When Diablo IV released back in June of 2023 it was met with mostly rave reviews by critics, but middling reviews by players due mainly do its lack of end game content. I really enjoyed the game when it released but it is hard to invalidate the criticism that fans of the series threw at the game. Seasonal content has gone a long way to filling in some of the end game content drought as most of the seasons have had new and interesting content to take part in, but this has always felt like more of a stop gap than a solution for the lack of end game activities. Now with the release of the games first expansion ‘Vessel of Hatred’ Blizzard Entertainment hope to silence the criticisms of the original game especially when it relates to end game content, thanks to Blizzard we got our hands on the game early to see if Vessel of Hatred lives up to its hype.

The end of Diablo IV had several threads which still need to be resolved, one of the main ones being the players defeat of Lilith, is she gone for good, or will we see her summoned back to Sanctuary? Vessels of Hatred starts immediately where the last cut scene of Diablo IV left off, it follows Neyrelle on her journey with the soulstone that holds Mephisto captive inside. I am not really going to reveal much more about the story than that as it is my aim to keep this review as spoiler free as possible, suffice to say the safety of Sanctuary and its inhabitants hang in the balance yet again and it will be up to you to try and save everyone.

Vessels of Hatred takes place to the Southwest of the original games map in a large new region known as Nahantu which is home to the games new class the Spiritborn. Nahantu is a vast sprawling jungle littered with swamps and pathways entwisted with vines. Of course, the expansion is not all just jungle and there are several other types of areas that you will visit as you progress through the story.  The new areas ooze atmosphere just as the original game did and prove once again that Blizzard’s art team is second to none when it comes to creating these types of worlds.

The Spiritborn, a new class in Diablo, are originally from the Nahantu jungles and go through a coming-of-age ceremony in which they must pass days-long testing by learning to open their "sight" and survive in the wild. They give up their previous life for their Spirit Realm throughout this process, allowing their spirit to reincarnate as an animal guardian such a centipede, jaguar, eagle, or gorilla. Each type of spirit imbues the Spiritborn with different abilities, the jaguar relies on fire, the gorilla relies on blocking and mitigating damage, the eagle wields lightning based abilities, and the centipede focusses on poisons and debuffs. As far as weapons go the Spiritborn are restricted to using glaives, quarterstaffs and polearms.

The Spiritborn class had me intrigued so I jumped into the game and created one to play through the expansion with, I usually play ARPGs with a build guide for the class I choose so it was kind of liberating not having one of these available and building my character up through trial and error. If you have ever played a druid or a shaman in an RPG before then the Spiritborn feels like a fusion of both of these classes as it uses the power of both the elements and animal spirits to destroy their enemies in battle. I really enjoyed my playthrough of the game as a Spiritborn, I spec’ed for the most part into centipede which revolves around poison, debuffs and crowd control and spent most of the time poisoning everything around me and then fearing them away from me to send them scattering as they slowly die, I found it to be a highly effective playstyle, though it did tend to lack single target damage so boss fights did prove to be a lot tougher than taking on packs of roaming monsters, though I am sure if I took some time to refine my skill tree I could find a good balance when it comes to taking on both packs of monsters and bosses. The Spiritborn also get access to a class specific quest that unlocks their ‘spirit hall’ mechanic, this allows you to further customise your character with spirit based bonuses based on the spirits you choose to equip, in my case I chose both centipede spirits which gave my character the ability to slow enemies and reduce their damage and heal myself each time I poisoned nearby enemies which I found to be a great balance of crowd control, damage and survivability, you can mix and max the two bonuses you can choose though so you could for instance choose gorilla and jaguar if you found their bonuses more appropriate to your build. The spirit hall is a great new mechanic that offers a lot of build diversity for the Spiritborn class, I would highly recommend giving the class a try for both new and returning players, especially a centipede build as the crowd control and survivability aspects of the build along with their spirit hall mechanic make it a lot of fun to play.

The Spiritborn aren’t the only class that gets to have fun with new mechanics and build customisation, there is a new Runeword system that involves slotting runes into both weapons and armour, there are two types of runes, runes of invocation and runes of ritual, the idea is to link two of these runes in your equipment sockets to reap the bonuses they offer. For instance, you may have a rune of ritual that gives you a certain amount of offering each time you drink a healing potion this will charge your rune of invocation up and it will eventually unleash an effect such as shooting out a poison bolt once the required amount of offering has been reached. This used in conjunction with the gem socketing system unlocks an amazing amount of build customisation and diversity for all classes in the game, those that like to min/max and continually try to improve their builds will have a lot of fun playing around with this system.

Mercenaries are another new mechanic in the game available to all classes, you will unlock the ability to use mercenaries during the main story of Vessel of Hatred when you unlock the mercenary den, this is basically a hideout area where you can select mercenaries for hire, you obtain access to the first mercenary, Raheir, as soon as you unlock the den and will then also get access to quests to unlock other mercenaries, each one of them having different combat abilities. Mercenaries will accompany you on your travels and help you during fights, they will also level up throughout your journeys and you can customise their skill trees to best synergise with your characters build, once you level up a mercenary to level 5 you will gain access. You can also hire a second mercenary, they won’t join your party but instead will appear when triggered by certain circumstances known as ‘opportunities’ which will see them provide supplemental support for a short period of time, you will also gain rapport with your second mercenary choice and influence their skill progression to help further synergise with your characters build. Gaining rapport with mercenaries will also earn you rewards such as pale marks that you can use in the den to purchase equipment for your character, so it is worth levelling your companions up.

The level cap has also been reduced to a maximum level of 60 in Vessel of Hatred, Blizzard stated that this change was introduced to make progression feel more meaningful, this comes along with a slew of other improvements and achievements to work toward such as each class receiving a new paragon board with each of these now also equipped with a legendary node, each class has also gained 1 new skill and 5 new passive skills and new class legendary and unique items have also been added to the game. While not up there with the likes of Path of Exile when it comes to build diversity the additions in Vessel of Hatred are certainly a massive step in the right direction.

The issues regarding lack of end game content that surrounded the original games launch last year have certainly been addressed in Vessel of Hate and it isn’t just the new game mechanics and Spiritborn class that players have to look forward to. There are several new activities available in the game, the Kurast Undercity is a new area that is basically a multi-stage, time-attack dungeon which you can use for both levelling and end game item farming. These dungeons contain some of the most hectic action I have seen in a Diablo game as you basically need to get through the dungeon as quickly as possible whilst igniting beacons, slaying monsters and destroying afflicted structures which will give you a time extension, successfully beating a stage will earn you rewards plus also unlock more of the undercity for you to explore, you can also influence the loot that drops by using spirit tributes to target specific items. The Undercity is a challenging place so you will need to bring your “A” game to successfully complete the many challenges that await you. Once you unlock torment level 1 you will also gain access to The Dark Citadel, this is a new co-op PvE end game experience that involves dungeon crawling and boss fights. You can enter the Dark Citadel with anywhere from 2 to 4 players and if successful you will earn weekly caches that include both powerful gear and cosmetic rewards. The boss fights in the Dark Citadel have complex mechanics that make them feel more like bosses in World of Warcraft than Diablo and they require communication and teamwork for you to come out victorious. Thankfully there is a new party finder mechanic that helps you find groups for multiplayer activities, or you can even use this to list your own group for recruiting purposes if you are having trouble getting through some of the harder dungeons in the game. This is a great addition to the game as I always felt like even though it is a multiplayer game that Diablo IV never felt very social at all, hopefully this will bring more people together and start fostering more of a community environment in game.

I really had a blast coming back to Diablo IV to play through the Vessel of Hatred expansion, the new Spiritborn class feels great to play and the various new mechanics sprinkled throughout the game as well as the many new end game activities and dungeons really help to bring new life to Sanctuary. I highly recommend picking Vessel of Hatred up for both new and returning players, Blizzard have created a world oozing with atmosphere along with a gripping story full of dread and psychological twists and turns. This is more than a step in the right direction, it truly feels like Diablo IV is starting to become the game I originally hoped it would be.