While the gameplay was superb and the visuals were wonderful… the story however, was barely acceptable at the best of times. And at the worst of times? I believe a steaming pile of hot garbage would be the best way to describe this mess.
Frankly, when compared to even D3, which had at least epic themes, large scale battles and a feeling of impending doom… D4 instead gave us cry babies, and MCU style jokes. It was also embarrassing, to go to war against hell, with an Angels army of just 8 soldiers. The scale of conflict was laughably small, and made it feel like nothing important was going on.
And let us not forget to mention the pathetic and silly villains, like our dear, boring, weak Lilith who spends 99.9% of the game, talking people to death.
But at least this game has inspired me to load up the classics (D2,D3), so I can wash the bitter taste of lame story writing out of my mouth.
This topic is one of those “now I know I’m getting old” moments for me. I rank it right up there with the kid on Tiktok a month back who unironically suggested a landline as innovative new tech.
Here’s the deal: those of us who actually went through the butterfly death, as it was relevant in that era of human history, do NOT want to go back to that. I don’t want to hear McGuffins yelling “the FALLEN STAR has AWAKENED ME” because Blizz didn’t want to reveal that plot twist in the open beta. I don’t want Belial to fall off his chair and pop his monocle off his face because we saw through his master plot. I definitely don’t think we need another showing of Diablette’s butt cheeks sauntering towards heaven.
That’s just… not a good chapter in the book of story telling.
But now we’ve arrived at a time in human history where people are, presumably seriously, asking to go backwards. And I cannot WAIT until you get off my lawn so that I can go back to enjoying D4.
Lillith was more underdelivered than Thanos. Final act felt super rushed and like the real final act is going to be sold back as an expansion. But hey, at least we got Mis-phisto to match She-ablo. Now all we need is Ba-lady to complete the collection.
Where were the massive scenic fights like in other Diablo though? I seem to remember D3 having like a huge war in heaven and battles that took up the whole screen. I haven’t played that game in years though.
Lilith got a bad deal. They fridged their best character before a single content drop.
Diablo was never meant to be series about massive scenic fights and “huge wars” . Ever. Diablo 3 is what brought that nonsense to the table as the norm.
Diablo 1 and Diablo 2 were never about that as the focus nd Diablo 4 was trying to go back closer to it’s roots. A Gothic horror action game.
Obviously giant fights are fine, but Diablo 3 was waaaay closer to a high fantasy style of game.
I agree with the other poster. This is very much a “I must be getting old” moment if people are expecting super fantastical wars and battles from Diablo instead of dread and horror.
Yeah I agree the battlefield could have been 10x bigger with a lot more enemies on the screen, explosions everywhere, and a truly intense and epic war. But instead we got a linear path with barely anyone around except a few minions incoming in slow waves.
But I loved the cinematic and the finale, and the finale of the finale too.
Are you talking about the fighting that happens in the zones as you move through them or the drawing parts? There’s no cinematics with wars like the one depicted in D4. Most of the battles we saw were things happening in the zone, like the Act 3 zones where Azmodan’s army is invading Arreat in the background as you’re on the castle ramparts or angels popping onto the landscape to fight off demons in Act 4.
D4 the only true demon invasion is Caldeum. Armies haven’t marched anywhere else…yet. That hell gate is hilariously still open. Like the writers/devs completely forgot to address that.
The whole entryway into hell looked bad. Like bad graphics. The sections of hell they chose for us looked like a weird… early 2000’s texture on a map the size of a peanut. Then the fat guy dies from what amounts to basically stepping on a thumbtack.
What a bizarre and terrible last section I forgot how stupid it was.
It’s fine for you to like it man, it doesn’t make his experience invalid.
He’s far from the only one to mention the bird-brain arc of the last hour or two of the campaign, just as you’re far from the only one to say it was the greatest experience of their life.
