Critical Diablo 4 Season 7 PTR bug has players eyeing Path of Exile 2

Diablo 4’s Season 7 PTR is now live but a major bug has players packing their bags for Path of Exile 2’s impending release.

2024 is set to become a war of ARPGs in its final month with two major events causing battle lines to be drawn. Diablo 4’s Season 7 PTR is now live giving players a taste of the content to come while its top competitor Path of Exile 2 is about to launch its early access offering.

With the two titles set to go head-to-head, predictions on the outcome of this clash are already being made. Asmongold weighed in claiming that Path of Exile 2 would “cannibalize” Diablo 4’s player base and a recent development may prove the streamer right.

While Diablo 4’s Season 7 PTR has officially kicked off, it’s getting off to a slow start thanks to a significant bug. Issues with Mrak, the NPC that boosts PTR characters to max level, have forced Blizzard to disable the feature.

Season 7 PTR is live but we will be disabling our boost NPC (Mrak) for the next 24 hrs. We discovered an issue where multiple players interacting w/ Mrak can lead to some behind the scenes issues. We will fix it up and have Mrak re-enabled tomorrow AM.https://t.co/LQvGdqNU3F

— Adam Fletcher (@PezRadar) December 3, 2024

Diablo 4 players plan mass exodus to Path of Exile 2

Global Director of Community for Diablo 4 Adam Fletcher took to X to explain the issue. According to Fletcher, multiple players interacting with Mrak causes “behind-the-scenes issues” but Blizzard aims to have this fixed by the morning of December 4, 2024.

Unfortunately, the inability to hit max level quickly prevents players from truly testing the balance of the updated Skills and Aspects in Diablo 4 Season 7’s endgame. For many, this defeats the purpose of the PTR. “So this basically means the PTR will be available tomorrow,” one player complained.

Other users in Fletcher’s thread have chosen to announce their planned migration to Path of Exile 2 (POE2) in protest of Diablo 4’s frequent bugs. “3 days before POE2 comes out and you’re talking about shutting it down for ‘24 hours’,” a user taunted. “That is the beginning of the end! POE2 wins,” another added.

Others claimed that Diablo 4’s “armageddon” would happen when Path of Exile 2 launched into early access and even went as far as to designate the thread a “POE2 waiting room”.

Diablo 4 Season 7 goes live in January 2025 but with Path of Exile 2 hitting early access on December 6, 2024, it may face an uphill battle to draw ARPG fans back. It will all depend on how well Grinding Gear Games’ answer to Diablo 4 is received.