Is No One Really Playing Diablo 4 Anymore?

One of the hottest releases this year was not a console exclusive, but an MMO RPG. 2023 is shaping up to be an incredible year for gamers. With the release of Baldur’s Gate 3 and Starfield, fans have been spoilt for choice. However, there is another. With a current Metascore of 88 on the PS5 and 91 on Xbox Series X, Diablo 4 is comfortably among the biggest game releases of the year. It is the fourth installment in the classic dungeon-crawler action RPG series. And it is one of the most successful installments in the series. The game racked up over 700 million hours in June, which made it one of the biggest games for Activision Blizzard. And yet, the game seems to have lost traction.

Gamers rushed to digital platforms to get their copy of Diablo 4 and in no time, it seemed like it was the only game anyone could talk about. Cut to a few weeks later, there seems to be a steep decline. And the reddit community has taken notice. Is this normal? Or has Diablo 4 lost its fire?

Is Diablo 4 losing players?

Diablo 4 is indeed losing a lot of players. And one Diablo fan picked this up on Reddit, asking if other Diablo 4 fans observed it. Most of the fanbase agreed, saying they saw the same thing.

The basic observation comes from seeing the game at two distinct points in its lifetime. The first point was when the game was released. At the time of its release, people could not get enough of the game. According to the second quarter financial results of 2023, “Blizzard Delivered Its First $1B Net Bookings Quarter and Record Segment Operating Income, Driven by the Successful Launch of Diablo IV.”

Is really no one playing anymore?
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The Reddit user even described having so many people wanting to join the clan that they had to create a second clan to accommodate everyone.

READ MORE: “We’ve Got Plans, We Have Storylines”: Diablo 4 General Manager Confirms A Possible Expansion for the Game

A few months after release, it seems only a few members of the clan remain active. Most users observed a similar trend. Additionally, it also reflected in the Twitch viewership for the game. Since the launch of season 1, viewership numbers fell by a record 99%. This sort of drop is certainly not normal, and it caught the attention of the gaming community.

Why have players lost interest in the game?

Ever since its release, fans had a problem with some gameplay features as well as the content updates. For instance, they struggled to strike a balance between class-based buffs and nerfs. The whirlwind barbarian for example was way more powerful than other barbarians. So the team decided to nerf the class to strike a balance. However, as a result, players just didn’t enjoy it anymore.

Season 1 did not go well with fans. While it may not have put off hardcore fans, most of the casual player base left the game, as it seems in this case. Instead of grinding the game out for hours on end, players revealed they spent maybe an hour a day, or less.

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The Twitch numbers portray an extreme case. While the game did lose a lot of its players, these viewership numbers are not exactly the best representation of how popular the game is among fans. Some Twitch streamers only picked up the game following its release, especially since it was quite popular. As it happens with streamers, they keep changing things up with different games, keeping things fresh.

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People certainly have lost interest in the game, but that does not mean they will not come back. If Blizzard can find the right elements for their updates which made this game so successful at launch, there’s no reason Diablo 4 won’t rise again.

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