Blizzard is very proud of the smooth launch of Diablo IV

You could argue that Activision Blizzard are probably the biggest ostriches in the gaming world right now, the way they choose to bury their heads in the sand. The other day Sledgehammer announced that they were "incredibly proud" of the almost unanimously mocked Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III, and now it's the turn of Diablo IV.

Despite initial high ratings and good sales, players have been somewhat disappointed with the fourth installation of Blizzard's hack n' slash series, and criticism of the first season has not been kind. Complaints about weakening classes, poor balance, greedy battlepasses, and boring loot systems have been thrown around countless times, but still, the general manager Rod Fergusson and production director Tiffany Wat, said in an interview with PCGamesN, that they are very proud of the smooth launch of Diablo IV:

"I think we did an incredible job with our launches" said Wat. "It's only been five months since we launched the game, but our launch was the biggest Blizzard has ever had - and I am very proud of that launch. [..] I've been on Diablo for 12 years; I was around for Diablo 3 where it was a non-ideal launch. My job is to ensure that Diablo 4 is the smoothest launch ever, and I think we did an incredible job - and that was just practicing as much as possible with our betas, with our alphas, really having very, very robust communication with all of the support teams."

Compared to the disastrous launch of Diablo 3, most things win, so Blizzard is of course right in that respect. But is it really a reasonable and relevant comparison? Anyway, fortunately we have more content next year when Vessel of Hatred is released.