Update 2 4:20 pm - Season of Blood is now live, but Blizzard has revealed that for the moment "due to a technical issue cross play between PC and Consoles is temporarily unavailable."
Update - 3:10 pm Eastern time - Diablo IV has now officially launched on Steam.
Original story - Blizzard Entertainment has encountered some issues with the launch of its next free content update, Season of Blood, for its hit action-RPG Diablo IV. As a result, its launch has been pushed back, and it appears that has also affected the release of the game on Valve"s Steam platform as well.
In a post on the game"s official forums, Blizzard stated:
Hello everyone,
We have encountered some technical issues with our current build and will be delaying Season of Blood’s start time by a few hours to remedy these issues. Once we have more information, we’ll update you right away. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate the feedback you have provided and your patience.
It would also appear that the launch delay for Season of Blood has also kept Blizzard from launching Diablo IV on Steam today. The title was supposed to be released on Valve"s digital game store around this time today, but the Steam page for the game still has the "Coming soon" label.
Season of Blood is the "Halloween" themed free content update for Diablo IV, where players will have to fight off a vampire invasion:
Sanctuary has been overrun, invaded by an army of vampires and their loyal followers gathering blood for a terrible ritual. But what will they do with the blood they’ve drained from the people of Sanctuary? Partner with Erys, a Vampire Hunter, to uncover and put an end to the Vampire Lord’s dark plot before all is lost.
The new season will include new vampire-like powers, new gear, five new end-game bosses, and more. There will also be a big 1.20 patch for the game, and you can already check out its release notes to see the many bug fixes, game balance changes and more.
We will update this post when Season of Blood, and Diablo IV"s Steam launch, goes live.