I’ve consistently complained that DF feels too lighthearted. However, after playing Diablo IV, I’ve come to appreciate WoW’s balance a bit more. From my understanding Diablo has always been a bleak and terribly beautiful world. There’s death and hopelessness around every corner, with everybody just trying to survive. Though I loved Diablo IV’s story, the bleak world filled with nothing, but monsters really made me feel kind of numb to it all after a while. It became difficult finding anything worth salvaging in Sanctuary.
Everywhere I went to was just more things trying to kill me, shabbier and broken-down towns, and downtrodden folks trying to get by. So, after a while I just stopped caring. I knew what to expect everywhere I went. There wasn’t really any surprises imho. Demons suck, angels suck, people suck, the world in itself sucks… but I’ll do what I can.
In WoW I’ve come to be reminded how nuanced the world actually is. The new blue dragonflight quests also seem to capture this vibe perfectly. MoP was hated at the time for how uplifting and “goofy” it all was, but it had its darker aspects while also being more uplifting and fun. Then it was to be followed by more war and genocide such as the Legion and BFA expansions. I’m sure we’ll look back at DF as one of those more peaceful and uplifting years, when we’re once again stuck in the muck of some grimdark narrative that brutally kills off beloved characters.
I guess I just needed to be reminded of that after playing Diablo IV. People who think this light hearted tone for WoW is going to last forever… it surely won’t, so try to find some appreciation in it while you can. During MoP, many people then even proclaimed it was the death of WoW. That it was the turning point in the story where WoW could no longer be taken seriously because of the goofy pandas and doing “chores” on farmville. Ironic that years later would follow some of the bleakest and darkest expansions WoW has ever produced which was Legion and BFA.
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I find it odd how Sanctuary exists at all, what with hordes of demons showing up to rip up peoples lawns every other year.
That and how the High Heavens are happy for Hell to essentially just swallow it up…you’d think they’d be making their own bid for it.
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Isn’t there a quest where Alexstraza is going to be raped and bred in the upcoming patch or am I misremembering?
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Yeah, that quest is being removed and to be fair, not even a game as dark as Diablo has the player character ever be complicit or try to justify such acts. I can see why people wanted no part of it; just feels unnecessary.
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You are the light in the darkness. I love that aspect. The world is so dark that when a sweet moment happens because you made it happen, it actually feels impactful.
Meanwhile, its hard to care about anything in DF because it’s so cartoony and light-hearted and everything kind of solves itself anyways. You don’t even need to be there. Heck, canonically we’ll hear that “Alexstraza’s Forces” took care of Razsageth.
In D4, you, the Wanderer, a core pivotal figure and you are the shining light that brings hope so what you do feels like it matters.
It was, in a way. Subs went down massively. MoP forced Blizzard to reevaluate their monetization of the game due to how poorly it was going, which resulted in them attempting yearly expansions, which resulted in the bombing of WoD because they couldn’t get there.
MoP was a disaster for this franchise. It didn’t start to recover until Legion.
50 years have passed between D3 and D4.
Also, to note, D1 took place in a single town. And something like 20 years passed between D2 and D3. So we have 1 incident with D1/D2, a 20 year gap, another big incident, and now a 50 year gap.
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D4 actually goes pretty hard lol
But I love the grand adventure tone of DF. Really feels like we’re in foreign lands, exploring and whatnot… one of the best overall feels for any expansion imo
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This is the dumbest part of the Diablo games.
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I get what you’re saying but Diablo IV (imo) didn’t make me feel like that at all. Everything was so bleak and miserable, it felt like everything I did was for nothing. SPOILERS Lilith goes out of her way to tell me that I’ve only spurred on the endless conflict with my decisions. I couldn’t rescue any of my friends like Vigo, Donan, Yoren, heck… not even Lorath considering what he did to himself (tree). The story even ends on a note where Nyrelle ends up going on her own of her own volition. Sanctuary still sucks and ultimately my contribution to Sanctuary only feels like we’re stuck back at square one with demons invading the place and no end to the endless conflict.
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The sidequests are more hopeful.
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I agree with that, I particularly enjoyed the ones with the priestess.
Those ones felt nice because you went out of your way to help the struggling people.
Even going out of your way to help that (I presume lesbian) couple in the cannibal city.
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Because Imperius vomits a little when ever he thinks of Sanctuary lol.
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OP, I’m of the opposite mind actually. I’m not saying WoW should go full bore Diablo tone but some grit over here would be appreciated. The stakes especially need to be raised when it comes to villains and even “heroes”.
I’d like to see more grounded gear, the Castle Nathria plate set is a good example of this. I’d like to see an actual “perpetual” warfront that we contribute to and expand during our play. The strongholds from Diablo 4 would be interesting over here. Just the idea of our play changing the environment would be great.
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I kinda liked that about the Diablo series, if I’m being honest.
And I say this as someone who isn’t playing Diablo 4, so it’s not fanboy-ism lol.
Wasn’t humanity (in that game) the result of a demon and angel union? The heavens rightfully see us as tainted, and they aren’t wrong based on how humans act.
I also liked how heaven itself was almost just as bad as hell. Heaven just cares about itself, and there’s infighting, and the “good” angels like Tyrael left.
One think I hate about WoW is how infallible and perfect the non-villains are.
Like, does Alexstrasza herself have any faults? She’s the main character of Dragonflight, and she’s boring.
She’s beautiful and does everything right- that’s extremely boring to me! And she’s a fan favorite. :-/
TLDR - Upbeat all the time is boring, and darker tones make stuff feel way more realistic, because the world is an insanely dark place in real life.
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Yeah, that’s kind of what I’m highlighting is that WoW may appear as “upbeat all the time”, but in actuality it’s just a small period that’s an expansion. WoW was also pretty upbeat during MoP, which yes, the faction war was at the center, but the focus was mainly the importance of peace and taking a moment to breathe. I feel DF is of a similar vein. When you think about the last three expansions, they were all pretty grimdark and depressing.
Legion killed off many beloved characters and kicked off with a tragedy on the Broken Shore. This was followed up by mass genociding a playable race in BFA, and pitting both Alliance and Horde against one another, killing off more beloved characters like Saurfang. This was followed up by Shadowlands, where we spend majority of the expansion in a place where souls are condemned to eternal torment, and find out another beloved character was tortured until he was a vegetable anima sphere.
I’d say DF is the first time in a long while in the WoW universe that things were actually upbeat and uplifting compared to say… the last 6 or 7 years.
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I understand what you mean, it’s just relatively upbeat compared to several other darker games in recent memory, like the souls titles and Elden Ring as well.
DF pulled me back in because it was, for once, an expansion about healing instead of more war.
Of course there’s villains, there always will be, but the overarching theme of the expansion is about coming back home, after a long time way.
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Yeah, though I do prefer a bit darker flavor to my tone, Diablo IV kind of made me scratch my chin a bit. The game is pretty grim 90% of the time, which I think is the appeal. Though it really got me questioning the strengths of WoW’s world. Personally, I tend to only appreciate WoW’s more uplifting moments when they’ve long since passed, oddly enough. Like MoP… I didn’t really enjoy it at the time and found it boring, but as the years passed and I was in the middle of Legion, I really appreciated some things about it.
I appreciated my little farm, and sitting with Wrathion and Anduin as they discussed philosophy in the MoP legendary quest. I appreciated the beauty of the zones like the Vale, which was (back then) not healed yet and destroyed husk. Right now in DF, I’m kind of feeling meh about the vibe, like… I WISH SOMETHING CRAZY WOULD HAPPEN! However, I do think I’ll look back and appreciate the fact they took the time to write more heartfelt quests like the Blue Dragonflight one etc as well.
These more uplifting memories will probably be more impactful down the line when things get dark again. Knowing WoW’s track record, they are bound to get dark which is what I also hope people take away from DF. Looking at it now through a new lens, I don’t think DF is the sign of the tone for the foreseeable future, more so like MoP, just a small period of breathing room until we get to the real stuff again.
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diablos kinda always been like that. Every time you win you actually didn’t because lmao demons are ebil and unkillable and angels are unkillable and dumb.
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This is how Blizzard writes all of their games though. I especially like when we stop a villain only for them to continue doing the bad thing after we win the fight.
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Dark Helmet: Evil will always triumph, because good is dumb!
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