In advance of this weekend’s Diablo 4 open beta, Blizzard boss Rod Fergusson has hit back against unfair criticisms levelled towards the problems experienced last time.
A lot more players on PlayStation, Xbox and PC are excited about Diablo 4’s launch on June 6, 2023, than even Activision Blizzard was expecting it seems. We know this because countless players had immense trouble accessing the Diablo 4 early access beta last weekend, hitting outrageous queue times despite trying to play at the specified start time of 4pm GMT / 12pm ET / 9am PT on Friday.
Thankfully, queue times and server load eventually eased over the next two days, but it’s unsurprising such issues occurred now knowing that – as per a Eurogamer interview with Blizzard general manager Rod Fergusson – “over a million people” were trying to access the game. The problems have also called into question what the entire concept of a beta actually is in a world where the likes of Warzone 2 and Fortnite have, as Fergusson himself puts it, “twisted” the concept.
Unlike those other games mentioned, which treat betas more along the lines of Early Access where there are teething issues but players can still jump in any time they want, the two Diablo 4 open beta periods come and go. They are time-limited, and it’s this difference that Fergusson has slyly taken issue with. Referencing last weekend’s events he says “for us this was a true beta because we wanted to be able to test that load and what does it mean to get a lot of players in”.
So prevalent were the issues with the Diablo 4 early access beta, an entire Reddit thread dedicated to known issues quickly sprung up. “I played for 7 hours straight and the stutters remained and eventually got worse” said one user. Others cited disconnection issues and queue times as long as 35 minutes, no doubt as a result of the sheer number of players trying to get in to slay some hellish monsters.
Blizzard has since tried to set expectations to a more reasonable level in advance of the Diablo 4 open beta period this weekend. “We expect unprecedented traffic and queue times as a result. We appreciate your patience & understanding”, read a tweet from the official @Diablo account before guiding people to a more in-depth forum post about how queue times and other issues are set to be addressed.
This weekend’s Diablo 4 open beta will start at 4pm GMT / 12pm ET / 9am PT later today.
Beta than nothing
The gaming landscape has changed so much in the years since the first Diablo launched and LAN parties were a thing, I can understand Fergusson’s frustrations with what people have come to expect from a beta. He’s referencing the concept in the correct, old-school sense, in that both Diablo 4 beta weekends will play an important role in collecting important information that can then be used to inform the full game’s launch in June.
With Diablo 4 being the first in the series to adhere closer to a live-service title, with random world events, other players present with you and so on, it makes sense for people to be surprised by how much trouble they had trying to get in. After all, we never heard of these issues – at least on this scale – during Call of Duty: Warzone 2 and Fortnite’s beta periods. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that the idea of a beta has been twisted per se, but I agree that there definitely needs to be a better distinction in future.
