Blizzard has submitted a worthy entry for the year's most-unhinged PR stunt, raffling a Diablo 4 gaming PC "infused with real human blood" as part of a community-wide blood drive seeking 666 quarts by next month, which would require standard 1-pint donations from 1,332 players assuming no repeat entries.
Diablo 4 Season 2 just started, and since it's all about vampires, Blizzard apparently decided that now would be a great time to ask players not just for their time and money, but also literally their blood. I'm assuming our sweat and tears will be harvested next. As part of the "Blood Harvest," from now until November 20, Diablo 4 players who are over 18 years old and live in the US can donate blood at any blood bank, get proof of their donation, and submit it online to fill up a blood fountain which will dish out in-game rewards every 222 quarts or so. All the rewards will be distributed on November 22.
At 33%, players will receive a collection of "Bloodpetal" weapon cosmetics. At 66%, the Diablo 4 community will get the Loch Raeth Maor Barbarian armor set. And when the fountain is finally 100% overflowing with blood, Diablo 4 will hand out the Vermillion Eye Piebald mount and, much more importantly, unlock a US-only sweepstakes that lets all players – even those who didn't donate blood – try for a beefy gaming PC which, I kid you not, has been "infused with real human blood."
Blizzard's blog post only says that the PC has been infused, but a press release specifies that the PC has been "infused with real human blood in its liquid cooling." Is the whole reservoir filled with blood? Of course not; I would bet anything that Blizzard added a drop of blood or plasma along with a bunch of red dye and normal coolant. I mean, I'm assuming this thing had to clear some kind of sanitary standard. Surely.
Anyway, here are the specs for this bloodstained PC:
- Intel Core i9 CPU
- Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 GPU
- 64GB of DDR5 RAM
- 3TB SSD
- Quantum Vector GPU water block system with red-and-black theming
And here's a look at the in-game rewards.
Donating blood is, of course, a good thing, and anything that gets people donating is arguably also a good thing. It's just a little... weird? A gaming PC infused with blood feels like the kind of thing we would've seen from games 15 years ago, but then again, Blizzard did previously get Megan Fox to eulogize Diablo 4 Hardcore players, so maybe I shouldn't be surprised by PR stunts like this anymore.
Still on the fence with Diablo 4? You can play the first 10 hours for free on Xbox this weekend. Here are some Diablo 4 tips to help you make the most of your time in Sanctuary.
