Most Disappointing – Diablo 4
Tom: Diablo 4 was a fantastic example of how to win back a bunch of goodwill. Finally, Blizzard had returned to form with an excellent campaign and a game that felt like Diablo with…okay it had some microtransactions and games-as-a-service bullshit but it didn’t launch with a real money auction house. It was at least trying to seduce you before screwing you rather than just going for it. At least take me to dinner and kiss me. The antagonist was compelling and many of us wanted Lilith to step on us (not me, I only read the Bible) and the story had some genuine twists and that final major cutscene, which I won’t spoil, man it felt like CLASSIC BLIZZARD WAS BACK BABY AIOUUU (wolf howl). And then they had that first patch, which they messaged with “lol well suck it down and like it, nerds”, with a bunch of D-Generation X crotch chops, with blowback so severe you could actually see their spirits break in their first livestream. I actually kept playing it and the patch around Halloween with the vampire hunting was a lot of fun, but they lost the moment so spectacularly it’s a monument to arrogance. Don’t worry about Bobby Kotick, though, he’s got a $35 million golden parachute to wipe away his tears after methodically destroying not one but TWO companies, all in the name of the cult of shareholder value. Capitalism, baybee!
Diego: Diablo has been on ice since the third game ages ago, so it was nice to see a return to form with Diablo 4 but it’s the kind of game that’s so safe and stuck in time that the longer I played the more evident it was that Blizzard was terrified to try anything new with this game. Diablo’s peers in the genre have all innovated and evolved in the time since Diablo 3, but Diablo 4 (while a solid game) is adamant in playing it safe. As if that wasn’t bad enough, Blizzard decided to not just shoot themselves in the foot, but hack the entire thing off by making one of the worst first patches I’ve seen a game do in a while that made basically every aspect of the game even worse. I’d say maybe a Diablo 5 could be great, but considering the state of Blizzard I’m not super hopeful.
Joe: The game feels like a 40 hour montage of someone showing you slightly photoshopped photos of a beloved family trip. Gently nudging you ever so often to remind you, hey you used to LOVE this. And for a while you think, yeah I do love this, and then 20 more hours go by and nothing has changed. It’s been the same thing on repeat for 23 years. You’re playing the same class you did when you were 10. Everyone looks exactly the same. Everyone is doing the same build. You start hyperventilating. The walls start closing in. You open the item shop and a horse skin is 30 fucking dollars. You scream. 3/5 stars
