Diablo IV is still very addictive and offers something new for newcomers and veterans of the series.
Diablo IV Early Access is finally out, and I had plenty enough for a first impression of the game. After playing it extensively, I have seen that Blizzard is definitely making good progress compared to the other Betas. Though there are still a few improvements to be made and a long way ahead of the June 6, 2023 release, we still expect a better game when it finally releases. In the meantime, let’s talk about my experience in this Early Access version, including the things I liked slightly less than anticipated.
That being said to anyone who has been playing any of the previous Diablo games and going into the new one. Obviously, the core mechanism of the series is still very much present in Diablo IV, and gameplay-wise, it feels just as good, if not even better.
Among some of the changes being made, one thing that remains as solid as ever is the classes and builds diversity. I thoroughly enjoyed trying out each class and the builds before deciding on one that really clicked. Every class has a path you can choose depending on what you enjoy the most and what challenges lie ahead. And there are enough mechanisms in the game that help promote each class.
The transition into a more traditional node-like skill tree for the classes also helps by giving us a greater sense of control over the final outcome without sacrificing the possibility of still making choices as you build your character up. There is one cost, however, as respecing a character can become prohibitively expensive at later levels if you do it a little bit too often. But we can expect those to drop off on higher-end, more rewarding content that becomes available later.
Of course, this would only matter if combat and spells were satisfying. Luckily they do, and even compared to the previous Diablo games. There’s a greater focus now on enemy reaction and animations, which combine with improved graphical effects, to give you that feeling of impact with each and every single attack. You’re always incentivized to jump into the biggest group possible and unleash your strongest attacks to send all enemies flying and see what you can do.
Loots and special items further facilitate this power fantasy, and even as early as level 25, Diablo IV lets you create some very strong and diverse setups due to the sheer number of effects for each class. This may sometimes feel overwhelming as you shuffle through countless legendaries to see which effect best fits your current setup. On a few occasions, I found myself distracted by the number of enticing effects that needed me to do a full respec of the character before them out.
Loot is overly abundant despite Blizzard saying loot showers won’t be as prevalent as in the previous games. While that’s true to a certain extent, eventually, the difference becomes less and less distinguishable to the point that you are still getting overwhelmed by loot drops regardless. That being said, the rate of legendary drops in the Beta was more than reasonable, and the ratio seemed good so far.
Character customization was another aspect I really appreciated through the isometric nature of Diablo IV, even though the game isn’t permitting a full-on detailed look. Even so, from the character operation screen of the Abundant gear system and transmog, the game has done a great job at letting players be who they want to be within the confinements of the game’s theme.
However, Diablo IV suffers a bit due to some of the cooler-looking skins’ lack of skin transfer. Certain good-looking weapons and armor cannot be salvaged, so you can’t have their skins transmog onto other pieces of gear. This seems like a missed opportunity on Blizzard’s part unless they obviously have other ways to make that possible. Even if there is an option for this, I have yet to find it.
As for the other features, a few of which I’ve seen other people complaining about or praising, is the user interface. I personally don’t care about the UI that much, even though some players say that Diablo IV looks more like a mobile game, and some quoted that it looks exactly like Diablo III. None of these matters as long as it’s a new Diablo game. Also, Graphics wise, the game looks good. I liked the more realistic and gritty approach than Diablo III’s cartoonish style. That’s my opinion; you don’t have to agree with it.
On the same note, the same stance stays about Diablo IV’s main story. While I like the presentation, and the main villain Lilith is an interesting concept, I often found myself skipping through dialogues and cutscenes due to the Beta time limit. Hopefully, this will change in the final release.
Another feature I’m not too sold on is the requirement to be Always Online. I appreciate being able to play with my friends and invite them to parties seamlessly, but this always leads to performance and stability problems.
Also, I cannot say too much about the monetization aspect of Diablo IV since we haven’t seen the full extent of it. Still, if Blizzard keeps true to its word and receives a temptation not to ruin another game, it might just turn up fine. As long as they strictly keep that to the seasonal passes and a few other cosmetic items in the shop, it will be fair enough if they don’t affect progression in any way now.
Unfortunately, this was yet another Beta that couldn’t eliminate performance and server issues on day one. Having cross-play enabled on the PC caused the most issues, including lag spikes and disconnects, which is why we had to turn the game off completely a few times. However, when I played it on PlayStation 5, there were no issues with disconnects or performance. So clearly, PC has some issues here, and this is something to be paid attention to by Blizzard since there will be more PC gamers than PS5 for Diablo IV.
Also, the world boss timer didn’t work the first day though I will give Blizzard credit for solving it within minutes. Obviously, stress testing the server was the purpose of the spawn times though all the issues do not inspire much confidence for the Open Beta since the player base will be much larger after the final launch. Hopefully, I’m wrong, but most of Blizzard’s past games and expansions had massive server and quality issues around the launch. So I’m keeping hopes too high, and of course, these are all technical issues, in theory, can be fixed easily.
However, I noticed a few problems that have to do more with game design. One of them is the repetitive nature of the dungeon gameplay, which is supposed to be the core of Diablo IV. On one side, there were a few too many times during this early access and the previous Betas when I noticed a lot of reused dungeon layouts with almost copy-and-paste dungeon sections.
Usually, it’s a corridor or a hallway and sometimes even a whole room even within the same dungeon that feels so jarring that it made me believe on many occasions that I must have taken a wrong turn; and gone back on the same map because of how similar the areas looked to the previous ones that I’ve just been into.
Another thing that quickly grew old on me was how many dungeons had the exact same mechanic for unlocking the final boss room. This usually involves a blocked door that either requires two keys or two mechanisms or something on the opposite sides of the dungeons that you need to open in the first place. I don’t remember previous Diablo games literally gatekeeping bosses in this way, but Diablo IV seems to do it a bit too often.
That being said, my overall impressions are solid, and most of the issues don’t compare to what Diablo IV does right. I’m expecting at least a few hundred hours of gameplay time in the final release judging by what I’ve seen so far. But of course, that depends on Blizzard and how they deliver the complete game. So far, the game’s very addictive and offers something new for newcomers and veterans of the series.
