TL;DR: I came back here after years to find the same bunch of whiny babies complaining about everything in a great game.
I have been playing Diablo since D2 LoD, on and off anyway. I was young then, a boy at the time and I was fully invested in Diablo. I loved the music, the story, the ambiance, the combat, the builds, the min/max of endgame, the schoolkid rumors of things that could be done or obtained. One of my first online games and absolutely first online game I played with a friend I knew offline. It holds a special place in my heart.
When Diablo 3 launched, I was in the service stationed in Hawaii. I suffered with my friends as we stared at the login screen on launch day. I remember watching the absolute dumpster fire that the real money auction house turned into. Everyone called that one huh? I played D3 quite a bit… but also more casually, only getting invested in seasonal characters and ladders towards the end of its life cycle. You know what? I absolutely loved that game too. Sure, the art style (while beautiful for its time) was brighter and more colorful than the bleak, bloody and dark D2. We lost some beloved classes, and gained new ones that we thought were questionable at best. Over time D3 evolved in ways that made it a actually good experience. Many of the mainstay features of D3 today were not present at launch and I still played the Hell right out of it.
Diablo Immortal released, and I played it on PC. I didn’t hate it but unfortunately the fact that it was optimized for mobile meant it was a killed on start with me because I just can’t stand the model. I enjoyed the time I spent with it as a free player, which was surprising given the hate it received if you weren’t paid.
A few days ago, Diablo 4 launched to widespread acclaim. I as an old man now have not spent much time thinking about Diablo 4, as I never expected I would buy it (I will never pay $70 for a game again, period.) After the cumulative nocturnal emission of the entire collective male population of the internet over the game after launch I decided to buy it and you know what…?
I LOVE THIS ONE TOO, IDC what yall say. This game is gorgeous. The audio paints a picture in my mind that the visuals deliver in a way that satisfies my desire to return to the darkness of Diablo from the past while maintaining that “moving painting” style of art that made D3 so great to look at. I absolutely love the setting and story so far. I’m not far, to be honest. I’m excited to see what happens.
And what’s more! I LIKE THE COMBAT TOO, COME AT ME! Look, it was really cool running through rifts and pushing numbers that reach the billions while I sprint through as quick as I can, trying not to die in fast-paced twitch speed combat (for an old guy like me). I enjoyed the arcadey aspect of the rifts in D3, but I have to be honest… it was sort of boring after a while don’t you think? Once you get there, at some point you don’t have to think too much for the majority of content and there’s only so much strafe spam I can handle in my advanced age before I have to take a break. D4’s combat attempts to slow combat down, and force you to consider mechanics that are present as a result. It’s (in my experience) harder to tank that glowy red circle on the ground now. You can’t ignore it or just run through it faster than the animation can go off. You need to pick your targets more carefully as a result of this slow down, and forces you to make decisions that balance surviving vs control vs dps. I really don’t hate this. Frankly? It makes me feel so cool to whip around the battlefield dodging attacks and landing hits tactically, and oh yeah I CAN ACTUALLY SEE what’s going on instead of a spam of spells and a blur of motion.
So what am I so disappointed about? What is this thing that hasn’t changed? It’s you. This forum. The last time I spent any length of time on blizzard forums was when I played wow like 10 damn years ago and ya’ll are why. Back then, this community was filled with whiny brats who did nothing, NOTHING but piss and moan because they didn’t get their custom action figure in exactly the right shade of yellow belly. Frankly I’m not coming back here either, because I just don’t need this sort of negativity. I think D4 is the awesome, and I don’t care if you don’t. I’m gonna play, and I’m gonna have fun and you can keep whining about it here but I’m not gonna add to it.
Everything else aside, bravo Blizzard for a great game. Screw the haters.