I recommend: Diablo IV (Spoiler-Free, Review-in-Progress)
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- čas přidán 16. 06. 2024
- Find out more about how Nvidia DLSS and Nvidia Reflex can deliver you the best possible performance in games like Diablo IV: www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/... Sponsored by Nvidia.
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What Diablo IV lacks in innovation and imagination, it makes up for in scale, presentation, polish and promise. This is one of the most successful live-service launches in the history of videogames, providing an incredible platform for Blizzard to eventually bring the Diablo franchise to new heights.
00:00 Intro
07:24 Performance, Visuals & Sound
13:17 Story
19:17 World Design & Dungeons
29:09 Progression, Itemisation & Class Design
38:57 Monetisation, Live-Service & Conclusion
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#Review #DiabloIV #D4 #RTXOn #DiabloRTX
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Video edited by @BloomHD
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Do you need to play the others
I may have missed it, but why would I pay full AAA pricing for this Diablo, and not just play Diablo immortal for free? .. great video as always, Ralph, the quality of your writing is always top notch
I’ve already said my piece, don’t know why your playing and promoting this but fine. But, if you say you recommend it when it launches, and a few days later, they add the microtransactions, I am gonna make fun of you and the people who continue to support blizzard, and I’ll be unsubbing. Prove to me that they are worth it, minus all the sexual allegations (700), all the baby milk stealing and drinking, the worker abuse, despite everything going on with the company, you want me to give them money? Then let’s see you prove it.
This is so painful to watch please stop doing the ultrawide thing.
Played on ps4
Issues I had
No overlay on mini map
Console settings did not match game settings
Off sync subtitles
Off sync audio
No collision
Server issues
Overlapping audio creating a horrible noise
No in game messaging
No in game clans
No in game Mic options
No in game commands
And many more issues I had...
Console port needs a lot of work!
Once a game invented the idea of “the enemies level as you level” the fun game mechanic of finding something unique and exciting you aren’t supposed to find, or got because of an incredibly rare drop, and then using that gear to completely annihilate enemies until they became strong again to challenge you, kind of went the way of the dodo bird. All in a ploy to keep you playing a game for ages even though not everyone wants to play the same game for the rest of their lives.
The zones do have a base level so the "scale with you" does have a starting point. It also has an end point so that during world tier IV you will start to feel incredibly overpowered in everything except the highest Nightmare Dungeons.
If a really strong drop doesn’t make my character feel more powerful against enemies due to scaling, why am I picking it up at all? Why am I playing?
Meh I don't agree
You can still power up while enemies are your level.
I never understood the argument of people saying it doesn't.....maybe y'all sent playing right? Idk
@@monstrofik It does make you feel more powerful though. You can get used to enemies at your level starting to get harder and harder because you're leveling, but your gear is not. Then you find that badass weapon drop and suddenly you're back to feeling like a badass.
@@pogtuber5146 That's the thing, enemies level with you, but their gear doesn't, so even if you're the same level, you should be dealing way more damage and receiving way less, bc of better armor and weapons.
Well, we’ve seen it already. Big company give reviewers copies without monetisation, they dial down monetization on start, but then, when all reviews are on Metacritic, they “introduce” those elements to the game.
I would like to believe D4 is an exception, but I cannot
It won't be.
Never forget Diablo Immoral.
They were testing the waters.
They know what they can get away with.
You CANNOT trust them.
if its cosmetics only i dont care
100% this
@@IVslam If you believe that, I warn you this is a dangerous delusion to buy into.
The best parts of Diablo for me have always been those moments when you get a new piece of gear which makes you steam roll the game for a few hours. It gradually tapers off however, where you then proceed to be challenged again, where you try to grind for another drop or something. You struggle and then get rewarded handsomly. Diablo 4 just seems like it lacks that rollercoaster is is just steady sailing.
There’s not enough good loot or uniques.if it was like borderlands or even the division it’s be great
The loot system in Diablo IV is absolutely appalling. I just don't get why they try to fix something that ain't broke. Just give us the D2 system unchanged!
Just saw this comment after the loot reborn update, highly recommend checking the game out again!
Man hearing SkillUp talk about how good a villain Lilith is and with proper motivations for her actions makes it all the more baffling that somehow this is the same company (Yes, I am aware different teams, but the teams do intermingle and help each other regularly) that shipped the absolute horrific train-wreck of a travesty that was Sylvanas and The Jailer.
Stopped playing on WotLK. What did they do to Sylvanas?
@@franciscoastorga8299well they made her arthas 2.0, and after doing that they went ahead and blamed everything she did on the influence from her split personality. It was a pretty big joke for awhile that the Jailer did "everything" because they were using him as a retcon device for the entire expansion
@@franciscoastorga8299 Bare with me it's A LOT. TLDR if you don't want the Essay below:
TLDR: She was retroactively made "teh evils" and into a blatant Mary Sue whose more powerful then everyone else. She has always been working with quite possibly one of the worst villains ever created, had a crisis of faith at the last possible second, turns good, and it then gets hand waived so shes technically not responsible for any of her actions.
Non-TLDR essay;
They made her a villain who has been working for Nipple Satan (He doesn't wear a shirt and has EXTREMELY prominent nipples for some reason) to funnel souls of the dead to him as a battery to "Reshape Reality" since the start of Cata. She also started a war with the Alliance and invaded Darkshore after she was made Warchief by Vol'jin.
Then a dying random Night Elf called her basic. She proceeds to burn Teldrassil and causing hundreds of thousands of Night Elves to burn to death. This was all done out of spite and was not the original plan.
BfA she kept making more and more dictator choices until half the Horde call her Garrosh 2.0 (Previous Warchief who ALSO turned evil) and rebelled. Saurfang and her have a duel in front of Orgrimmar and then when Saurfang calls her a loser she kills him and screams at the Horde "You are all nothing!!!1!!11!" and flies away in a giant puff of smoke.
She proceeds to go to Icecrown Citadel, make Bolvar look like a bitch (she literally doesn't get hit even ONCE by him and is toying with him the entire time) , rips off the LK helmet, snaps it in half, and uses it to open a portal to the Shadowlands where Nipple Satan is. Nipple Satan is then told to us that he is the "mastermind" behind LITERALLY everything in the Warcraft universe.
From WC1 to WoW: Shadowlands it was ALL planned by him. He's behind the creation of the Burning Legion, Draenei losing their homeworld, Orcs coming to Azeroth ect ect. Literally the only thing he just about isn't responsible for directly is Deathwing.
Nipple Satan's whole personality is "I am evil. You are weak. Muahaha look at all the chains and spikes I have. Did I mention you are nothing? Because you are nothing and I am the very best like no one else ever was." there is no motivation or reason given to him in game as to why he wants to do his plans or any kind of characterization AT ALL. Simply he's super smart hes tricked everyone and everyone in the Shadowlands is terrified of him.
Also it's revealed Frostmourne splits souls in half when it kills people and Nipple Satan has been hoarding them in his evil tower including Sylvanas's. Sylvanas proceeds to help him get 90% of the way to his goal and then when we fight her as a raid boss and beat her (Nipple Satan comes and saves her of course) he says he will make us all his slaves and she "suddenly" has a crisis of maybe thinking this whole thing isn't a good idea.
She proceeds to mouth off at him and tries to fire a SINGLE arrow at his chest. Not sneakily or anything. She literally announced shes rebelling against him, slowly draws her bow while he watches then tried to shoot dead at his chest and is shocked when Nipple Satan just catches the arrow.
He then takes her other soul half he's been hoarding from when Arthas killed her and shoves it in her to merge with the other half of her soul and knock her out while he leaves and we are all stuck frozen in place watching this go down.
They then try to Karma Houdini her by saying shes a "different and complete soul" now. Everything from when Arthas killed her to right then was because it was the "bad" part of her.
Also we eventually killed Nipple Satan and then right as he dies he reveals he was doing all this to prevent a "greater threat" that has never been hinted at in any way shape or form.
@@Revengemoon thank you
Such hilarious essay deserves a video of its own
@@Revengemoon Damn, this sounds awful.
Thanks for the essay, man. Read the whole thing. I was really into Warcraft lore when I was younger, so this was fun to read, even when it made me kind of sad because all the bad writing.
Guess the glory days of WC3, WoW and TBC are really behind us 🥲
I strongly recommend Skill up Reviews, very well paced, edited and spoken. 10/10
Agreed
“It has a little something for everyone”
I like the way he says monstah
no love for the nvidia sponsorship though. price gouging is lame
@@Shinkajo Did somebody say Monsta?
the context you give for your reviews and how it affects the process make you my favorite reviewer
Do you need to play the others
@@daganbanks Nope but I do recommend trying them except immortals
He actually mentioned dynamic scalling. Ok, I will ask, what is the point of the game being RPG and leveling up if there is dynamic scalling whenever you go? I was exited up until he said that... I love RPGs because when I start, most of the map kicks my ass, then I can work to get better, grind, do quests, gain XP, you know, gain skillups which is most satisfying part of any game, then I return and kick everyones ass. Thats the fun part, to feel your character got stronger, no?
@@TheRealUcanUwill Yep. Also i think balance itself is very overrated in PvE games. It felt great to find some lucky legendary drop that suddenly made you god tier for a few levels. This game seems like its laser focused on a perfectly smooth power progression, where you never really get any stronger or weaker compared to enemies you just unlock new stuff as you go and build up smoothly and linearly. I really hate that design philosophy for looter games. Borderlands is the only series i know of that still does this right. You can find fucking nutty legendary drops randomly during the campaign that suddenly make you one shot everything for a few levels. Of course, that smooths out and balance becomes more important for end game or if the game has pvp. But for just the campaign, i want to get lucky loot drops that make me super powerful. I want to come back to that boss that kicked my ass and melt him after gaining a few levels. Scaling everything to your level ruins a lot of what makes these games fun to me.
His reviews remind me of Totalbiscuits WTF IS… series. SkillUp is doing the work of greats.
Gotta say, the static map is something I may be able to get used to. The enemy scaling coupled with meaningless drops? That's a rough one.
That’s only during leveling. Once the season starts and you optimize your builds you start 1 shotting everything
@@Coheed420 wish they dropped it immediately would make my first play through a bit more meaningful but I am excited if this is true!
The static map is par for the course these days. Torchlight 2, 3 and Infinite were all static as well, and so is Path of Exile for the most part. Grim Dawn is also static. I think having this randomized is a bit overrated. Having the dungeons randomized is enough.
@@Katie-hb8iq I can’t believe D4 doesn’t have camera rotation like Grim Dawn rofl or a workable zoom feature. The zoom in D4 is unplayable… this is 2023 wtf
@@cody3335 they gotto suck you in for those juicy paid battlepasses and "seasonal content" for more money on a full priced game. get your lube ready. this is a live service game for a reason
I can't wrap my head around the enemies scaling with your power in a genre where the whole point is to find cool loot that makes you more powerful.
That reminds me of Anthem's design where players eventually figured out you did more damage with the base pistol and equipping lower stats gear nerfed your damage so it was more beneficial to leave slots unequipped.
The enemies don't scale DOWN to you, they scale UP to you, so that their HP and damage will increase as you level but your build being better will still make you hit them harder
It also did this in Diablo 3...
If you want to feel more powerful, play on lower world tiers.
I mean, even in D3 the whole point of leveling gear in the end game was specifically to be able to push higher and higher torment levels without failing or doing them faster for the real hardcore player base. Builds will always have a certain realization point where you're able to jump a world tier (or many) to increase your gains, and there is nothing really stopping you from just.. staying at your current world tier. So while the enemies will scale up to you, unless you're also pumping the world tier alongside it, they will be significantly weaker.
If you want your full power fantasy, you can have it, you just won't be getting multipliers to your loot, gold, and XP, which I think is a fair tradeoff for steam-rolling the game.
@@Katie-hb8iq when the cornerstone of progression is RAISING world tiers? lmao
@@hua.. Arpgs are often just that?
Not a big fan of dynamic scaling. I like running through older stuff and smashing shit out, or sometime pushing into harder areas getting away with finding some really cool gear a little early.
Same, one of the fence i have plus the bloated itemization as describe by skillup. Other than that, the game is good. Too bad, the progression and itemization is the core to any arpg. Being life service, hope they do something about it in due time, cause it gotten bored real sooner or later.
As far as I've experience in both the Beta and Launch the levels only scale up, not down. So you can still run into high level areas. In the beta we had a lvl 30? 35? boss that dropped higher level gear. In Launch for example I decided to do the Act 2 quest before starting the Act 1 story (after getting to the main town). Act 2 starts from lvl 10. I went around lvl 13 and as I was making my way I took a wrong turn and stepped foot into a lvl 20 area. Needless to say they were kicking my shit in as I was frantically trying to escape.
And as far as older content, I went back after finishing Act 2 to go finish Act 1 at lvl 20. Even at lvl 20, the mobs around the Act 1 area seem to have much less resistances or armor, or something. Despite them being lvl 20 they didn't do nearly as much damage as the Act 2 area and died significantly faster than what I was just fighting.
The scaling works more so that if you're playing with friends as a high level, you can still help friends but not power level (outside of Legendary gear and a better build) while gaining items for your character. And you can also obtain gear drops from back tracking older areas.
Pretty sure they confirmed that enemies in the open world only scale up to certain degree based on the region they are in. For example enemies in the act 1 area could never be higher than level 30.
same , treadmill life sucks
I mean, Diablo 3 basically did the same so I don't think this system should come as a shock.
Despite all the good reviews, I still do not feel compelled to play this game at all. My trust for Blizzard is completely gone. And even IF they don't screw this game up within the next 2-3 years, I don't think I'll miss out on much. There are more games out there than I will be ever able to play anyway.
It's always morally correct to boycott an Activition-Blizzard game.
Same here. Ill let it simmer for a month or so before i decide its worth the buy. Doubt it tho. It just looks like more uninspired garbage.
Same. That he recommends this despite this huge thing on the horizon is beyond me. Good game, yes, but I would not recommend this to anyone just because of this. Wait and see. That is what it should be.
I don’t think I can ever forgive Blizzard for all those allegations that got swept under the rug, games and corruption aside. Absolutely evil company on all fronts
Same. On the one hand I grew up with the Diablo franchise, and the Necromancer is my favourite class in anything, ever. But ever since Warcraft 3 Refunded, Blizzard have been dead to me, and the never ending litany of scandals, abuses and ineptitude that has followed has dug an ever deeper hole.
My decision will be made in July, when we get to see just how exploitative and FOMO soaked the Battle Pass is. Though given their track record of pandering Rainbow Capitalism and that it's Pride Month, maybe if I just keep count of how many OW characters they reveal the orientation of I'll be forewarned how bad it is (2 so far).
You describe exactly how I felt in the first 7 minutes better than I ever could.
There’s that missing umph from feeling weak to overpowered to average again when you change an item or ability that used to happen semi-regularly
If you go back to play Diablo 3, it is scaled also after Reaper of Souls. You only felt more powerful if you went back to play easier Torment levels, which is actually exactly the same in Diablo 4 with the different world tiers. It's exactly the same as D3.
@@Katie-hb8iq not necessarily, this auto scales in a different way.
I literally mention that in a few replies elsewhere that I wish it was optional alongside the world tier system
@@StripedJacket why did you add "literally"?
@@chillpengeru I don’t know? For emphasis?
@@StripedJacket If you're on max-world tier you shouldn't be able to farm level 1 zones for good items, so with no scaling, each zone would need its own drop/multiplier values, scaled again with world tiers.
Why do that when you can just give the player the option to scale down their world tier and feel as overpowered as you so desire? There would still be the tradeoff of drops/multipliers, so what is the difference? In one, you get choice of which areas you want to farm and at what world tier, in the other it is forced.
Plus, when you hit a certain point with any build, you will be punching above your level. You can then choose to make the game harder for greater reward, or stay where you are and enjoy being OP for as long as you want and all while gaining more.
It was great to hear someone that likes Diablo still give a critical pros and cons review. As someone who has never played them and is on the fence, it was really helpful to hear both sides. Most reviews seem to be from Diablo fanatics so I appreciate the overall objectivity
I will say, if you haven't bought yet, 100% hold off for a few weeks, at least until the seasonal content starts. It's super shady when companies purposefully handicap reviewers and keep the shitty IRL money store out of sight for the first month. Activision-Blizzard has done this several times and the stores just get worse and worse. I will be amazed if in two weeks we don't see a massive surge of videos like "WTF IS BLIZZARD DOING TO DIABLO IV." Idk man, just from experience it's better to be safe than sorry
Something suspicious about a full price game with DLC and season pass. It might be a fun game. But also the fact that they are waiting a month to add all the financial stuff is a BIG RED FLAG
$16 Horse Armour is a Red Flag
ABK think we're a bunch of suckers.
The sad thing is that the next best arpg, last epoch, while not full price (half price, in fact. It's 35 bucks), also added a cosmetic shop with their multiplayer update.. PoE is f2p but their cosmetics cost twice as much as they do in this game, it has a billion mechanics and no controller support. The arpg Genre is not in a great state for the non-sweaty crowd.
@@azyrael96 Grim Dawn
@@hmblahatrue, but that's been out for a while now, and the last new content was added years ago. It's a very fun game, but I've really had my fill. Superfuse seems promising (new game in early access), but also no controller support and has not yet had new content since its launch 5 months ago (which is not a great sign)
Personally I find the delayed battle pass to be a pretty big red flag. Something tells me that the battle pass will lead to multiple problems as already skins are roughly $25 a pop, and by the time it releases it will be too late for some to return the game as they will already exceed the allotted return window which is likely the reasoning behind the delay. Blizzard is a husk of its former self and its gonna need an unholy miracle for them to even come close to redeeming themselves with this game...
If its just cosmetics, I will never see it as a problem. Be it in Diablo or any other game
If the developers wanna profit from dumb players who will pay $60 for a shiny skin... all the power to them, I couldnt care less as it wont affect my enjoyment of the game
"something tells me". Very scientific
I don't care what price tag they give the mtx as long as they are cosmetic ONLY.
If they wanna charge stupid people 1k for a golden druid skin... by all means.
As long as it doesn't give any advantages over other players.
@@Kimera92 Technically it is affecting the game, as the cosmetics are not earnable but instead are locked behind a paywall. The more leeway you give, the more companies will take
@@Kimera92 I hate this brainwashing that "Oh it's just cosmetics so it doesn't matter". I fully disagree. Looking cool in a game is a big appeal to people and companies have gaslit everyone into thinking as long as you aren't paying for an in game advantage any overpriced scheme they come up to try and juice the playerbase for money is somehow fine. It's not. Companies know people want their character to look good - that's why selling cosmetics work.
Finding items and looking cool is part of the ARPG experience. Pyawalling them sucks. They cost 30 dollars in this fucking game. Blizz can go to hell.
The legendary powers you apply with the codex of power, are always the lowest possible version of that legendary. So you'll want to replace them with better versions extracted from dropped items (legendary aspects) which are one time use, or with the dropped item itself.
yeah I was really surprised that after 50 hours of gameplay he still hasn't realized that dungeon aspects are potentially far far inferior than randomly dropped ones
There's still merit to what he says, which is that gearing feels quite meaningless with the scaling world. I haven't run into a situation where i've gone "damn, I wish I had a dropped version of this aspect." Power spikes are important for a sense of progression and this game feels devoid of them
@@Silver-yy3so I highly disagree with this. I'm level 70 and I almost entirely forget that things scale with me. If you are building your character correctly, and itemizing properly (not going "oh higher item power - put dungeon affix on it!") - you don't feel the scaling at all.
I stronghold boss that decimated me at level 35 in what was a 10+ minute fight... was destroyed by me at level 60 in < 10 seconds because my gear and itemization was so much different and better.
I love SkillUp but it's a complete lie to say that it's a crafting game and that itemization doesn't matter. Eventually, people are going to hit walls because they used "attack power" to gauge their player power (which is entirely based off of weapon damage and main stat... useless) or didn't keep an eye out for great base rare items to imprint on.
My brother who is around the same level doesn't itemize at all, and does 1/10th of my damage. We are only 2 levels apart and playing the same class. Yes, 1/10th. I'm seeing crits up to 200K+ constantly and he is critting in the 6-20K range.
@@Greg-if8es This conversation has been ongoing since people were first allowed to try the game, and I fully agree with you that if you properly itemize and buildcraft you'll quickly realize it is not an issue in the way that people seem to think. This is also the reason people thought Barb and Druid felt weak in the beta, they'd just click on the higher power item, not think about the skills they picked, and then complain when they get rocked.
@@Silver-yy3so I keep seeing this argument and I strongly disagree. At the end of the game I had put together a cohesive build and was killing bosses literally in seconds on WT2. My gear had made me vastly stronger than I was earlier in the game. There is absolutely a sense of progression.
Yes Blizzard promised to include no Pay-to-win mechanics in it’s cash shop, but they also PROMISED US A SINGLE PLAYER MODE IN OVERWATCH 2
I have altered the deal; pray that I do not alter it any further -Darth Kotick
I don’t trust them. The game looks gorgeous and fun as hell but the fact they’re shamelessly adding a battle pass on top of an in game shop after reviews kills it for me
Same here. It's still Blizzard.
Who cares? Even if Blizzard does fuck it up after a few months, it sounds like the game is worth it based on campaign and the 50 hours it’s going to take to even get to endgame. I guess if you want it to be your “forever” game, maybe proceed with caution, but it’s clear that the package at launch is worth the money alone. If you think the game looks gorgeous and fun, how is that not worth $70?
i agree, its still blizzard. these guys have been F-ing around for over a decade and you aint gonna trick me into thinking that they magically turned things around on a dime AKA diablo 4 this one game. also the live service on a game thats like 80 F-KING DOLLARS? I DO F-ING THINK SO. they are scum bags and its really suspect when everyone seems to be kinda on the same page about the blizzard well deserved hate and then someone puts out a review thats all bubbly "I TOTALLY RECCOMEND DUDES" ...no
Flabbergasted that a bunch of cosmetics that you can 100% ignore is enough to completely prevent you from playing it
Okay, don’t play it then, and the rest of us will have fun without you while ignoring that crap. No harm; no foul. 🤷🏻♂️
The fact that it's Blizzard, there is a battlepass and in-game shop, and there is dynamic scaling which basically makes loot kinda boring... it's all enough for me to pass on what otherwise looks like a fun game.
I really appreciate your in-depth and honest review!
I went back after finishing Act 2 to go finish Act 1 at lvl 20. Even at lvl 20, the mobs around the Act 1 area seem to have much less resistances or armor, or something. Despite them being lvl 20 they didn't do nearly as much damage as the Act 2 area and died significantly faster than what I was just fighting.
The scaling works more so that if you're playing with friends as a high level, you can still help friends but not power level (outside of Legendary gear and a better build) while gaining items for your character. And you can also obtain gear drops from back tracking older areas.
You’re really missing out. Diablo IV is really good.
@@IVslam That's likely an enemy design situation. The later acts are likely to be more on level. When you have the first part of a game, you don't include the dangerous/complicated enemy designs. Meaning as they are tuned up they either underperform or their raw stats make them utterly overpowered.
@Aaron Humphrey compared to Last Epoch, Diablo 4 is not what I thought it would be. Diablo 4 is a bloated arpg made by a company that has lost touch and is all about profit not fun, charging $70 for a base game, then more for a battle pass, and cosmetics, and dyes, etc., it's just not fun to me, getting nickled and dimed for things that should be in the game, not sold back to me.
Lost Epoch is the single most refreshing ARPG I've played since Titan Quest/Grim Dawn. It's far better than those though, and it really puts D4 to shame in terms of fun, depth, and love from the devs
@@IVslam The whole idea that the level scaling makes you not feel any progression on your character is simply ridiculous. Like, this ia a genre solely based around the power growth of your character, and people really believe they purposely made the game in a way that prohibits this very design principle?
I believe since you played the version of the game that creators and reviewers got to play, they have adjusted the level scaling aggressiveness. I remember reading something like that. Also, the tradeoff for the leveling scaling being present in the first place is so that you don't ever out-level an area and all the content can be experienced non-linearly and at your own pace.
I think it's a good trade overall. The power increases can be enjoyed during endgame. They aren't really needed yet during the campaign.
Man I love your story beats. Every time you finish that first impeccably structured opening monologue, the switch to loud music with cool gameplay always gets me hyped. You remind me that reviews are art too. Love ya Shill Up!
It's completely formulaic. So many others do the exact thing. Simple people will be impressed by simple things, and you are simple.
Interesting how it was a recommend but it was a very thorough dissection of why someone who actually enjoys ARPG would not want to buy it. Watching this actually kept me away from the pre-purchase. Thank you!
It’s very good. Watching people turn themselves into pretzels to make Diablo IV out to be anything but a good ARPG is hilarious to me.
@@aaronhumphrey3514 The game itself can be great. Hay, I don't mind that. But it's Activision and I am not giving that company my money. It's like War Thunder (just to make an example) where I just can not stomach the rest wrapped around the good core game like a quilt made of human skin.
@@Sorain1 I am interested in buying good games, not buying all the baggage from a company, they are all selfish and greedy... blizzard is particularly slimy but if they can manage to make an actually good game I am going to play it because I am not naive to think any company is good
@@Sorain1 I’d bet anything comments like yours are rarely genuine and exists only to pat yourself on the back for not buying a video game as if anyone cares. hard to take seriously when half the shit in your house is made with slave/child labor but oh man video games now that’s some serious stuff you could never support such a company huh.
@@Sorain1there's no such a thing as a good or bad company, there's only profit.
Your section on itemization and progression solidified it for me - I'll pass on buying this for a while. What you describe as the ARPG progression of power is so important to this genre, to miss that is to miss what makes these games fun.
I thought diablo 3 was terribly boring for this reason
Likewise! It's basically the whole point for me.
Yeah it seems like it breaks the logic of the genre
Yeah honestly this whole review sounds pretty negative. Aside from audio/ visual
Played the beta and server slam, and i think the new system is the best in the series, i think skill up missed a lot the nuances of the apsect system, and makes it look bad, each new equiped aspect is felt drasticly on proggression, the good feeling went from leveling to the hunt of aspects and their synergies, also the hunt here is for rare items with the secondary stats to match an aspect that you found becouse apsects from the index is allways the loweset roll.
Also you need to find the aspects for the index as well.
This was done to speed up new charchters, becouse it is an acount wide index.
This makes the hunt for rare and aspects the best in the series.
I finished the story last night and I actually liked it. I play a lot of story based RPG's and it doesn't match up against most of those but for a Diablo/ARPG storyline it was pretty good. I had already played through act 1 in 2nd beta and server slam so was wondering where it was going and I was pleasantly surprised. Like you I thought the 5th act maybe dragged on a bit but it didn't detract too much. The things you mentioned as criticisms didn't really occur t me playing the game but now that you point them out I can see them. I had been replaying D3 for a week or so just o get back into ARPG mode and you can feel the power when you get bigger and and more powerful gear. My sorc is 47 now and I feel like I need to rebuild her as I am feeling a lot less powerful than before and it is taking longer to kill mobs, or maybe I need o try upgrading more often but I am trying to wait until post 50 to resist putting resources into something I will throw away.
As usual loved your review. I played on PC and on PS5 and cross-save works great. I might need a new video card soon as only have a 2070 Ti but they are so expensive, and I might need a new power supply to run a new card. Might just be cheaper to get a new PC :P
Keep up the great work aussie aussie aussie oi oi oi
@Skill Up You started to touch on it but part of the reason the zone level progression matches to your level unless it's higher than you is because you are given so much freedom with where you go. If these dungeons or zones were given preset levels AND you give the player the freedom to go anywhere on so a massive map then you are likely to miss a lot areas. If you have advanced decently far and run into these missed areas later, then there is a good chance you have greatly out-leveled it. The game would have to be a bit more linear if you want to hit them in the right order. It's a tough design challenge. It works in games like Zelda Tears of the Kingdom because there is no leveling but instead gear stats and upgrading your health and stamina. Elden Ring had a remarkable system of leveling and gear stats but you still feel challenged most places that you go. You can still have plenty of instances in Elden Ring where you revisit and older area and the enemies are super easy, but for the most part I felt challenged most places I went even if that area was a few levels recommended below me.
I agree with your point. Simply highlighting a likely reason why its set up the way it is. Perhaps it can be tweaked to make that experience better. Perhaps if it's your first time ever doing the dungeon it's at the level it was intended for, but every time you revisit it after that then it's adjusted to your current level?
Blizzard finally makes a game that on launch ships with a large amount of content, only for it to be sandwiched between a battle pass and in game shop.
Honestly, I wouldn't even call the "large amount of content" a plus, given that it mostly seems like filler such as uncovering the map, doing open world chores that basically amount to D3 bounties, and doing repetitive dungeons that basically amount to D3 greater rifts. It may be a lot, but it doesn't seem very high quality.
It's not a large amount of content. The story isn't anywhere close to 60 hrs. The dungeons are basically the same. The activities (minus world boss) are d3 activities just reskinned for the open world design. Then add in a bit of procedural gen and they get to say "unique dungeons" and people like you will say ,"wow there's so much content". Repetitive mundane content isn't content. It's you not realizing they're shoveling crap
@@Arunnn241 my man people who play arpg love it for the repetitive grindy stuff
@@ricardofonseca2165 I know. I'm the same. But nowadays a) you're penalized for grinding bc the devs make it much longer and harder to grind to make their cash shop more enticing and b) every "new" piece of content is typically just old content in a "new" context. It's lazy content we have to grind for more and more hours. In the past, the content at least used to be good or unique. Old school wow had 10x the variety in monster design, boss design, boss mechanics, "build" diversity than diablo *on release* and that was decades ago.
Good review but im a bit surprised you put so much faith in the live service's ability to fix what sound like major design issues. That's a lot of work, assuming the developers are willing to walk back their original design philosophy in the first place. It happened with Diablo 3 but only due to the game's poor reception which is unlikely to happen this time. Diablo 4 is receiving almost unanimous praise from reviewers so I'm not sure Blizzard will have much incentive to make major changes to the core systems of their wildly popular game.
He said similar things about Cyberpunk 2077. I'd be hesitant to take his endorsement at face value.
From what I’ve seen there’s really nothing to fix.
@@jacobjohnson3200 i mean cyberpunk did fix most of their issues
I can see this, but things like the skill trees being too straight forward or gear and stats being a little boring aren't likely to stay as they are. PoE has had radical changes to its skill tree, abilities, difficulty as far as life to defensives to damage intake and output as well as how a huge portion of its stats function over the years it's been around. Also the vast, vast difference in boss mechanics from original act bosses to something like Sirus is night and day. I would be surprised if we look at the mechanics of bosses here versus years in the future and not think the same for D4 as we do with PoE.
Mind you, this is all speculation, but blizzard can't sit idle with current designs staying the same from season to season because people will dip out if things don't change; this is change for changes sake, to keep things fresh.
@@mikevos4460 so? They lied and the reviewers lied.
Your opinions about itemization/crafting/aspects piling up are spot on, I feel the same way.
I dont mind as much the game scaling with you as you level up, however I do agree that you get sort of mentally overloaded with item stats and legendary aspects to the point where there can be so many permeations of itemization and build loadouts that you just get sort of overwhelmed, turned off by it and just try and piece together *something* that looks to synergize based upon an overall build/skill archetype rather than focusing on individual stats
Compelling loot drops and rewarding progression are so important in these kinds of games and it sounds like that's a major stumbling block for Diablo IV. After watching that part of the review it felt like a surprise that he'd still recommend this. Think I'll wait to buy it for an update that addresses this because as of now this doesn't seem like a fun experience.
Exactly. The way he talked about the negatives of the game make it seem like it should be a Do Not Recommend. I can't believe anyone would support such a safe and money-grabbing game tbh.
he also mentioned that end game and shared world progression was not there for him. That could drastically change how combat/gear feels and works.
Yeah. It's part of what has me hesitant to even entertain the thought of buying the game (the other is how money grubbing Blizz will be, especially with at least two major classes missing, shoving in cosmetics instead of more content in a $70 game with MTX along with a battlepass, and they can definitely add pay-2-win later). Every ARPG on the market atm has waaaaaay better itemization from what I've seen. I may also be ruined by how the equipment crafting in Last Epoch is, but I know this is a step down from even D2&3.
Has this been mirrored by other reviews or reviewers because this sounds like a huge turn off.
I enjoyed the beta most the time BUT I can't imagine myself playing it long term
I have 0 doubts that Blizzard will drop the ball once the in-game shop is enabled
It’s enabled and it’s really not that bad. Might change, but right now it’s very easy to completely ignore it.
@@aaronhumphrey3514 I'm more worried about the battle pass, I feel like ARPGs are largely about progress visualized through aesthetic gear upgrades, and if those upgrades are locked in a battle pass that goes away every season, it's not gonna feel good.
also, waiting until the review cycle is over to enable the battle pass feels...shady.
Exactly my thoughts.
Right after the reviews are all done
I can only really think of OW2 and Diablo Immortal to where they've dropped the ball in terms of monetization. That's not to say they won't fuck it up, but the fact that ex World of Warcraft still has by FAR the smallest cash shop out of the top MMORPGs says something.
It's crazy how they monetize the game like it's OW2 and MWII (which are F2P or have F2P game modes) yet it's a full price release... what a joke.
40:21
Let me remind you and everyone that sees this:
Blizzard said "D3 will be supported for next 20 years!" They switched to skeleton crew after THE ONLY DLC
Blizzard charged for Overwatch 2, which is the SAME GAME as Overwatch - and Blizzdrones PAYED.
They said "Overwatch 2 will have PVE! - As soon as they didn't meet Battle Pass Sale quotas -> they said "No PVE, we are sad cus you people are dumb and get bamboozled every time"
Blizzard abandoned HOTS
Blizzard abandonded Heartstone
Any idiot thinking Blizzard wants to make a "good game" and "Great Diablo continuation" doesnt understand that they need 3 devs to hack D3 textures and make a predatory "mobile game" that earn millions
vs a dedicated team that know what they are doing , putting more work that get repayed by LESS CASH SHOP PURCHASES.
Message to whoever supports Blizzard "YOU DESERVE NOTHING WORSE THAN WHAT IS COMING FOR U"
And yet people will still pre order and make activision blizzard rain millions of dollars because it’s diablo only ever way to stop the greed is just stop buying there games
Dynamic difficulty is a dealbreaker for me, thanks for pointing that out !
the time to kill for most enemies feels the same from level one onwards 🤣
@@ledf2012 Streamers on end-game, level 70 play exactly the same as people on their second hour at level 15. Maybe just a tiny bit faster, if that. Literally no power curve like you'd see in any actual RPG. Classic Blizzard.
@@ledf2012 oooooooooh I disagree. my rogue went from taking ages to kill elites etc to absolutely nuking packs and bosses at lvl 25 or so
@@ledf2012 ttk gets worse while enemies get better and better debuffs and such to slow you down even more
I'm in the boat that Legendary's should have varying negative effects as well. It makes the other rarities more enticing if they have little to no negative effects but you miss out on some cool upgrades exclusive to Legendry's. It would fit with the lore of the world too. I remember this one Diablo Book I read about this blood armor that gave the wearer great power, but it also did not so great things to the wearer as well as drawback for wearing the armor since it is a tainted armor. Perhaps there are different negatives like "cursed", "tained", "possessed", and so on.
Besides encouraging looking at the other rarities, but also including a bit more randomization that will require some decision making. Mixing in armor that may help with the debuff of the legendary. This is something that games like Monster Hunter does. Also reminded on Darkest Dungeon where you get varying rarity of gear with some having mixes of good and bad stats.
interesting idea (shoutout to the Darkest Dungeon and Monster Hunter players out there) but more time in menus does not equal more fun.
The power scaling is a huge downside for me. I like to progressively feel that power as I get new loot or levels. I could definitely see myself not buying the game because of this.
I argue it shows ur power better because now it's all about items and ur skills and not just ur lvl
@@DaxRaider the items are mostly just damage multipliers and have some lines where it heavily favors some skills to pretty much force you to play certain skills, just like d3. Maybe once people play more there will be more interesting builds popping up.
Same i really dislike it, like what is the point of leveling up if everything else levels up with you.
You do get more powerful, due to better items, more passives and skill points invested. They still scale but you will melt enemies at a certain point, but it's quite late.
Same. It's crazy, they took away the one fundamental system that allows you to actually "feel" like you're getting stronger in relation to your enemies.
My man, you have a lot of confidence that Blizzard will "address" problems in their game.
I’m hoping Blizzard sees this and takes notes. I’m liking Diablo 4 so far, my friends and I are having a blast going through it, but there are a lot of aspects that you mentioned that Blizzard can add in and improve upon. I’d really like to see some procedural generation and some random loot drops. This is a fantastic game so far and I’m excited to see what gets added to it and how it can be improved throughout its life cycle.
Edit: I am completely bored and have no interest playing the game
Or "I sunk in 200 hours into the game, ate it like a locust and no I have no further content to swallow, I am bored, it's my fault game companies focus on quantity over quality."
Great points on the skill tree. Has very little imagination and forces you to pick certain nodes depending on abilities chosen
$60??? It's $70 for the base game and $90 for the deluxe
Dont forget the fucking battle pass and all other mtx they will cram in. Fuck this game, its devs and their shills. Seriously have enough of this garbage.
80 Euros and 100 Euros for Deluxe for me:O
He compares 60/70 USD games with D4. That was the idea.
Other 60/70 Euro or Dollar Games dont have a Cashshop tho
9600 yen for regular version 14,596 yen for the deluxe version in Japan and to add insult to injury I was just told I also need to pay the extortion fee to Sony in ps+ to even play it. To me this is an abject failure from blizzard in every regard.
I guess I'm glad it's good for those who will play it; I just can't support this though.
Blizzard has just done too much shit, and its CEO is far too gross, with not enough pushback.
It wouldn't feel right if I criticized blizzard for their bad practices, but then bought their games just because they're fun.
blizzard shills have no empathy nor good character
I agree. Also, I'm not sure if I agree that D4 is good. I mean, it's not bad, but it's not particularly anything special. Apart from the excessive spending on cutscenes, this kind of game is effectively achievable for AA game studios. It's no longer special. That's why all the marketing and cinematics, since otherwise it's not really stand-out.
my sentiments exactly. the ongoing history of abuse the company has cultivated does not dissolve the moment they make a fun game.
I was about to comment the same thing. Good luck to those who love and play it, Blizzard is on my black list.
The Blitzchung scandal still disgusts me.
Radio silence from Activisision (not) Blizzard until they pair the most fake, corporate non-apology with the D4 announcement.
They never even referenced the incident at all. Just completely swept it under the rug: we made a 'mistake' and are sorry that you were offended by it. What's this incident we are speaking of? Well Winnie the Pooh will get VERY mad at us, again, if we so much as reference it..... so anywho, here's Diablo 4! You kids like Diablo 4, right? RIGHT!?
PLEASE FORGET ABOUT BEING MAD AT US BOWING TO AUTHORITARIAN TYRANTS AS WE DANGLE THE SHINY KEYS IN YOUR FACE!
And that was all before Diablo Immoral came out so they could test the waters on what "excessive" micro-transactions are. At this point I don't even care if D4 is a good game. I just can't make myself care enough to try. Blizzard is dead. Blizzard died a long time ago. There is only Activision and Greed left.
Diablo has such immersive worlds i wish there was a 3rd person zoomed in camera mode. Same gameplay style, but just being able to see our armor closer up, the enemies and environments, etc
You can zoom the camera very close but you can't see the enemies then. You can check out your characters gear in the menus and starting screen.
@jengaaaaa I know about that I just mean for general gameplay. Take any souls game, assassins creed, zelda. There's just something about seeing your character front and centre, confronting enemies etc
@@ecfeclipse please go play your sony and ubisoft games.
how did blizzard convince you to turn this into an "I recommend" review? your actual review was so critical of such fundamental parts of the gameplay loop, cutting into the core motivations for even playing the game, that I couldn't really understand why you ultimately gave the game a thumbs up, instead of a "wait till they fix it" or "wait for a sale." if the game isn't even fun to play, what's the point in buying it now? you said there's a lot of content for the price (which doesn't matter if it's too boring to play) and that they can respond to feedback with patches, but that seems more like a rationale for a "wait and see" verdict than for a "buy it now" verdict.
also, it's been 5 months, and I looked through the patch notes, and it doesn't seem like they've even begun to address any of your criticisms. even slightly. all the changes in the patch notes are bug fixes and balance changes, reworking experience gain and class abilities and stuff. not the kind of thing you'd want to see, right? and it's hard to see how they can even fix these things. difficulty scaling and aspects are such fundamental parts of the game, these would almost need to be removed, or at least every single aspect to be redone from scratch to provide more minor bonuses, and every piece of equipment reworked to provide a greater contribution to differentiating your build from other builds. reworking every class's talent tree, etc. it's so much that needs to be changed, and if you're a product manager at blizzard you have to ask yourself what's a better use of your designers and engineers' time, doing all that? or just doubling down on the working systems you already have, and pumping out more content? it's too easy to rationalize just doubling down on the design choices. it's entirely possible the game will be like this for its entire life, until diablo 5, because they get more bang for their buck generating new seasonal content to bring existing players back to the game every now and then, and those are always the players who will spend the most on the microtransactions and the battle pass (barf). the ones who come back to the game every few months and have endgame characters they're willing to spend money to decorate
This is where we are folks…. We’ve finally hit the point where a AAA game launching in simply normal, working order, and feature complete has become SO rare, that it’s amaze-balls if it ever happens
Unfortunately its broken for alot of people. It constantly freezes for a minute straight just by talking to Vendors or opening up Character or Pause menus
Not only a AAA game, but a live service looter AAA. Insane
It's not rare. Play more games and you'd realize that.
@@LowResLeafa Are you thick
the fact that live service game seems to be given more development than single player games worries and saddens me. I dont like playing MMO, maybe coop with friends. Was so looking forward to Wu Long and Star Wars but both have horrendous PC ports.
Yeah, another pretty positive review that actually makes me not want to play the game. The Acti-Blizz red flags were bad enough to begin with but hearing the details of how the game functions and plays was enough for me to check out entirely. Not to mention the fact that you could basically take any of the gameplay footage in this review and exchange it with any other and you'd never be able to tell that something was moved or altered. It all just looks exactly the same.. and while that may be fine for a 20 hour game, it's death for an experience that asks for 100s of hours over months/years of Live Service.
Stay strong. Boycott Blizzard. Evade bland games for the dumb masses. Resit the Hype. Resist the FOMO. Become an individual
I too was surprised by how despite the concerns he had with the game he still ended up recommending it. Some of these are such huge red flags/anti-fun mechanics that I just know before even playing that it would ruin the experience.
And then it's Blizzard. They gotta do something flawless with no cause of concern before you can even begin to think about trusting them again. And this ain't it.
@@Kserijaro I'm trying to resist, but there aren't any interesting games (for me) coming out in June/July/August. Starfield is my most anticipated game this year.
@Kusariyaro It's a shame many have fallen back into buying another blizz game and extras considering the never ending controversy and issues. I guess Bobby is getting another yacht since people pre-ordered that deluxe and everything.
@@Kserijaro It's a tonic to hear someone else is in the same boat, I may not be able to avoid putting money in the pockets of people I despise when it comes to the essentials, but my luxuries are another matter. No EA/ActiBliz/Ubi/Beth/et al, no cry.
And yes, my car is powered by my sense of self-satisfaction. It's still the lesser of two evils, IMHO anyway.
Well this aged well...
I didn't have the same experience with progression. I felt some pretty significant power spikes pushing through on WT2, and they all had to do with shifting things towards more specific builds.
There's also reasons to desire one main stat over the other - it's just no longer character dependent, and entirely build dependent. You can also feasibly do the same builds, with an entirely different stat focus.
The level scaling is part of what allows this build flexibility, as well as the changes to some of the endgame things, such as Nightmare Dungeons doing away with the Greater Rift time gating. You no longer need to have 99% damage reduction aaaand be doing 6 trillion damage crits. You can reasonably fight through all of this with a more defensive or offensive focus.
It also felt WAY better progressing to endgame than it has in any other Diablo game. I actually felt real, significant changes in my gameplay as I levelled and a ton of creativity available to me, rather than just smacking together garbage gear that does nothing.
This game very much explicitly encourages experimentation, so I would say I had the opposite experience here. But I'm also a Diablo veteran, so take this as you will.
The skills also make way more of a difference than you've stated, in my opinion. Key passives especially. The difference between the storm passive and the storm/earth swap passive with Druid is absolutely immense, and one piece of key gear that synergizes with either passive can send them into a totally different direction. One piece of gear prompted me to swap from the former to the latter, and it completely changed my build, even though my skills were largely similar.
Felt real? You literally look like a god from the start, there's no sign of visual progression, from the start you look already look strong
Love this review by skill up, but I feel like he was looking at the strength of the player thru a Destiny Fan lens. With that game you feel all powerful all the time, while Diablo 4 so far, feels more like a subtle but gradual rise to being super powerful.
Level scaling is a huge no-go for me. Went from ready to buy to wait for Black Friday.
Same 😂
@SpiderMeng Hell no. Open world RPG's with level scaling suck. Deadric armour on bandits anyone?
I love that feeling of going into a higher level zone, getting my a kicked, and then thinking "Right... I'm coming back for you later".
@SpiderMeng Global lvl scaling (like here in D4) is a sign that team did not have enough skill to design proper monster/loot economy. It's the laziest of approaches you can take, and definitely NOT necessity!
@spidermeng1846 what a lame reply. Plenty of people agree (obviously). Ever heard of “power fantasy?” Or are you living under a rock?
Let me guess, you’re going to say 🤓 well technically the way the game blah bleh bluh it just wouldn’t work of bleh buh beh.
Where TF did you read where I said I wanted a completely open world RPG? And btw, Elden Ring did pretty well, eh?
This game honestly looks great. I would buy but I'm more than certain that Blizzard will screw it up eventually
I can't trust Blizzard after OW2
Good. If anyone's just optimistic about this game, then they haven't learned and they will be disappointed.
It looks like d3 hot topic edition
@@obrgrs2547 Man say it out loud for the people in the back about OW2.
I'm definitely waiting a few months for a sale and to see how the post-launch goes. Every live service over the past couple years have been a massive let down and I can't see D4 being any different.
Diablo is like that popstar you loved so much when you were a teenager. You grew up and find out they are still makeing the same teenager music.
Btw, I think the end game will be fine. I've seen people on CZcams/twitch running end game builds, and the sense of power is definitely there.
Secondary affixes definitely matter for optimizing, and you can re-roll them at the occultist. So far I've been looking for items with two out of three stats that could be an upgrade, and rerolling the third one.
I think aspects from the legendary drops are stronger than the dungeon ones. However, there's definitely a best in class aspect for my sorc that will have to be on my gear for good.
The game is super addicting, I've been grinding through acts and gathering gear all weekend, and it's been a ton of fun.
The dynamic level scaling honestly broke my gaming heart... Almost the whole point of these kind of games is the fulfillment you get when finding a new awesome weapon and seeing the difference it makes.
it scales with level not gear, so it's still there sort of, your gear is what makes you feel weak or strong
Exactly.
@Carbon it's not there.
@@carbon7536 he litterary said that you don't even notice the difference upon upgrading weapon/build
Everything about leveling, scaling, and skill tree sucks in this game. It looks good, feels pretty good, and has the Diablo lore, but it is just so far behind games like last epoch in what make arpgs good.
Thoroughly disappointed.
Damn despite all the positives you have to say, all the things you don't like about the game (meaningful gear progression, items/ relics that do fun new stuff like torchlight, etc.) are things that are a really big deal for me.
yeah, i was already holding off on buying for at least 6 months.... now im considering never buying... all the fun got sucked out in favor of window dressing
I mean, maybe check some reviews from people who have been playing it more and are long-term Diablo streamers. Some of the stuff he said in the review doesn't really sound right, especially around the itemisation since I've only seem him call the secondary affixes "disappointing" and he ignored the fact that there are legendary affixes outside of the dungeon ones as far as I'm aware, and ignores the fact that legendaries drop in the world too which may have abilities you haven't unlocked to your codex (or may not be able to unlock on your codex) and you can break down your legendaries into enchants that are like single-use versions of the codex legendaries
@@Hudson316 I feel that is how we should take game reviewers. People tend to just focus on their favorite content creator and dismiss others. I've definitely found some major flaws in games he has highly praised in the past. I mean, after all reviews are opinions and subjective
Progression and power building via looting IS the whole deal of these games. Otherwise you're just clicking buttons which is all I've seen people do in this game so far.
Although his review is great. He seems lacking on the gearing subject and you guys should really look deeper into it.
5:21 Some might be looking at the characters, but I haven't missed the sick drift that the rooster is doing there
Fantastic review! I can only imagine how much work went into it.
when skill up hits you with that single 'recommend ' and you have to watch the entire video to figure out if its good or mid.
Literally
Right!
I'm gonna go with "Mid" or even bad until i see how fucked the monetisation gets
Yeah, 6 minutes in is enough that the take away is pretty much, game is mid. 7/10 at best (which is still above average jfc people need to get that through their heads)
@@Chaotic_H3LL You kinda self contradict here. 7/10 is not mid. 5/10 is mid.
for a 90 euro game, with shop, it has to be insanely good to pass my personal review
69,99
@@Baustakar oh yeah, if you want to delay premiere for yourself, skip a weekend and play on work day
@@TheRunner3D Yeah, these bastards suits at Blizzard did that on purpose, there should never have been an early access like that. Everyone should've been able to play it now.
@@TheRunner3D why is this an issue? Like what will happen if you miss a few days?
You europeans with your complaining keep adding more and more money onto the purchase price
The moment I heard I can't over level and absolutely SWEEP lower level enemies I was out, game looks good but that "constantly pushing the goal post" type of stuff never bodes well for me, I want to not only grow stronger but to be able to FEEL my progress and how far I've come.
Funnily enough Diablo 4's more deterministic itemization with legendary aspects being transferable sounds extremely appealing to me as a POE player of over 10 years. If both games were infinite RNG farm fests I would've just stuck to POE but a more casual experience where getting a good item drop is much easier because it can be used in ways other than just equiping it or selling it sounds nice.
The RNG in POE feels like an insurmountable wall when you can identify 10,000 items and none of them are upgrades which feels discouraging when wanting to try something new, because you'll be throwing that much more progress you made when you start over.
I hope for the diablo fans out there that this time there's no ticking time bomb of a failed game waiting for players in max difficulty, like there was in Inferno back on D3's launch.
The endgame is a joke. Go look up level 100 barb gameplay. Guy in the press preview (that SKILLUP played) got to 100 on like 3 characters. ITS EXACTLY LIKE D3.
@@Paelmoon tbh it's actualy worse, all that cash shop stuff and battlepass make it a skip for me aswell.. if it whoud be f2p i accept the cash shop but this is atm Diablo immmortal behind smoke and mirrors.
Asmongold played the game after the latest patch and said, while playing it, that it's become unplayable. I suppose he was talking about the endgame, madlad was pretty far on with absurd equipments and skills. Still he had not many kind words to give to the newly patched game. I suppose that I'll be watching from the bleachers for a little longer before buying, just to see if this is actually true.
Seeing as you don't have to push map levels to get the best items, I doubt there will be this kind of a difficult wall unless you really want it.
@Darkkoi85 is the micro transaction not just cosmetic? I'm wondering because I'm thinking of buying
That 300-500 hours of bang for your buck with the initial asking price is if Blizzard DOES NOT screw with the battle pass or monetization model to frustrate us into paying.
I don't trust Blizzard at all after Diablo Immortal.
P.S. Changing the monetization on games for review copies/post-launch should absolutely be illegal and should be considered false advertising.
Exactly. They changed it for the reviews, so it's obvious they're hiding something. I'm not paying a hundred bucks to find out what. By the time the first sale comes around, we'll know.
The second the video games industry becomes regulated around microtransactions, is the day the crash begins.. and not just their profits, investors are going to eject.. probably to the tune of 30-40 in the first week..
Monetization schemes and battle passes were designed to frustrate people into eventually paying. They're designed to make you feel like you're going to miss out if you don't pay up.
Is there a list of the songs used in this review I really like the sound of some of them and would like to check them out?
I was worried my 7 year old rig with a 1080 Ti would have trouble when there's lots of action going on but even with everything on max settings at 1080p it runs at 120fps (most of the time) which i did not expect. I plan to get a new PC soon but for now i'm really happy it plays this smoothly on such an old machine. No lag or log in issues at all either, another thing i did NOT expect.
Same here, I was worried about performance because the game looked pretty dense and detailed graphically in trailers but my 5500xt babydick gpu can do locked 60 ultra settings with 0 hiccups. wasn’t expecting that at all. Same on the network side of things too, I’ve been DC’d 1 time and that was during the first like 15 minutes early access started
The 1080 will go down as one of the top 3 GPUs of all time
Auto scaling it the deal-breaker for me, I don't understand how a game designer can think that is a good idea
It's geared towards casuals. If they didn't scale the AI difficulty the average gamer would get frustrated and give up. 😂
@@JCTiggs1 Maybe. I personally don't care if its more or less casual, or maybe sortof welcome more players -> more money -> better games (to a certain extent). I just think auto scaling is bad everywhere you look at it from and I don't understand a group of game designers sitting on a table and deciding its a good idea to have it.
Diablo 3 was the same way though. Level isn't the only way the game handles difficulty. That is handled by 4 different world tiers, just as it was with Torment levels in D3.
@@Katie-hb8iq I guess many were hoping that since it went to an open world design that areas further away from the starting area would have a set difficulty level range for enemies like many other open world games.
@@Katie-hb8iq afair in d3 u had to unlock those torment levels and then manually adjust it yourself, things did not automagically happen in the background
Spending thousands of hours in poe, was excited to try d4. The dynamic difficulty just kills it for me 😔. I know it's a small complain but I want to feel how weak/powerful I am compare to each area/enemy and that makes the builds and drops that much more meaningful for me. Without that it's a pointless grind imho.
I'd hardly call that small. It's kinda the point if the genre. I'd say you're quite justified in your feeling
The passive gameplay of poe was what lead to me actually looking for other arpgs. Tried to find a warchief build for this season and seeing afk rightous fire be on top turned me around real quick. I want every grp of enemies to be a "challenge". I myself am looking forward to playing the campaig of this game when a sale happens. Not really interested in live service games personally.
Thanks for sharing yer opinion! ^_^
Enemies don't scale down, they scale up so that no matter what order you play the world in, nothing will be a walk-over zone you can shrug off, but some zones will roflstomp you if you go into them too early
are you really that surprised with a modern day blizzard product? Especially after they tipped their hand with Diablo Immortal.
It's almost like you want interesting and unpredictible things to occur
u can take this back
I'd love to see his take on 'The Last Epoch' some day and see how it measures up to D4. Great review as always team!!
It's not there yet, but has plenty of potential. Story needs more ironing out, character creation needs to be added, a better - more fleshed out endgame other than just monoliths is still needed. Will be nice to have DiabloIV and Last Epoch to play tho once it finally launches and leaves early access.
Exciting drops is the reason I play Diablo. I love to get a piece of gear that completely changes my playstyle. That's kind of what I look for an all loot games like this. It really bums me out to know that Diablo 4 doesn't have what made me love Diablo so much.
Yep. i agree. I don't think im going to play. I really hate this focus on paragon levels and funneling you up a smooth power progression curve to end game. It's a treadmill. You keep growing exactly in proportion to enemies, so you never end up actually feeling stronger. It seems like its just cynically designed to get you habituated to the game, get you running on the treadmill, and getting you hooked so eventually you make it a daily activity and start buying the battle passes. In a looter game, i want to find a new weapon that lets me crush everything for a few levels and actually feel overpowered for a bit. Diablo is like THE original looter game, it was so exciting finding some crazy new legendary weapon in diablo 1 or 2. This new design philosophy kind of sucks.
@@johnwrath3612 the one thing that I judge all other looters against is the time I was playing D3ROS, and I got boots that left a trail of fire on the ground and it burned enemies. ( I was a console pleb for most my life) it wasn't even crazy powerful but it changed how I was playing the game in one drop. It made me feel like I was crushing shit that used to give me a tough time. That experience has stuck with me and it's how I judge all looter games. This really bums me out because I have been looking to D4 for so long. I bought Diablo 3 reaper of souls on...3 different consoles? And played tons of time in it. I was hoping 4 would just be 3 but better....I never played D1 or D2.
100%. This is a real bummer. I was going to buy this at launch but fuck that mess. Maybe when it's cheap.
@@redfin382 Yep. Stat sticks have their place in RPG design, but they're not fun. Being able to transfer "legendary aspects" seems like something you should ONLY unlock deep in the end game. Being able to transfer all the interesting abilities to any item you want ruins the feeling of finding a new item. Interesting, unique, even overpowered effects on new items are what make the genre fun.
@@johnwrath3612 yeah exactly...bc then just like skillup said...you find a perk you like and just put it on every weapon you get. It's boring.
Hey Skillup, Diablo 4 is 70$ not 60. Just throwing that out there.
$80 for standard edition in my country, yaay.
$110 in Australia 🗿
100$ Collectors edition that comes with NO GAME :D
Blizzcuck bots will say this is ok
Been playing it for 2 hours and am immediately gripped by the story and look. Cannot wait to play more but I wish the scaling wasn’t so heavy and let’s hope they adjust it so it’s not as invasive.
This review actually made me consider just jumping into Diablo 3 for that reason. Ive never played any diablo game but ive always wanted to for the sake of getting rewarding loot and feeling like a badass as I progressed. But if the scaling is going to make most of the game feel the same as it felt during the beta, I think im just going to wait and hope they fix this issue in the future.
@@chrisfrost3076 I just played through D3 and kind of felt the same way you describe the D4 beta makes me nervous about pulling the trigger on D4...
@@chrisfrost3076 Diablo 3 also has scaling like D4. It's the same thing. At launch, Diablo 3 did not have scaling, but that was changed from the Reaper of Souls update. SkillUp should have known this actually. Difficulty is managed in D3 through the Torment levels just as D4 manages it through the world tiers.
It definitely exposes the class balance issues. I'm struggling to find one that actually feels fun to play. The necro minions feel like armor clad skeletons using pool noodles. Maybe it's the world tier veteran throwing the gameplay off or the on rails "builds". I don't feel like there is a whole lot of build diversity at all in this game. Idk, I'm struggling but trying to find some fun in it.
The scaling fkn sucks
What's the music running at around 7:15? I wanna look into whoever it is.
personally, I would hold off recommendation of this game until the monetization shop arrived... it's common practice now days for terrible company to hide monetization in the review copy and release it a week after the game release.... also dont forget this is the same company that release diablo immortal and it make back all the development cost in the 1st week... if you dont think they will implement that monetization into Diablo 4, I have a bridge to sell you.
Really odd for this to have been a recommendation considering how many things he said he was disappointed about
He gives plenty of both pros and cons on most reviews
You are away that you can recommend something while it still has cons right?
TUREE
@@veliona8920 yes. I didn't say "oh he criticized a thing and still recommended it". But the vast majority of this review seems to be complaints and disappointments, some of which concern fundamental design elements (like dungeons feeling repetitive or gear drops being meaningless).
@@mechanicalmonk2020 trust me this is without a doubt the best diablo game ever made what a real diablo fan review the game skillup doesn't really understand what the game is going for e.g the level scaling is completely different then what he explained. i recommend. FextraLifes, review on the game
You're so right about level scaling. Level scaling is such a drag and makes no sense for an arpg. Its less of problem once you reach end game but still. One of the mist satisfying thing about D2 is being too weak for a boss, farming for a couple levels and better gear then going back and destroying. Ugggh, why?
I feel like with diablo 3 yes you could swap skills around very easily. However the items really gated you into certain skills and limited what you could play with due to the power creep of set bonuses. I do wonder about the time investment though and how thatll impact experimentation. Maybe though it's just a good reason to make alts
Hey Skill, thanks for this review it's very interesting to see this unfold. I do really hope you get to do an update to this maybe 6 or 12 months down the line or something when the game has had months of content releases and patches. I feel like we will be able to use that as a reasonable yardstick as to how much the devs are actually willing to address complaints or game design issues in the long run, depending on what they come up against.
I'm also super interested to see how this plays and runs on console. I personally can't play KB+M ARPGs easily so being able to play on controller on PS4 for Diablo 3 was a godsend, especially since their console port of the game was extremely well designed. I am super interested to see what the console port of this will look like too, and hell, maybe even controller support for PC?
I played the beta on PC with a DualSense (PS5) controller and it controlled pretty well in my experience as a Rogue. Didn’t play much of the game though.
Let's see what this looks like in a month. Don't trust the monetisation.
7:04 - The song playing, is that Corrosion of Conformity's _"Albatross"_ but... slower? Because if it isn't... It sounds suspiciously similar, lol...
I was happy to finish the game and feel like it was worth playing solely for the main story. I just B-lined the story the whole way through and enjoyed it almost the entire way. There were a little slow spots but it really hit the right notes I felt. Worth playing alone for the solo main-story experience imo.
Shillup + live service = living up to the shill.
I made a promise to myself that any game that has a battle pass, no matter how good, isn't for me. Dont care how much good content there is. I dont want this type of monetization in games.
40:20
This feels like an incredibly strange point to argue in a year where we got Tears of the Kingdom, will get FFXVI, and are slated to get plenty more big titles before the year's out.
Yeah I'm getting some fan boy vibes from him on this review in general
where are the ragdoll explosions?
What I really missed in the beta after many years in diablo 3 was the reaction of the enemies to your attacks. In part 3, when you hit the ground with a hammer with a barbarian and the damage is enough, then the creatures scattered in all directions. And those lumps of corpses that were nearby also reacted to the blow and merrily scattered. I understand that part 3 is more about fun than about gloom, but these blows felt the power of the heroes, when from one shot the skeletons scattered all over the screen. I hope they add this feature as an option, it's all I can ask for like the map in the previous parts.
I was crying in agony watching the world quest objectives I was supposed to protect getting thrown around a cave as I was using a new barb ability where you rend the earth and throw it forward and it tosses corpses and any little thing in the environment.
I just Twisted Blades with Shadow Imbue through several mobs and saw them explode into literally limbs in all directions. So idk what to tell ya there. IIRC Blizzard mentioned in one of their videos that the more points you put into the spell the more impactful itll look and feel. Between lvl 1 and 5 there isn't a ton of difference (though it is there) but seeing as how you can get skills up to even lvl 15 via I'm assuming armor, you might get those huge impactful hits later on.
This is also why Diablo 2 get hit animation still superior than D3 and D4
@@ROFLWAFFLELAWL4 I talked about the fact that there is no interactivity with the killed enemies, they just lie under your feet like a dead weight and do not react to your actions (unless of course you are a necromancer).
At the very same game (beta), I personally did not see what you are talking about. They seem to have added a new visual mechanic for mob death, but I wasn't impressed anyway.
@@sahabatgamerID lfmao the copium is strong with you m'y friend
What I love about you review is that you went in knowing your limits. EG not getting to end game, and talking your time with the story and the world itself. That all but makes your review unique, in the landscape. Far too many others, good in their own way, just seemed to be more about rushing. Given I am a journey, not the destination type player, I love that you did this.
Skill Up is a fantastic reviewer. He knows his shit more than most people in the buisness.
Why do people have to brown nose on every youtube video?
We get it - he's a good reviewer
@@bigguschungus968 ok chief who asked
I almost feel that the metrics you give towards the end about how we're getting " XXX # of hours of game play with this" game might actually be and adverse effect with what you say earlier. Never once in my (so far) 30 hours have I felt particularly powerful. I feel like I'm playing catch-up to be able to deal with monsters that scale to my level or are always 2+ levels above (like in strongholds). If the paragon board "solves" that issue -- whenever I get there, that just feels like selling a solution to a free problem.
The loot game really opens up at later world tiers, with uniques and more legendaries..and you can't get aspects for most unless you destroy the item, so drops are more important
It's true. As good as the review is I'm surprised he didn't mention it. I picked up a legendary for the druid that gave 240% increased pulverize damage and also turned it into a giant wave, you can't get that from a dungeon. I extracted and imprinted it once and then had to toss it because it wasn't strong enough after levelling, and now I'm looking for it again and will be buzzing when I find it. The loot game is definitely still there.
@@MrMartyDgod damn where you find that legendary at though? 😂
@@biscuitboi9478 Random one handed weapon drop from a trash mob in a dungeon, was glorious! I extracted it an put it on a two-handed weapon which doubles the roll. The range was 190% - 260%, so there's an even better one out there somewhere :)
All you gotta do is suffer through 50 hours of boring homogenized garbage first
My Necro is almost lvl 50 and I barely started Act 3 😄. I constantly find myself wandering around and doing side-quests, I really want to unlock Tier 3 and 4 but I can't help myself screwing around 😆
Diablo: Destiny edition.
I get why you like it Skill Up, definitely don’t think it’s for me. Great review!
Game looks very fun, but no way am I taking part in something that has a $70 purchase price, AND a battle pass AND a store front.
"Hell" no.
And INB4 they sell you more classes as well.
70$ point is fair (but with that mentality you wont be buying any AAA games since they are all like that now), but the other 2 are just dumb. I don't get why the comments find it so impossible to simply ignore cosmetic microtransactions
40:21
@Caleb Eubank, it's the amount to come inevitably.
This company is gonna bait and switch. Just wait. Mark my words.
Don't give one single flying fuck if the MTX are "just cosmetic:" you do NOT monetize a game with an upfront sticker price.
F2P games can get away with it because we aren't paying an entry fee only to be worn down with manipulative monetization schemes attempting to break down your will power into $$$. And hey, I know games exist to make money: they are businesses. If the F2P game is good enough and the MTX reasonable, I don't mind tossing in some $$$.
But charging money for the 'box' AND having the audacity to ask for more immediately afterwards?
Fuck off.
FUCK. OFF.
The term 'damage gate' is mentioned a few ttimes, ie 27:07, what does that mean?
VERY IMPORTANT QUESTION: I have nerve damage so rapid clicking is painful. Does D4 allow you to bind move/walk to a keyboard button like W instead of mouse click? That function is the only reason I can play Path of Exile
yeah you can bind move/interact to anything you want, will still need to "aim" with mouse for direction of movement, or you can use a joystick on a controller which works great in general
10 years and no offline undermines all the hard work...
LOL hard work... man they got you snowed completely
I will bet my left nut that Blizzard's gonna rug-pull the Diablo playerbase after a month or two.
thank you so much for the widescreen format sir.
I feel this review perfectly took us through the journey of initial awe, be it scale, graphics and improved narrative, then let us down slowly by highlighting its shortcomings and many aspects that kill the progression enjoyment. I for one feel satisfied skipping Diablo 4 now, whilst before I had this insatiable desire to play it on day 1. I've now come to my senses and can appreciate it's a great game and improves on many previous aspects, but not worth the time and emotional investment required as ultimately it never pays off. Astounding review, you are a gem sir.
@Jacob Culliver I played 20-30 hours over the betas. Enjoyed the atmosphere and story. D3's hook was insanely powered gear that once you obtain you "feel" godlike. D4 doesnt have this , for better or worse. Im in my mid 30s, i dont have 1000 hours to grind incremental upgrades each season and thats OK. im not the target market.
@Jacob Culliver you can resonate with aspects of their review if it provides enough nuance and well thought out discussion points. If that's not you, that's ok. I'm an avid lover of Diablo but I work full time and reviews of this quality help establish what games are suitable for me. 10 years ago fuck yeah D4 would be amazing, but i dont have the time so at this point I'll sit out. Hope you find enjoyment in it that i couldn't Jacob, i genuinely mean that.
SkillUp: Before I continue, I recommend this game. It's the best Diablo ever.
* proceeds to lay out in detail everything he doesn't like about it.
Isn't that how reviews work?
@@beady0081 I guess. But he had a 25 minute list of things of things he didn’t like and gave reasons for them, but recommends it because it’s big and has a lot in it. As Bernard Black would say, it represents a tremendous amount of value. I wouldn’t recommend you have Denny’s for breakfast, though it is a lot of food for the price. It is just immediately satisfying but not very good for you in the long run. Sorry, I think my analogy wandered off.
Also Necromancer, itself (it being the only class I've played so far) feels like your intentionally handicapping yourself unless you are following a Bone build. I tried a Shadow DOT build and struggled throughout the campaign. Another Ytber tried a Blood build and saw the same thing. Both of us switched to Bone and saw a massive impact on our viability.
That D3 gameplay used throughout the video, was it being run on a N64?
About dynamic level scaling, it only scales up to you, not down. So you have areas that are above your level, if you misstep and don't follow the Act progressions. And even then I think some things like resistances aren't scaled, only their health and damage.
I like this cause I'm the kind of guy that kills every mob and cant have a smidge of fog of war on the screen
Even in BETA I rushed through story to get to the first(?) big encounter in that underground zone where you go with a knight and a girl(Trying to be non spoilerish here). And IT KICKED MY ASS HARD so I definitely had an easier time there later after getting some levels and skills.
Thanks for this review. You've saved me 70$
Jesus, so am I correct in assuming that the whole rush of upgrading and grinding to enjoy the feeling of being stronger than your enemies (at least for a short while) is gone? If so I'm out.
@@caldale4941
Not completely.
With good gear at lvl30 you start going over the scaling and becoming stronger than the scaling, so returning to old areas is easier but not completely irrelevant to run.
But there is not a point where starter enemies die to one thorns item alone.
As always, great review with superb attention to detail, professionalism and wit. Also: moonwalking chicken @5:23
The problems with this game is staggering from inventory management to almost non existent endgame. A big empty world with the same bland dungeon is just a drag to do
no overlay map and the horse gets stuck everywhere. Insane and gated respec cost with no way reset without unchecking every nod.
very underwhelming loot along with boring legendary and four stash tab shared across all your chars.
its a very pretty game no doubt but it is not ready for release and should have been delayed at least a year.
I have never listen to @SkillUp before, he did a very nice review. Very well done, easy to listen to. Nice work!