Diablo IV Is Headed to Steam This Month, Just in Time for the Vampire-Themed Season 2
Diablo IV is coming to Steam, merely four months after its multi-platform launch. The devilish loot RPG is headed to Valve’s game storefront on October 17, keeping with creator Blizzard’s promise to bring more of its PC catalogue to the commonly preferred choice of platform. You see, all PC games from Blizzard are restricted to its proprietary Battle.net launcher, making it a nuisance for players to jump between and log into different accounts. It’s a hot topic among the community, who’d much rather have their entire library on Steam, for easy access. The free-to-play shooter Overwatch 2 was the first to break this tradition in August, albeit that ended poorly.
The Steam version is now available for wishlisting, and owners will be required to link/ connect Diablo 4 to a Battle.net account, enabling cross-platform play and cross-progression. That said, the game can be launched natively and there’s no need for you to keep Blizzard’s app installed on your PC. The arrival also brings the niceties of unlockable achievements, alongside smooth access to the Steam friend list, so you can invite others for co-op demon-killing sessions. For now, there is no word on whether existing owners of the game will be getting a discount on their Steam purchase, but the store page listing does feature three editions — Standard, Deluxe, and Ultimate — same as the initial launch. During the developer update live stream, held late Wednesday, the team noted that the dungeon-crawler is playable on the Steam Deck, though they never went into the specifics of graphical settings.
Diablo 4’s arrival on Steam coincides with the upcoming season 2 content, titled ‘Season of Blood,’ granting you vampiric powers to storm through the lands of Sanctuary. The update will introduce a new questline, pairing you with the crossbow-wielding vampire hunter Erys, voiced by Gemma Chan (The Eternals), as you investigate a string of bloodied murders and the Dark Master responsible for it. More importantly, players can access the season 2 content right after completing the Missing Pieces prologue quest, essentially skipping the campaign to fulfil their blood-sucking desires. The update also vastly improves the endgame progression by increasing XP gains after level 50, faster by up to 40 percent. Expect five new endgame bosses, a general balance of skills, and faster mounts for traversal.
As mentioned before, Overwatch 2 was the first Blizzard PC game to make a jump to Steam, with the publisher promising that it plans on bringing over more titles. The shooter’s arrival was instantly blasted with negative reviews, making it the worst-reviewed game on the platform. At the time of writing, it’s got an ‘Overwhelmingly Negative’ review score, due to players’ dissatisfaction with the battle pass system and the cancellation of its long-promised PvE mode. Diablo IV, on the other hand, was received well at launch but slowly fell off with season 1’s release that made the game incredibly unfun to grind. Hopefully, fate doesn’t repeat itself this time.
Diablo IV is headed to Steam on October 17. It is already available to play on PC via Battle.net, in addition to console through PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series S/X.
