At last year’s BlizzCon, developer Blizzard announced that the first expansion for Diablo 4 would be called Vessel of Hatred and include a brand-new character class for the series. Since then, the developers have been mostly quiet, preferring to focus on the seasonal content that continues to drop every few months in Diablo 4. However, at today’s Xbox Showcase, the developers released a lengthy new story trailer, setting up where Vessel of Hatred will take players when it launches. While we didn’t get any gameplay, the trailer did end with a release date, which is almost as good.
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Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred Release Date
We knew Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred was coming later this year, but some thought it might launch very soon. After all, the last three major releases in the Diablo mainline franchise (Diablo 4, Diablo 3, and Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls) all launched during the first half of the year. That never meant that Vessel of Hatred was a lock to launch this summer, but with Diablo 4 Season 5 launching on August 6th, some assumed Vessel of Hatred would launch at the same time.
Sadly for those players, it was revealed today that Blizzard is targeting October 8th for the expansion’s launch. That date could move around depending on how development goes, but Blizzard will likely try to stick as close to it as possible to capitalize on the Halloween season. After all, it doesn’t get much spookier than Mephisto, the Lord of Hatred. Of course, the one thing most players are talking about following the new announcement is when we’re going to see gameplay.
Diablo 4: Vessel of Hatred New Class
As mentioned, the most anticipated addition coming in the Vessel of Hatred is the new character class. Blizzard has previously said that it’s a class that’s never been seen and will tie into the expansion’s jungle theme. Remember, the expansion is taking players to a new region called Nahantu, so the class will have something to do with that region. Unfortunately, it will not be the Witch Doctor, a fan-favorite class from Diablo 3. We also won’t be getting a classic class like the Paladin or Assassin, though Blizzard did say they’re planning to release yearly expansions, so we might see them somewhere down the line. Hopefully, we’ll learn more about the new class and get gameplay over the next few weeks.
Diablo 4 is available now on PlayStation, Xbox, and PC platforms. The Vessel of Hatred DLC launches on October 8th.
