Diablo 4 is about going back to its root and by root I mean Diablo 1 or 2 not 3. Diablo 2 has such a cool gothic vibe. There’s something in the silence and stillness & they bring a great sense of mystery. Diablo IV has satanic, punk rock vibe with everything heavily decorated with blood, guts, and symbols which is not a bad thing…just typical. It doesn’t feel like Diablo quite yet from character design down to the UI, except the world, the world is beautiful, tbh.
Animation could be better and more unique. Many deaths in this game including the bosses just quickly dissolve or blow up in blood pieces after they die…Just boring…Remember in D2, Andariel and the flame, Duriel explosion and earthquake, Mephisto with volcanic eruption, Diablo soul leaving his body or Baal vomiting his guts…so iconic and memorable. Or when you activate the gateways in D2 & the blue flame slowly rises with the nostalgic sound vs the way it is in Diablo 3 and 4. And I don’t know if it’s me or what but I do like the portal design in D2 with the swirling effect around its edge so prominent and it gets less and less after installments. Little things make big differences. You guys create such a beautiful and realistic world for D4 but too lazy to put such fine touches on those animations or effects…Same thing with D3. That would be a great misopportunity.
In-game cinematic needs refinements: Great job on this part. But the goal is trying to make these scenes look and feel like real cinematic but I know real cinematic has camera grain/noise, motion blur, letterbox, 24 fps, not to mention insane amount of detail. .The in game ones don’t have any of those which takes away the cinematic feel. Of course, they would never compare to the pre-rendered cinematic Blizzard is famous for but I would love to see some more efforts bringing some of those mentioned elements in order to narrow the gap. I notice, the prederened Lilith model looks more mature with more details on the horn and her face judging by looking at the CGI cinematic and artwork. The in-game model looks like the younger version of her, everything seems skinnier, the horn is smaller and less majestic which makes her less scary. Another point is that, with darker environments like in the Rathma scene, the lighting makes her feel more cinematic vs the first time she shows up in the church, the bright light behind her and glow makes it feel like the in-game quality right away. Hard to explain.
UI needs character. It’s not that the UI is bad but its tone and vibe are too similar to D3 so people get bored quickly because of lack of creativity. Remember when you finish the quest in Diablo 2 and its icon swirling in fire and fading away….We don’t have those moments in D4 UI……D2 UI has personality of its own, D4 UI is just like a messy mixture between the old and the new but mostly D3 with things just fade or slide in and out of the gameplay like PowerPoint slideshow. Players don’t wait almost a decade for this. Additionally, modern fonts, big buttons/white highlight, and spacing are only for modern applications not fitting well with a themed or game UI. Map overlay is a must but missing and the player position should be better highlighted. I have a hard time locating myself when opening the open world map, that white arrow just blends with everything which makes it difficult to distinguish.
Bosses could be more challenging. Some bosses are too slow to attack which makes it easy to defeat them if you keep running around and dodge all the attacks long enough. When they’re ready to attack you, you already move to another place. The marks on their health bar make it predictable to know when the health globe drops too. I mean Blizzard, they might be tanky but not powerful or dangerous at all. The ACT 1 boss looks and feels ridiculous. Just because everything is put in blood doesn’t mean it’s scary. In some ways, its design looks less scarier than the blood bishop which has a cooler design. Should make the bosses look cool and AI smart. I also don’t like how they’re usually being treated as typical boss fight event where the magic wall comes up and you can’t escape or flee until you die or defeat them. Back in the day, you go to kill Andariel and her minions down there and you can run away and go back again…no event not magic wall that blocks you from running away. Not every boss is the same because of the different settings and situations. Sometimes, you can flee…sometimes not… but you get the idea. Lastly, I’m looking for more dynamic gameplay mechanics. Currently, it feels somewhat repetitive especially the dungeons and some of the side quests.