Diablo IV's Season of the Malignant: A Bittersweet Start

On July 20, 2023, Activision-Blizzard officially released Diablo IV’s first season, knowing it could be either hit or miss with the players.  Upon its release, Season of the Malignant met with mixed reviews.  While the development team seemed to listen to the complaints players had regarding the game, this particular patch to Diablo IV was also seen as a disappointment.

About Season of the Malignant
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With the intent to have up to four seasons per year in the Diablo IV universe, Season of the Malignant was the first to start what Blizzard hoped would be with a bang.  The inspiration behind these seasons came from Diablo III’s seasonal modes.  This means a new character is created once a new season goes live.

However, not every Diablo fan is thrilled with the idea of starting a brand new character each time a new season starts.  Many would like to stick with their favorite hero, which is not an option when playing seasonal modes.  Some believe since there are new quests and storylines that can be followed, players should be given the option to either start from ground zero or pick up where their favorite hero left off.

With Season of the Malignant, the idea is for players to collect Malignant Hearts as a commodity that behaves like gems.  These are placed in the sockets of a hero’s gear to help improve its performance level.  For the most part, these are supposed to offer better stats than regular gems.

Malignant Woes
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The Season 1 patch by Diablo IV also met with criticism from the players as the game’s defensive stats were nerfed in the process.  “Nerfing” is the term used to lower the performance level of something specific so that it is not as powerful.  Sometimes, this is necessary for a better balance in gameplay.

However, Blizzard seemed to drop the ball with a nerf they put into place that made the characters playing in Season 1 considerably weaker than how Diablo IV’s main game mode was played.  This didn’t sit well with the players.  This was especially obvious with the jewelry slots as the skull gems that were used weakened each item’s performance level instead of improving it.  

Although Blizzard has apparently fixed the problem with a hotfix, the concerns shared by the majority of Diablo IV players in the gaming community remain the same.  For at least five years now, gamers have witnessed the integrity level of Activision-Blizzard take a sharp nosedive.  Instead of releasing top-quality games that are thoroughly enjoyable, they’re coming out either flawed or badly broken.  Season of the Malignant’s release as the first of what’s supposed to be many seasons for Diablo IV simply added more fuel to a fire that’s been burning out of control for too long.

Malignant Conditions
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In order for players to participate in Season of the Malignant they need to complete Diablo IV’s campaign first.  This makes sense as the first seasonal storyline picks up where Lilith left off as the game’s main antagonist.  However, in order to play this, as well as every new season, is to start a brand new player from scratch.

While many players don’t agree with this, there are just as many who don’t seem to mind.  Among the new characters created in Season 1, as soon as its schedule of three months to run is over, they are converted into Eternal Realm characters.  This means they can be played in normal game mode.  However, all the seasonal perks that were once available will no longer be the case.

Diablo IV’s Conditions

Even though it was released with some flaws, Diablo IV was another big hit for Activision Blizzard.  While many players spared no effort to voice their concerns about the game, many more don’t seem to mind.  They’re enjoying the latest edition to Diablo’s saga with millions of players around the world playing on various platforms.

Now that the deal between Microsoft and Activision has gone through, already a number of changes have taken place where Blizzard and its entire catalog of video games are concerned.  As far as the majority of gamers are concerned, this is a plus.  However, there are also huge expectations by members of the gaming community that Microsoft will whip Activision-Blizzard back into shape.  Several gamers still frown upon Activision with disdain.

Learning from Season 1

Hopefully, Blizzard will take the lessons learned from Season 1 into account as they look ahead to future seasonal gameplay where Diablo IV is concerned.  It is the hope they will continue to listen to the gaming community.  Ideally, it would be great for gamers to take their favorite characters they’ve created into each new season as it comes up.  At the same time, still offer gamers opportunities to create a new hero as they start a new season.

No two people are alike.  This is also applied to their gaming preferences.  Even as they play the same game, not everybody is into the same thing.  Overall, people like variety.  They expect this in everything they touch, including video games.