available. We apologize for the delay and look forward to seeing you in Nahantu soon.

Given that the game was launching at 12 a.m in the UK, I'm happily off to bed now, but fingers crossed for my American friends you will be online and playing the Spiritborn soon!

Get ready for Vessel of Hatred while you wait...

We're not sure how long it will take to solve the technical issues, but in the mean time you can read our guide on how to start Vessel of Hatred when it does go live, and then update yourself on everything that has changed in the expansion and Season 6. 

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Jennifer Young
Jennifer Young

Jen is a News Writer for Windows Central, focused on all things gaming and Microsoft. Anything slaying monsters with magical weapons will get a thumbs up such as Dark Souls, Dragon Age, Diablo, and Monster Hunter. When not playing games, she'll be watching a horror or trash reality TV show, she hasn't decided which of those categories the Kardashians fit into. You can follow Jen on Twitter @Jenbox360 for more Diablo fangirling and general moaning about British weather. 

2 Comments Comment from the forums
  • HeyCori
    I play via Game Pass. I logged in this morning because I wanted to see if I needed to buy the expansion. The first pop-up said to purchase the expansion, but then I logged in and the new map was available. I'm still not sure if I need to pay. I didn't try to explore the map so maybe the game would block me from entering.
    Reply
  • fdruid
    This is wrong. People get (circumstantially) angry at a game and review it negatively. They're not speaking of the quality of the game, they're complaining about something circumstantial. That's not the right way to use a review.
    Review bombing and this kind of thing that has people negatively reviewing a game for external reasons to the game experience is abusing the privilege of having the possibility of writing a review.

    A review should be an opinion on the actual gameplay, whether a game is good or fun or not. Technical issues get fixed. Are those thousands of tantrum-like negative reviews going to get changed back to positive when in hours or days the issue is fixed? It would be fair to do so, but I highly doubt it.

    This is clearly a case of too much freedom being given. Unfair reviews and bombing have outright killed whole games, the work, time and livelyhood of many devs just thrown to the trash because of entitled kids.
    Reply