Diablo 4 | Review

Initial Release Date: June 6, 2023

Platforms: PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X and Series S, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Microsoft Windows

Mode: Multiplayer and Single Player

Composer: Ted Reedy

Genres: Hack and Slash, Adventure, Fighting

Developer: Blizzard Entertainment

Publisher: Blizzard Entertainment

SPOILERS THROUGHOUT!

Introduction

Before I start if you want to watch gameplay visit Diablo 4 Gameplay Playlist. My experience with the Diablo franchise consists of beating Diablo 3 Ultimate Edition, fifteen hours of Diablo Immortal and playing through a quarter of Diablo 2 Resurrection’s campaign.

Let me preface this review by telling you I am not one of those gamers who can tell you how to make a specific build-type that does specific thing etc. However, I can say from my experience and roughly 70+ hours of playtime prior to Diablo 4 that Diablo hasn’t had a strong story in the Diablo’s I played until now.

So rejoice, Diablo has a story now. Well, Diablo 4 does at least and it’s probably the most impressive aspect of the game in my opinion. Also, Blizzard Entertainment did change the overall design of Diablo’s map for Diablo 4.

Going for an open world GAAS, MMO styled map. The map of Sanctuary is huge. You have a steed to get around for a reason. Over this review I will dig into Diablo 4’s Presentation, story, gameplay, visuals, music. fun-factor and tone in what I believe is a fun game with almost limitless content to the single player.

Presentation

My amazon copy of Diablo 4 was three days late so I downloaded Diablo 4 digitally two days after it launched. I thought the connection would be fine by then since Blizzard were conducting all of those server slams prior to launch. Nope.

Technically, netcode-wise Diablo 4 didn’t leave a a good impression on me. Plenty of rubberbaning (when your character moves one way and gets pulled back). It looks funny but can get you killed quick in Diablo.

I had plenty of instances where I was dropped due to the game’s connection. So yea, not a pretty first impression regarding Diablo 4’s opening few days. Aside from the shit netcode early on pretty much everything else was really good.

I loved Sanctuary (Earth sorta) as a playground. I really grown to like some of the characters and antagonists. The world of Sanctuary is bleak, depressing and haunting just like a Diablo game should be. I only reached level 45 with my Druid build which I played solo so this review won’t contain post-game opinions.

I played through the campaign solo, did some dungeons and side quests. Presentation of Diablo 4 is top notch, from it’s eerie music, to solid visuals running on my Playstation 5. Gameplay and it’s fantasy warrior fantasy is all here.

Now I hate the fact Diablo 4 is always online. I really do. It sucks extra for me because I upload gameplay videos to Youtube as I play games and with my below average USA internet it sucks even more. Diablo 4 at $69.99 is a absolute steal in value. It took me close to 30 hours to streamline the main story with some side stuff.

I had so many side quests stacked that the game said I couldn’t except anymore by the time I beaten Lilith. You take into account the future GAAS nature, how massive Sanctuary is, how much to do and play with all of the other classes?

You have over a thousand hours of content out of the box at launch and that’s without future expansions. So yes, Diablo 4 might have the best bang for the buck at launch when it comes to video games. Until Starfield…..

Story

If you tend to be a lone wolf type of gamer like myself and just want to play Diablo 4 for it’s story please do. The story was really good and cohesive with gameplay. Diablo 4 had so many in-engine cutscenes telling all sides of the Eternal Conflict.

Diablo 4’s story starts out with a random warrior collapsing in a cave to avoid a blizzard. Unknowingly at first the Prime Evil Mephisto saves said warrior from death only to help him slay his daughter name Lilith. Lilith is a Lesser Evil and the main antagonist of Diablo 4 known as “Mother” and daughter of God of Hatred Mephisto.

Lilith created Sanctuarary, a place where she hoped angels and demons along with humans could escape and be free from the Eternal Conflict between Heaven and Hell. Sounds good right? The thing is Lilith wanted to destroy the Prime Evil Mephisto and he wasn’t having that.

Lilith wants to be free from The Prime Evils. For the record, these are all Hell’s Gods I am writing about here. Anyways, that’s where the player comes in. Mephisto basically guides the hero warrior into getting a World Stone that can trap and seal Gods. Much of the early story has you tracking down Elias, Lilith’s disciple and pupil of Lorath.

To do the latter you meet great characters such as Lorath Nahr and Donan who are both Horadrim (special warriors of magic). Lorath is like Deckard Cain from past Diablo games. You also have Neyrelle, a young Horadrim who loses her mother to Lilith early in the story.

Along the way you meet Taissa a witch who joins and helps out. The Cathedral of Light are the holy guard of Sanctuary lead my soldier angel Inarius and Reverenced Mother Prava. The Cathedral of light were clowns. My god Inarius was a clown. He could have defeated lilith but hubris and arrogance got him killed in the end.

Inarius killed his own son to appease Heaven. He was worse than Lilith considering Inarius was an Angel and Lilith a Hell Goddess says a lot. Inarius and Lilith actually had a kid named Rathma (who Inarius murdered).

Diablo 4 is littered with good story-telling. Take Donan and his son Yorin for example. Yorin gets killed by Lilith which in turns drives Donan into depression and grief-stricken going forward. With Taissa’s help Donan breaks free of his grief and focuses on slaying Lilith again. Donan himself dies near the end of the story before fighting Lilith.

Story is depressing and dark. Many of the NPCs I grown to like will either died or been maimed like young Neyrelle. Lorath cuts her arm off to save her life when she get’s infected with poison. As doom and gloom as Diablo 4’s story was it was told in a focused and concise easy to understand manor.

I am just scratching the proverbial surface of Diablo 4’s story here. there are so many NPC’s with their own stories and collectibles to collect that further fleshes out Sanctuary’s lore. I recommend just playing Diablo 4 for it’s story if you like what I written above.

Gameplay

Diablo 4 is a action role-playing top down Hack ‘n slash video game. I played Diablo 4 on my Playstation 5 for reference. Aside from the shitty netcode the game looked and ran decent yet had some glitches and bugs. The latter weren’t serious just odd to see happen. Diablo 4 is a real warrior fantasy game.

You choose between five classes between Necromancer, Barbarian, Druid, Sorcerer and Rogue. I choose Druid for my first class. I usually choose Barbarian in Diablo. I thought about choosing the Necromancer first. Playing the Druid solo was fine until I got to Lilith. She wrecked me until I beat her at level 44.

The Druid was a fun fantasy warrior. Druid is like a mix between a hippy barbarian and sorcerer. As a druid you can use the earth and sky to pulverize enemies. You can transform into a Werewolf or a Werebear which I did. I unlocked and leveled up stone, storm, wolves, with werebear pulverize.

I cannot stress the importance of builds and how they affect your playstyle and how much you damage enemies. Class builds truely are dynamic and takes some thought and reading the skill tree. You can respec anytime with coin.

I started my solo Druid playthrough on world Tier 2 then went down to World Tier 1 later in the story campaign due to the bosses wrecking me. Sanctuary is “earth” if you will. The map of Sanctuary is massive and diverse in it’s locals. You have deserts, jungles, swamps, high grassy-lands, beaches and snow tundra.

Diablo 4’s gameplay loop revolves around marking a point on the map. Following that point to an objective. Complete said objective and portaling back to a blacksmith or whatever to level up your gear. Rinse and repeat. At the start of Act IV you get a horse to travel with.

Content is one thing Diablo 4 doesn’t have to worry about. You will never get bored in Sanctuary. Plenty of quests, dungeons, random events and enemies of all types to conquer in Diablo 4. But what about fun Jason? It’s fun. I mean, once you played a fixed camera isometric ARPG you sorta played them all.

But like I said the story and open world are huge changes for Diablo 4 in particular. I never got tired of running around Sanctuary as a Druid with my trusty wolves. It’s addicting and time consuming as all hell.

Visuals/Graphics

I loved Diablo 4’s art more than anything. It’s darker, more mature and exacting compared to Diablo Immortal and Diablo 3. It’s difficult to judge the textures when Diablo 4’s camera is so high up on a bird’s eye view.

From what I can tell the textures were good not great. Sanctuary’s design and various locals featured great art that Blizzard is know for. Towns, villages, ruined hell-scapes, demons you name it everything had a grounded dark fantasy-look. Plus the game runs at sixty frames per second when it wasn’t rubber-banding.

Sound/Music

Ahh that guitar strum is back! Diablo 4’s music is a blend of bluegrass, rock, metal with atmospheric beats. Diablo 4 was composed by Ted Reedy who did a bang-up job with it’s soundtrack. Music elevated and revitalized the world of Sanctuary. Voice acting was surprisingly great lead by well-written characters and voice actor’s performances.

Tips and Tricks

I’m no Diablo build-pro guy in the slightest. I will say design your Druid around werebear and Werewolf Core skills. Most importantly, just have fun and don’t rush your playthrough due to so much in-game content. You get your steed at the start of Act 4. Just sayin

Final Verdict

Rejoice! If you always wanted to play Diablo but held off due to it’s lack of story I recommend you buy this game just to play it solo for it’s story. To all of the Diablo veterans you know this game is loaded from top to bottom with content.

I had fun living the Druid fantasy and defeating Lilith in Sanctuary. Diablo 4 besides the upcoming Startfield has the most single player content out of the box. I’m taking value here.

In an age where video games are expensive and lack content Diablo 4 shines. Granted, I did have connection and technical issues while playing. I warned you. With that said I loved the story, gameplay and content level of this beast game. Thanks for stopping by – Jason

8/10