Diablo IV Reviews Suggest It's More Of The Same, In A Good Way

The first three Acts of [Diablo IV] can be addressed in any order you like, provided you’re willing to do a little grinding (and let’s be honest, if you aren’t, you must be lost to get this far). With each located in far-flung and geographically diverse corners of the map, this structure makes the prospect of playing again as other characters more appealing. For those without that kind of free time, beating the Campaign with a single character thankfully gives you the option to skip it with the next.

We are back to the bleak, gothic horror of the second game. I think [Diablo III] got unfairly maligned in that regard but yes, this is pure [Diablo II]. Washed-out, bloody, but still in many areas, grotesquely gorgeous. At worst, a bit muddy in a few zones. Fresh detail has been put into your hero specifically, between the character creator and some really beautiful work on the armor and weapons this time around that will greet you each time you log into the game. I’ve already had a blast going through transmog with my limited farmed selection of gear.

By virtue of its format alone, [Diablo IV] is a tad limited with what it can really do to push the complexity of its dungeon diving, probably — but I feel even in this case, there’s more that could have been done. There are no puzzles to work out, most of the later bosses are variants, and it doesn’t feel like there’s enough of a reward for straying from the main path.

Experimentation is further encouraged by Diablo IV’s low cost to respec, and unlimited chances to do so. Unlike the more punishing approach in Diablo II, you can completely redefine your build at any time for a small fee of in-game gold, approaching your skill tree with a different idea in mind or just making some small changes to adjust for a difficult fight. This freedom is empowering in a similar way to that of Diablo III’s fluid build system, but still requires you to engage meaningfully with synergies to make your builds viable. It feels like the culmination of all the ways previous games in the series have allowed you to play while catering to as many playstyles as possible, but without many of the critical compromises from the last time out. The cost for a respec does naturally increase the higher your level, but it never got to a point where I felt it was too expensive in relation to the amount of gold I was earning at the time.

Diablo IV’s biggest issue is the lack of innovation. Every gameplay improvement and feature is built upon lessons learned from previous entries. Though it’s polished to the brightest of sheens, in no way does it feel like a massive improvement upon the preceding games. Remember how I said the Diablo games have always felt like paradigm shifts in their genre whenever one releases? The disappointing part of Diablo IV is that it doesn’t feel like that. Setting the game in a massive open world isn’t enough and though it’s exciting to explore, at times the only element I feel it adds to core Diablo is that there is no loading in between hubs anymore and players can now travel there on foot. It’s been 11 years since the last game and I’ll be damned to determine what exactly Diablo IV does far better than Diablo III: Reaper of Souls when it reached the end of development.

First is the faultless rhythm at which the game is paced, so that every few minutes you’re either hitting a new level, finding a new weapon, discovering a new location, or being sent on a new mission. It feels almost scientifically measured to make sure that you don’t go more than a few minutes without a small treat.

Diablo 4 is an isometric action RPG. It’s all about incrementally gaining loot and shaping your character in whatever way you’d like, within the limitations of their class.

So far, nothing has convinced me the endgame is so brilliant that it’s worth stripping everything out of the initial leveling process. The thin storytelling doesn’t help either—thankfully you can skip it on subsequent characters. Diablo 4 is a live service game that puts an insulting amount of effort into trying to convince you it’s not. It’s backwards; trying to build up to the most robust part of itself instead of starting with it. The moment entering a fresh dungeon feels more like a chore than a ride is the moment Diablo loses me, and I’ve been worryingly close to that feeling in my time with it so far.

Oftentimes, your ability to succeed in any given encounter will come down to how well you’re controlling your character, or managing cooldowns and the unique class-specific resource pools which replace Diablo 3's universal mana. The precision Blizzard has injected into handling is felt most keenly in battles with Boss, Champion, Elite, and Super Unique ranked enemies, instances which demand precise movement and quick reactions. Every class now has a dodge roll as standard, and agility can be greatly enhanced by investing in movement abilities such as Dash, Leap, or Teleport, allowing you an opportunity to more deftly weave through domineering attacks with strict invincibility frames.

But in stretching the intimate, deliberate claustrophobia of Diablo’s original one-town scope to fit a whole world, it’s lost that taut sense of terror that so beautifully defined the series’ smaller and more vulnerable spaces. There’s now a fixed overworld map for the continent of Estuar, and it’s enormous. The procedurally generated dungeons don’t vary much in layout and feel like missed opportunities to have fun with randomized architecture — and no, adding more dungeon to a dungeon doesn’t necessarily make it better or more interesting. Capstone dungeons — multi-stage trials that function as gear/level checks between difficulty tiers — feel like a non-solution from a sadistic bureaucracy instead of an invitation to get rich or die trying.

Despite the nearly three decades worth of robust lore, the Diablo series has always struggled with delivering the main story in a compelling way. Sure the cutscenes are always cool, but the classic tale of good vs evil is always played out through two-dimensional villains who have no real motivation for their actions other than “that is what the bad guys are supposed to do.” In Diablo 4, Lilith could not be more the opposite. Unlike the Lords of Hell, Lilith feels like a real character. She has a compelling backstory, complex motivations, and is relentless in the pursuit of her ideals. For the first time in the series, I can actually sympathize with why the antagonist is doing the things she is doing, a vital ingredient in the making of a great villain. The same three-dimensionality also extends to many of the other characters in the game. Although there was plenty of loss and hardship in the prior games, it feels much more heart-wrenching and sinister in Diablo 4, making the story and characters quite possibly the best improvement the game brings to the series.

Live service games require a foundation of trust, as meaningful updates ostensibly justify these inconveniences. Before you buy Diablo 4, ask yourself if you trust Blizzard to deliver an experience that will only get better into the foreseeable future. Otherwise, you’ll need to be content knowing that Diablo 4 could change at any moment, either for better or for worse.

Another way I wish the developers would have strayed a bit from the hack and slash basics is the near impossibility of performing a role different than DPS (damage per second). While you can apply crowd control effects like stuns or conditions like vulnerable that can be exploited by everyone, there’s no way to create a fully dedicated support character right now. That also means you may be standing near another player, whether you’re in a party for a dungeon or you’re just fighting a world boss alongside a group of randoms, but there’s not much in the way of actual teamwork due to lacking mechanics.

What Blizzard has succeeded in is creating one of its most compelling characters within its catalog of games. Lilith, the central antagonist of Diablo IV and mother of Sanctuary, is without one of the best additions to the Diablo series by far, with this only amplified by Caroline Faber’s performance. While she is no doubt driving Sanctuary to the brink of madness, there is something human about Lilith that makes her the most interesting antagonist in the series to date. However, despite Diablo IV introducing a new antagonist and even a new cast of characters, it is a narrative determined to retread old ground. Homages and even references to prior Diablo games, specifically Diablo II, feel as though they are reassuring players this is not Diablo III, for better or worse. This hinders what new ideas Diablo IV presents, as the narrative seems caught up in trying to tell the same story as its predecessors.

But as annoying as the shop is, it doesn’t ruin the design of the game like the real-money auction house did in Diablo 3. The game offers a wealth of high-quality content, and speaking from experience, there’s no need to touch the store at all to enjoy it. Diablo 4 is categorically not Diablo Immortal. It’s a real AAA game with an optional shop. If you love the genre, I have no doubt that you’ll get your money’s worth, even if you never play a season or roll a second character.