TL:DR: Overall enjoyed the beta, visuals sound atmosphere and story are pretty top notch, good customization and plenty o’ loot, marred by various balance issues some meaningless content (cellars) awkward waypoint distribution and further marred by janky projectile hitboxes very janky PC arrow hitboxes and weird issues with the ambush script.
Hello,
I just cleared the main open beta campaign, did most of the side quests and one of the strongholds. I played as a Marksman Rogue because I wanted to give the good ol’ bow class a shot. This was on PC.
Throwing this out for feedback purposes in a “Good, Bad and Ugly” format.
THE GOOD
~Responsive combat: Everything felt snappy and responsive. No awkward delayed animations, no weird floatiness, I was able to move shoot and dodge without any issues. Felt good to just go around and blast some demons without any hassles with controls.
~Customization: Really liked the character customization options, and the transmog system is top notch. You can even dye your gear for no additional cost. I’ve seen some pretty neat (and silly) looking heroes running about.
I did find it funny that a game where you usually only see your character from an overhead perspective gets dyable armor before a certain MMORPG where people requested the feature for years…
~Atmosphere: Maybe I’m a sucker for snowy areas in general but the atmosphere of the Fractured Peaks was top notch. Absolutely breathtaking during daytime but certainly a spooky jog during nighttime, where I could get ambushed by any number of things at any point.
~Sound: Top notch work on the ambiance, music and sounds in general. With ranged weapons in games you can get something that sounds great and impactful or sounds like you thwapping something with a wet towel. (Read: World of Warcraft’s bow and gun sounds) I’m happy to say the bow and crossbow felt very impactful and sounded great.
The voice acting is also top notch across the board. I was pleasantly surprised to see that almost all the side quests have full voice acting and that it was done well. Usually that’s not a thing games do. Really help add to the atmosphere of the game.
~Story: The stories that unfold in Fractured Peaks kept my interest and I’m really looking forward to seeing how it wraps up in later acts. I also really liked all the side quests and how they had their own ongoing stories. Know in games like Diablo story isn’t seen as a high priority but hey, it goes a long way with me.
~A Lot To Do: The first area alone has around 40 side quests, there’s all the random events, plenty of dungeons to delve through and the strongholds to fight through. While you’re more than able to just plow through the main campaign there certainly wasn’t a lack of side things to do if I so chose.
~Lots of Loot: Unlike the debacle that was Diablo 3’s launch, Diablo 4 is not want for loot: I was able to find plenty of useful rares and legendaries without really straining myself or grinding for soulless hours just to get something like a two handed sword I can’t use. They also have really useful effects: I have a bow that splits my Penetrating Shot into two extra arrows that also pierce, and some pants that gives me a 25% reduction in damage for six seconds for using my basic ability. So forever as long as I’m in combat.
THE BAD
~Balance Clown Fiesta: I’m not going to speak on class balance: I only played my Mark Rogue and I don’t have time to fully level the other classes but even outside of that there’s some…issues.
Bosses can range from stunlocking add-spamming machines to dead in mere seconds. The most dangerous foe I fought was a dungeon spider boss that spewed spreading poison and webs that rooted, while summoning a dozen spiders that also root. Minions of hell? Nothing compared to a slightly larger spider.
Skills have some issues. Sure, I could get Rapid Fire that does decent single target damage but it roots you in place during it’s duration and has no crowd control. Or, I can get Penetrating Shot which pierces, takes a fraction of the cast time and does just as much if not more damage to multiple enemies. Sure it costs more energy but that’s rarely an issue. The talents also seem restrictive: I found it odd that the only infusion I could use as a Rogue is cold and while that makes sense for a Marks Rogue to use, what if I wanted to dabble with poison? Poison and arrows have been a combination since forever.
Strongholds are vastly tiers beyond one another. One has you going household to household clearing some demon mobs and destroying effigies, ending in a trio boss fight that can be overwhelming but really wasn’t too bad. Reasonable challenge. Another has you clearing a cathedral taken by vampires and here:
- You have large pustules that continuously spawn strong enemies as long as you’re near and are immune to all damage until you destroy multiple smaller pustules that, by the way, aren’t on your minimap. You’re constantly hounded until you destroy them.
- Every small pustule destroyed spawns mobs and every large one, in addition to spawning mobs until destroyed, will spawn a champion.
- The end boss spews a spread of projectiles that can shotgun you in mere moments and summons three unkillable adds that has a fast melee harasser, a rooting caster and a tank boi that provides a barrier that no attacks can go in or out of. The shotgun spread threat exists the whole fight.
The difficulty is worlds apart.
As you can see from forums and beyond class balance is a thing but I can’t add any input on that. Mark Rogue played fine for me. No real complaints.
~Cellars Are Meaningless: Cellars are described as ‘short dungeons that have varying content’. They’re sure short, but I’m somehow missing the content beyond the singular room that has a crowd of a similar size you’d run into right outside.
I had an event in a cellar once: It was to hunt for werewolves. That was the only time it deviated from having a singular elite and friends. Some actual content instead of a pack of mobs to fight would be welcomed otherwise I don’t see much of a reason to ever do them.
~Enemy Projectile Hitboxes Are Huge: A lot of bosses throw light bullet hell-ish projectile patterns and it looks like you can step between the patterns to dodge the attacks. Simple 3 shot V pattern? Stand between the shots, easy right?
But I still get tagged by at least one of the shots and visually it’s nowhere near me. This happens with every single enemy in the game that shoots a projectile. I can’t imagine melee trying to dodge anything with the size of the hitboxes. Sure it’s expected you take damage but either increase the size of the projectiles with accurate hitboxes, or shrink the hitboxes to fit the size of the projectile.
~Waypoint Distribution: Initially the waypoints are fine. The lower left of Fractured Peaks have waypoints close to one another but far away enough to be a convenience. Really the entire left side of the map has reasonable distribution.
I guess the waypoint budget ran out because the right side is extremely sparse. You have the southeastern WP (Which is locked behind a stronghold you must clear) and the Wolf Clan camp. Outside of that north of Kyovashad and almost the entirety of the right side of the Peaks you’re legging it. And you have to leg it there a lot.
I don’t know, maybe one directly to the right of Kyovashad? Then one directly north of that? You have to cover a whole lot of ground on the right side of the map in stark contrast to the left side and I certainly noticed when I was doing side quests and just overall exploring.
Where’s The Crafting?: I usually could care less about crafting but in games like D2, D3 and PoE it’s handy to be able to craft your own weapons and armor if luck isn’t on your side. Usually your crafted items aren’t going to be quite as good as drops (There are exceptions) but they would allow you to stay at the ‘par’ expected of you at your level. As I played I noticed I got a ton of materials: Lot of leather, ores, various other objects dropped from mobs…I bet I can make some neat stuff!
Except you can’t. The only crafting items I could find are elixirs. You can’t craft anything else besides. (I don’t count gems because you’re more upgrading them than crafting them) This seems like a huge waste? Like I said before it’s not like loot is a problem but being able to craft my own stuff would be pretty neat. Seems like a huge waste to have all these materials and the only thing you use them for is to upgrade your gear by 5 Ilvls each time.
THE UGLY
~WHERE ARE MY ARROWS GOING: While I experienced many threats and dangers during my time in D4 none were more dangerous than archways and mobs near walls. All too often ranged mobs are taking potshots at me through archways and, as a ranged class I return fire.
Unless they are directly, and I mean directly, in the middle of the archway my shots either hit an invisible wall or vanish. All too often an enemy against a wall will be immune to my shots unless (sometimes) I get pointblank and fire from the side of them. This made it infuriating to handle mobs in inside locations because turns out D4 has a lot of archways.
This needs fixed.
~Ambush Overkill: Let me make this clear: I love how out in the world the enemies can set traps and ambush you. It’s a great perspective check, you’re not always the hunter when hell is roaming around.
There are times where it goes to extremes. I seen a cellar that I wanted to explore early in my experience (Before I realized cellars were ultimately meaningless) and it was guarded by a few packs of bandits. Clear them, head onto an ice lake and then a large pack of bandits smokebomb into existence. That’s fine, let me kite them around and another pack of bandits poof in. And another. And another.
Suddenly I found myself surrounded by 50-60 bandits. I’m not exaggerating. I had to run for my life when yet another ambush of bandits popped up.
I don’t know if it’s a % chance for the ambush event to trigger upon reaching a location or what exactly the trigger is, but I had it go to ‘overkill’ levels a few times. It’s one thing for me to be overambitious and pull over my head but I’m just trying to get somewhere. That’s an awkward reason to get swarmed by dozens of mobs out of nowhere.
CONCLUSION
Usually with Diablo and Diablo-type games I don’t ask for a lot: Snappy combat, lots of mobs to slaughter, cool and consistent loot. Diablo 4 meets this and brings a lot of quality visuals, sound and content. I overall really enjoyed my time in the open beta.
As mentioned there are issues, some more severe than others but we got months for that to get fixed up. As long as it is I think I’ll really enjoy D4. I have some pretty high hopes for the finished product and hope they’re met. Thankfully lot of games to play until then.
And I guess I could always boot up PoE if things go south. Once I find and dust off that encyclopedia to even get started with the game…
Thanks for reading, if you did.