Diablo Immortal is the latest in Blizzard’s extremely popular Diablo series of action RPGs that have defined the genre since 1996. The games have generally been highly successful thanks to the satisfyingly brutal combat against hordes of demons, massive variety of character-build possibilities, and a veritable dopamine drip of increasingly powerful showers of loot. Diablo Immortal was highly anticipated as it’s been 10 years since Diablo 3, with many players looking forward to the game’s convenient crossplay functionality allowing them to play on both mobile devices and PC. Typical of mobile games, however, Diablo Immortal is plagued by predatory monetization that has led to players spending exorbitant amounts of money in order to make progress.
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YouTuber jtisallbusiness has reportedly invested a staggering $100,000 into making his Barbarian one of the most powerful characters among the millions who play Diablo Immortal. This has resulted in an extremely high PvP win rate that has placed jtisallbusiness’s rating so high that Diablo Immortal’s matchmaking system can no longer find opponents. According to jtisallbusiness, he spends “somewhere around 48 to 72 hours somewhere in between that of only trying to queue for a Battleground and never being able to get one.”
The primary motivation for spending thousands of dollars on Diablo Immortal is, of course, to stomp other players, and it’s problematic that those who invest the most into the game are unable to participate. The game’s Rite of Exile event requires his clan to defend its Immortals status through PvP Battlegrounds matches, meaning jtisallbusiness has to remain on the sidelines while waiting hopelessly for the game’s matchmaking. Other members of his clan have also reportedly spent thousands of dollars on their characters, so it’s uncertain if his clan will be successful in this event if other members are also unable to find matches.
Diablo Immortal’s monetization has been a major point of contention for fans of Blizzard’s action RPGs. The aggressive microtransaction system incessantly demands cash investment to speed up progress, meanwhile players who do spend thousands on Diablo Immortal are faced with their own problems. The combination of irritating mobile game mechanics and unrewarding odds even for big-spending “whales” has been frustrating to all Diablo Immortal players, though many players have remarked that it’s difficult to feel sorry for someone who spends more than most people’s yearly salary on a video game character.
Diablo Immortal is available on Mobile and PC.
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Source: Kotaku
