Despite highest-ever retention, Diablo 4 Season 11 sits on 44% positive rating on Steam

Diablo 4 is sitting on only a 44% (Mixed) positive rating on Steam right now, despite the game’s current success. With anywhere from 20,000-40,000 players active on Steam at any given moment, many are still incredibly frustrated with Blizzard’s business practices. Some of these complaints are certainly justified, but not everyone agrees that all of the complaints have merit.

It’s also worth pointing out that this is only on Steam, and not indicative of the game’s numbers on any other platform, much less the Battle.net platform itself, away from Steam. Since users on Steam can give public reviews, we know what players are frustrated with primarily: Microtransactions, and the Lord of Hatred price/bundle.

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What has led to Diablo 4’s rating on Steam in 2026?

There are two primary complaints about Diablo 4 that led to its 44% positive rating on Steam, and that’s the Microtransactions, and the recent Lord of Hatred bundle/change. While I love Diablo 4, I cannot possibly defend the outrageous cost of its microtransactions. Between these, and the Reliquaries costing a ridiculous amount of Platinum (Real-money currency), it can cost you a lot of money if you want to get the extra cosmetics.

Putting Vessel of Hatred on sale, removing it from being purchased, and bundling it with Lord of Hatred in just a few weeks has made people justifiably upset. (Image via Valve)

However, that is all optional stuff that doesn’t affect the game, or make you stronger in any way, shape or form. Some of those cosmetics do look cool (such as the World of Warcraft collaborations), but the cost is just too high. This is also the game that had a 60+ USD horse cosmetic, mind.

The majority of the recent Diablo 4 complaints come from the Lord of Hatred bundle. They’ve removed Vessel of Hatred as a purchase option, and the two come together. Now, I do think the timing is rotten, because Vessel of Hatred was recently put on sale for the holidays. So for those people, I certainly get the frustration, because now the next expansion has been revealed, and comes with the Paladin class.

While there are many reviews, these two topics are the ones we see the most, when it comes to the game's negative traits (Image via Valve)

I agree that that timing is pretty horrendous. As far as the two being bundled together, that’s pretty standard for Blizzard. When you purchase a World of Warcraft expansion, for example, you get every expansion that came before it. If your first time in the game is say, The War Within, you get everything from Vanilla through Dragonflight as well.

The price (39.99 USD) isn’t unreasonable to get both expansions. I do agree with the people that think there should be some kind of discount or prorate if you already own Vessel of Hatred, and definitely sympathize with people that just bought the expansion.

It’s not a good look, and I know I’d be frustrated if I had to shell out another 40 bucks just to get early access to the Paladin class, instead of waiting a week or two first. The whole of Season 11 was designed around teasing/introducing the Paladin, so having it at launch makes sense.

I do think the sale were perhaps a bit misplaced, or even greedy of the Blizzard executives, if they always knew they were going to reveal Lord of Hatred. That said, I don’t think the price is outrageous, but I do think the timing is not ideal.

Despite these complaints, the game is doing quite well on Steam, averaging anywhere between 20-40,000 players between December and the start of 2026. November 2025 wasn't great on Steam, but the preceeding months were exceptional, according to Steamcharts.

At the time of writing, there are 17k players on Steam, which is nothing to sneeze at. I cannot help but think the numbers could be higher, if Blizzard had not performed what some feel is a bait and switch, when it comes to putting Vessel of Hatred on sale, and then revealing Lord of Hatred as a bundle.

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Check out our other Diablo 4 guides and features

• Diablo 4 Season 11: Hadriel’s Divine Missive walkthrough
• Diablo 4 Season 11: Call of the Paladin walkthrough (Path of the Paladin)
• Diablo 4 devs walk back major Masterworking change ahead of Season 11
• Diablo 4: Lord of Hatred DLC: Release date, known features, and more
• Diablo 4: What to do with Unique Purified Essences?

Edited by Jason Parker