Diablo Immortal, from Activision Blizzard, was released earlier than expected a few days ago and has made headlines for various reasons, not least of which is its microtransaction model. Diablo Immortal is a free-to-play game and as such has ways for players to support its continued development.
Although this approach to sustainability is quite common today, Devil Immortal it may have taken things a step further than most players might have expected. According to calculations by the YouTube channel Bellular News, the game’s monetization system is set up in such a way that it makes “maxing” characters an excessively expensive task.
According to the recent Bellular News video, it is that Devil Immortal allows players to purchase so-called Legendary Gems. These are one of the three pillars of character progression, along with normal gear and XP level, and dictate end game level progression beyond what is possible by simply reaching the Diablo Immortal level cap. .
At the moment, F2P players cannot earn higher level Legendary Gems, which are only available through some of the game’s monetization options, and maxing out a character effectively costs $110k.
Matt and Michael from Bellular News also argue that Diablo Immortal’s Legendary Gems are a deliberately complicated system, explaining that an F2P player would need roughly 10 years of gameplay to fully equip a character in the current iteration of the game.
Specifically, Legendary Gems aren’t even guaranteed for paying players, as they’re only randomly awarded when purchasing Legendary Chests, which may be why Diablo Immortal wasn’t released worldwide, as this type of business are prohibited in some parts of the world.