So I beat Diablo IV

 

So a while back I just randomly got into playing through the Diablo games on a whim and was kinda of seeing where it was leading me- finding out if ARPGs were going to become my new thing. As it turns out the grind curve of those games tends to start feeling like Mobile games after a while, where you're dedicating far too much time to move forward a single decimal point, and thus I never quite reach the pinnacle in any of these titles- both 2 and 3 were still fun times for what they were and I was interested to try 4 one day. Well as it turns out that one day was actually a few weeks ago and I've been hanging around with Diablo IV (courtesy of Gamepass) and seeing where that journey ends up leading me. And so far I think I've spent the most time grinding this one out yet- so what does that mean for my experience?

Well first off I have to admit that from a gameplay standpoint I certainly like building my character in Diablo IV a lot more than I did for 2 and even for 3- although that might be because I actually have an idea of how to build one of these characters now and so I knew how to play- as opposed to back in Diablo III where I was playing it by ear until everything clicked late game. But all that being said I have to extol how much fun I had with itemisation, getting crazy powers from my Unique helmet which turned my meteor attack into an absolute rain of splash damage, or melting my way through pretty much everything in the game with tri-flamethrower beams courtesy of an aspect that I've been shopping around into every new armour set I cook up. I'm really eating well of the labours of Diablo IV's latest patch being all around fixing the apparently weak itemisation of the launch version.

But those are only ever the juicy addendums to my Diablo journeys- they all start with delves into the inner workings of the narrative and seeing what the team have been cooking up in creating, within the devs own words, 'the darkest adventure since Diablo II'. So having played Diablo 2 I would probably say that whilst this doesn't quite delve into those realms of darkly fantastical despair- it does feel more like a continuation of that world than Diablo III did. There's less babbling about how you're some sort of deific chosen one destined to bat back the gods in a blink of an eye, and more harrowing journeys of loss and mourning in a world that, truth be told, doesn't really seem worth saving. I mean you get mobbed by a thousand demons on your way to get milk from the next village over- at that point I'd say the world's a wash!

Ah yes, because of course Diablo IV is the first game in the series to bring in an open world for you to explore between adventures and with that comes a certain degree of cohesiveness to the world layout to absorb. Something does have to be said for the way that grinding can be done across different environments instead of along the same levels of the original three games- but apart from that the open world is largely perfunctory. The promise of dozens of dungeons strewn across the world loses it's lustre once you learn that most of those dungeons are built using three or four tilesets with three or four end bosses to pick between. Still, nothing is lost in the experience of the open world aside from a supposed sense of 'intimacy' with your close vendors but to be honest- I always found that a bit ham-fisted in previous games. Particularly 3- those guys never shut up.

Diablo IV drags Lilith into the forefront as the daughter of Hatred (literally the Prime Evil of Hatred; Mephisto) and Mother of Sanctuary, the world within which the game is set, and does an absolutely abysmal job telling the rather important story of her and Inarius. (The father of Sanctuary, also an angel)

I know the story had technically already been touched on in documents strewn about previous games, but this was the first to feature both characters as supposedly core parts of the plot and we don't even have the history of why these two are destined to war played out? Even as a mere refresher? Inarius is laughably absent from the story, and Lilith is played more as a sympathetic character than some supremely terrifying and unknowable evil like the Prime Evils were usually made out to be. Which I guess fits her position as a supposed tyrannical 'saviour'.

Our cast of co-stars are actually fine this time around, if slightly close to the Diablo 3 cast. Maybe I like these guys more because they all undergo fittingly horrific hardships to be considered worthy of being a Diablo cast member. We even have a stand in for Leah in the form of Neyrelle- although Ney feels a lot more like a kid trying to survive in a grim world gone evil rather than Leah who sort of felt like a princess from a storybook. My only real complaint for this cast is the same reason why I took to dubbing them all 'the toddler squad' by the final few acts- they all can't keep themselves out of trouble when out of your sight. I am serious- every member of the cast undergoes some horrific mutilation or kidnapping in moments when they leave your direct supervision for literally 10 seconds. Every single cast mate. Aside from Lorath but we have DLC coming up- plenty of time for him to accidentally trip into a crocodile's open mouth whilst we're hitching our mounts, or something.

Diablo feels pretty fluid and fun in it's latest iteration, and mowing down even the smallest mobs tickles the right dopamine channels you need in a game about killing dozens of hoards. It's a refined point, sharpened over a series of revisions, and that's what makes it so effective. I would say there's a bit of a 'too easy' problem in the early game. The first two world tiers make it nearly impossible to lose unless you're literally trying to die and the latter two world tiers only really manage to make a challenge by throwing you against enemies that hopelessly outlevel you. The major challenges of each season are literally bosses that rank 100 levels above the max and exist as endurance challenges- I don't really consider that 'great endgame boss' material. Plus, the 'time to kill' situation is pretty wild. You are literally alive or you're dead- nothing inbetween. It can get frustrating.

In the end as someone who isn't exactly a giant fan of this genre of games, in style or substance, Diablo IV had everything I wanted for a casual experience and enough to hook me in to play a lot more than I originally wanted to. Would I call it better than previous games? Honestly it's offerings are so thematically and tacitly distinct that I'd have to take the easy way out and call it a 'matter of taste'. Certainly if you want the most polished feeling ARPG on the market right now, you're in the right place- at least until the beta for Path of Exile 2 launches- which actually does look pretty fire- I wonder if Diablo will have the backbone to stand up to PoE2 when the time comes...

Don't forget to tip!

Dupont would be proud.

Mike Ybarra is a bit of a scapegoat. He was dragged into his role as leader of Blizzard following a sexual abuse scandal that left the position as toxic, and then he was thrown out of the role when Microsoft took over as an example of the change that would be coming to the brand. Now that would be a pretty significant position to hold, a shining example to stick in one's CV, had it not followed that whole 'sexual abuse scandal' that I just mentioned. (Bit of a red flag, that.) As it happens the man was a stop gap between the Blizzard that had to be doused for it's PR and the Blizzard that was incoming because the Blizzard deal was being cooked up for an age and a half before he even swore the oath. (They have an oath of office at Blizzard, right?) But do not get me wrong, despite his relatively brief tenure, my man has quite a few achievements under his belt!

Why, he marched into the office and demanded he needed to see everyone's pearly teeth in person else he just couldn't quite get in the 'working mood'- or at least that's what I can assume would be the logic behind a 'return to office' order... for a technology company. (It just isn't the same unless you're typing on our keyboards!) He scrapped the annual profit-sharing bonuses that the company had run on for years, essentially meaning that when the company had achieved well because one department excelled, everyone would benefit- and he did a bunch of other little stuff like downplaying the importance of QA teams and other stuff that actual developers who make the products consider antithetical to a healthy environment. The dude was a Looney Tunes character brought into a role that had an expiration date upon signing, scrambling to try and make enough changes to stick on his over-inflated CV so he brag about all the nonsensical changes he made and how much of a 'trend setter' he was!

Mike's a moron, basically. Which is why it should come as no surprise to anyone that the man, enjoying his time out of the big seat for now, spouted cringe on main when it came to single player games. Yeah, that thing which Blizzard doesn't do anymore because they can't figure out how to squeeze it for every cent it's worth, single player games? Mike is playing them now. (To be fair, Blizzard never really made any Single Player games, it's just that the reason behind that these days is a bit different to how it used to be.) And Mike is using the internet's dirty dumping ground, known as Twitter, (or some other name I can't remember) to tell us all about his further revolutionary ideas which, much like the actual policies he affected as a CEO, clearly did not churn around his little walnut of a brain for longer than it took him to evacuate his bowels that morning.

"I thought about this idea for a while..." he claimed, likely referring to the particularly stubborn 'log' he struggled to shake off just an hour previously. "When I beat a game, there are some that just leave me in awe of how amazing the experience was. At the end of the game, (Unnecessary comma alert) I've often thought "I wish I could give these folks another $10 or $20 because it was worth more than my initial $70 and they didn't try to nickel and dime me every second." Now barring the severe irony of the man talking about being 'Nickel and Dimed' when he was CEO for the release of bloody Diablo 4- is my man seriously advocating for tipping game developers? Because that is either an insanely naïve idea formed by a severely delusional idealist or... no, actually I won't give the benefit of the doubt- that's all it is. Naïve.

Now to be clear, this man is not talking about indie games on Itch.io- (as you can likely deduce from the $70 comment) because obviously those games already have a tipping feature, built into the service. He's talking your mega games, your Red Dead Redemption 2, your Baldur's Gate 3, your Horizon Zero Dawns. He thinks these are the kinds of games that simply demand much more than that painful '$70' price tag, which is already raising a debate on 'value proposition' lately- why? Because he wants to pay more, damn it! And the developers deserve a bit more of a kick-back! You mean... that they deserve... Bonuses? You think people should be rewarded for success with bonuses, Mike Ybarra- famous scrapper of bonuses? I wonder why he didn't use the common term 'bonus' and instead conjured up some bizarre 'tipping' concept. I wonder...

But lets' throw our heads into 'La La' land for a second, ignore the waltzing Ryan Gosling and pretend this was a real thing people could do. Why in the hell would you ever think that extra money would see developers? What has happened since games shot up to $70? Where has that extra $10 gone? To the sacking of half the AAA industry, whilst profits shoot up for the suits! So where do you think your tip money would go? Right into those same pockets. See- that's why this whole 'please give us more RRP for our poor hungry developers' is a bunch of absolute barnacle paste! When you're talking about multi-million dollar studios who are balancing whole empires in their balance sheets- you have to realise that the only barrier to developers being paid solid wages, are the companies themselves. There's no lack of money flying around the industry, there's a lack of standards on whom gets paid what. Unless we're talking about implementing some sort of 'royalties' system but- let's be honest, Mike didn't think this through- of course he never considered 'royalties'.

All this is without taking into account that Mike Ybarra is actually talking about reward games with more than the above full-price standard for the sheer magnanimity of not 'Nickle and Diming' us. My man has such low esteem for the consumer caste that he thinks we should wheel out the parades and circuses every time developers doesn't go to the nth degree to clog up their games with endless Microtransactions, bloat out progression to encourage time skipper packs, lock day-one content behind ludicrously over priced special editions and... well, do everything that Ubisoft does. He basically wants to Pavlov the game's industry for not becoming more like Ubisoft. That's kind of like the bare minimum, Mike. I thought your generation was supposed to be so far removed from the 'participation trophy' mentality! Turns out that's because your more into the 'You've made it out of bed, here's my credit card details' meta!

Tipping comes with a strange change of the dynamic between consumer and product, and just like every single 'revision' to that relationship I've ever read over the course of the past year- no one really thinks past the basic implementation of their insanely short sighted idea. I read one Metro contributor propose every game being free-to-play for the first few hours with people paying access to the content they want to play, thus circumventing the exorbitant buy in prices. Totally ignoring how that would influence all game design to front end the most explosive content to try and trick people into investing for the back half of lazier stuff. (Which is already a quiet meta worming it's way through design.) Or the whole 'pay per hour you play' model I heard brought up, which would totally assassinate all slower paced games which encourage you to enjoy the journey and see the sights such as Red Dead Redemption 2. Mike Ybarra kind of slides neatly into that cadre of clueless 'ideas guy' people who throw around half-baked shoot-for-the-fences concepts without putting any of the gears upstairs to work trying to think their ideas through. Thank god he's no longer a CEO and those ideas no longer have a human cost!

Marvel's Overwatch

 

If I worked at the Marvel company right about now- well I'd be loaded, wouldn't I? But I would also be incredibly hyper-conscious every waking hour about the razors-edge my place in pop culture is currently balancing upon. Insist though Kevin Fiege might, there's no denying the fact that Marvel is currently far past it's prime and rapidly approaching the realm of irrelevancy at such a depressing speed that I'm no longer surprised when a Marvel named project slides neatly under everyone's radar and goes on to underperform. As this point every failure has to feel like a stab in the back of a wounded animal, struggling to get back on it's feet and speed back into the race, which is probably why Marvel has all but retreated from this year in the hopes that Deadpool can prove the about face their franchise needs. Of course, Marvel can't control the whims of the mad scientist Sony, and as such another on of their half-aborted cross-bred abominations of life will slither onto screens this year too with 'Kraven the animal-loving all-vegan largely-respectful bad-guy hunter'.

In such straits, I can only imagine a slam dunk video game under the Marvel brand that will remind everyone why they love this franchise is exactly what the team are looking for- something to keep people distracted whilst the movie divisions figure out how to unscrew themselves from the absolute mess of everything they've made. (Not least of all changing course after having to fire their leading man for the next ten planned movies.) We've already gotten wind of that Black Panther meets Captain America game- which could currently be anything from a Souls-based action title to a choice-based narrative game to a Rhythm-based space shooter- we've got nothing to go on for that one. But one might say that for their other leading project we have quite a lot to go on. Perhaps even too much- considering that I'm pretty sure most of the gaming world is familiar enough with Overwatch at this point.

Yes, the team based hero shooter based around guarding payloads through the same rough feeling map that hasn't managed to significantly grow out of that base concept since it's inception. And the team have gaslit themselves into being proud of that, despite once having dreams of growing the brand into a powerhouse that caters to all kinds of players, not just forlorn soldiers of the old guard who stick around out of habit and Rule 34 artists who pop in to get a preview of who they'll be morally bankrupting over the next year. Having just recently shrunken to such a size in their development team that they can't even support the promised PVE functions that were meant to replace the promised extensive singleplayer content- one might say it's never been a better time to present a direct competitor copycat with the money and brand recognition to steal it's faded luster. In comes Marvel Rivals.

Despite sounding like on of those low-rent mobile store fluff pieces, Marvel Rivals looks like it might be a semi-competent hero shooter set in colourful cartoon-style maps that look near identical to Overwatch ones and featuring a cast of characters who have actually been properly fleshed out through canonical ancillary media- Blizzard! We'll see anime-ass looking Iron Man teaming up with K-pop idol Hulk, mobile-banner-ad Loki, Hanzo-in-cosplay Namor, Ultimate-design-reject Spider-Man, Grown-up D.VA stand-in Peni Parker- (Obviously piloting SP//dr) and this one girl called Luna Snow who looks like she exists only as a 2D ad-waifu for Korean mobile games. All these heroes are teaming up against Galacta- Galactus slightly more skimpy daughter who likely exists only to quench some lonely comic artist's desire for hot giant women. As a Lady D survivor, I have no grounds on which to judge that.

And you know what- the game looks... functioning. It doesn't promise a whole lot thus far, merely bringing us to a Marvel-based version of the Overwatch vision; but in that lies a simple and steadfast truth- they haven't overpromised yet. Overwatch was the home of overpromises, built on the foundations of a Blizzard that still had some slither of it's former dignity left in 2016. Some saw Overwatch, which had existed in some form in the company vaults for years beforehand, as the last hurrah new franchise from the player-first studio and expected it to be the exception in the slow dissolution of brand. Overwatch's promises then started to turn into broken promises which blossomed into ruptured trust. And when all trust is gone- that is when the lying started.

What Marvel Rivals offers is a clean slate- if a familiar one- peppered with an easily recognisable cast of distinctive silhouettes that already starts with a stronger base appeal than, say, Paladins. (Another Overwatch wannabe.) I genuinely think that this game's cleverly picked line-up of thin coded Tik-tok E-boy Marvel variants paired with the long-legged waifu companion cast has the potential to slip into the rotation of hero shooters provided everything goes to plan. Given that we're looking at a pure PC release right now, the most difficult platform to develop for recently, it would be really bad if they do a 'Modern gaming move' and screwed up the windows version. (And there's a not-0% chance that they do screw it up, knowing the landscape.)

Of course, any sparks of anticipation you might feel welling up at all this should be duly tempered by my next bit of news. This is a game by NetEase Games. Oh yeah, that Chinese tech company known for peddling free-to-play titles that lure in with functioning games and then trap you in their culture-typical pay-piggy hell. Starting up one of their games is like signing up to a Loanshark subscription service where they come around and knock on your window every morning when you're trying to relax to squeeze some blood of you. It's like trying to walk down the street and enjoy the view whilst beset by an gang of organised beggars who have strategized how best to squeeze into your wallet. It's like trying to be an an every day land-loving Chinese famer in the 1800s, whilst bad-boy-Britain keeps hitting up your local haunt peddling just wagon-loads of Opium for an insane mark-up. And you're already addicted at this point, so they're essentially just dependency enslaving you. You're picking up what I'm putting down, right?

Still, with how Overwatch currently sits- their waifu skin-suit badly stretched across a one-armed bandit- (I just remembered how that is actually a fetish, unfortunately.) maybe there's a space for even a NetEase disaster child to steal some of that thunder. I mean, it's not like Overwatch has some moral highground to stand on. They've thought impure thoughts about Lady D, just the same as the rest of us! (Wait, what were we talking about?) Of course, it will take a talented team of dedicated developers to retain such stolen thunder, and not do a 'Pokemon Unity' and fade from the limelight less than two weeks after launch. And to this I can say- wow, Overwatch 2 really wouldn't be in trouble of being outshone of they stuck to their guns and diversified the brand, now would they? Food for thought!

Overwatch

I've been focusing on the same whipping boy for the past few months on this blog, the big U- who's name I shall not quoteth throughout this diatribe- such to the extent that I've forgotten the other names who deserve my villainization just as much. In that vein, allow me to bring to the fore Overwatch 2- the fall of Blizzard; although, I suppose every Blizzard product has been the fall of Blizzard in some way shape or form, hasn't it? To even coin the term 'fall', would imply that the Blizzard of today is in any way similar to the Blizzard of the old world- which of course it simply isn't. Those old developers have been weeded out of the company bit by bit and those that remain are the inexpensive and inexperienced interns stumbling over their own feet in pursuit of some vapid concept coined 'Blizzard quality'.

Overwatch has been like a 'before and after' picture condemning excessive drug abuse, showcasing a Blizzard team that were once powerful enough to steal the spotlight of the entire industry for a brief time alongside a pathetic shadow of their former self which cannot help but repeatedly disappoint everyone they come across. To this day I find it near impossible to reconcile the fact that Overwatch 2 launched with promises that the team knew were scrapped and wouldn't announce their cancellation until years had already passed. Here I was waiting for the complete single player campaign to drop in order to get back into the game, only to learn that I had been essentially shafted by a team who figured their online efforts were so taxing they couldn't possible meet the bars of quality they set for themselves.

The team's claim that the parameters of their vision have changed is like a government trying to recontextualise the devastation following a hurricane as a 'reimagining of their public infrastructure.' How else can you feasibly go from a high quality single player narrative campaign that highlighted individual heroes with RPG skill trees undergoing story-led missions and end up with badly balanced co-op raids feasibly stretched across an ill-fitting range of PVP designed and focused characters, topped off by bare basic narrative voice overs in lieu of real storytelling, and not be supremely embarrassed in yourselves? God, I wouldn't ever show my face again in the industry if my game underwent a glow down that pathetic for a franchise has well-defined as Overwatch.

To this day this franchise has no storyline beyond that which we're briefly told in the intro cutscene, despite years of well designed and performed characters with entire wealth's worth of backstories which could be used to fuel a truly engaging narrative if only the team could successfully pull it's head out of it's arse. Instead they want to screw around slowly 'trial and erroring' themselves into gradually recreating the exact same game Overwatch 1 was, before pulling everything apart again and building it up once more. How the hell can you just totally rip apart the healing system that the entire franchise has had since inception and call that a decent use of development time? Seriously, I'm dying to know!

But of course, that is all old news- the newest of the new is the current 'missions structure' that Overwatch decided to pimp it's former narrative aspirations through, premium chunks of paid content that seems to have been disparaged by every Overwatch player on the planet for their lack of replayability and general play-worth, has been cancelled. Or so the team seem to think behind the scenes, because of course Overwatch devs are terrible at communication both inside and out of their community- Don't worry though. When the decision is actually made the Overwatch team will be sure to inform us around about circa 2026- probably after farming pre-orders of the next bunch of missions with a handy 'no refunds' clause attached to the disclaimer.

The ambiguity comes from the fact that there was actually a large team at Overwatch dedicated to making these missions, apparently somewhere near 400 people were sitting down trying to fit a square block through a round peg and failing embarrassingly through the attempt. 'Were' being the operative in this conversation because these fellows are no more. They have shifted off this employed coil after the recent rounds of layoffs that apparently got everyone working on the co-op missions, mid-development. So either literally no one in management realised that and the department is going to stay unknowingly dormant for the next three years, or this was a particularly guerrilla way to insist they aren't going to need the team anymore for a task they aren't interested in being completed anymore.

So yes, this seems to be yet another aborted vector of the game that is Overwatch 2- a product who's only substantive changes has been removing one player from the line-up, recently totally restructuring healing and... there has to be another one right... oh- I guess the monetisation system! Yeah, Overwatch 2 is a bit of an embarrassment of a multi-year project that has floundered in nearly everyway to innovate upon the first game. It's lost the cultural impact the franchise launched with, fumbled every opportunity through which they could have launched a second wind and seems to be scratching it's head wondering how to get the Multiplayer working. (Which means rewiring the game, apparently. Cause why not, it's not like anything else you try is going to make it to market!)

I actually used to believe in Overwatch. I thought it could be a positive and fun force for moving in a solid direction in game design. Normalising multimedia storytelling, developing iconic and distinctly strong characters, presenting a cast of diverse nationalities in a way that makes sense and isn't pandering- there is so much that Overwatch could have been: but for some reason no one seems willing enough to put in the effort, resources or love to bring it about. Maybe it's a corporate thing, with the man in the high castle stomping out the flames of potential before they can be sparked, or maybe we are suffering from an unfocused team who can't decide whether they're brave enough to try and innovate or still too skittish to trust in the framework they've been refining for about 8 years now. Either way, the Overwatch vine is wilting- and they have no one to blame but those within the office walls.

Bobby's bounced

 Kotick Down

So Robert Kotick has officially flown the coop. He has based jumped off the top of the Activision ladder with his pockets stuffed full of bills and bullion and his parachute glinting a special gleam of glorious gold. The man has succeeded to such an extent that the many alleged crimes that he committed, actual crimes not just crimes against art, have bounced off him like water off the back of a duck and now he is free to pollute some other business with his presence and start the cycle all over again, all whilst giving that rodent-like grin he saved for all of his public press photos that make him look like discount Peter Pettigrew. (I know: "Personal insults- so mature!" But the guy is a colossus now, I hardly think a snide comment on his wavering public image is going to hurt the man's pride.)

Bobby is a mystery of a man all to himself, slipping from business to business all of his life before landing on the Activision train that he decided to suck dry. You can't call him a career business creep that fell into the world of gaming, because Bobby was hovering our industry like a vulture for years before taking his top role, picking at the body- trying to extract whatever carrion the man could stuff down his maw. I would imagine there was even a time where his presence was looked on with some sort of respect, or even favourability. A man with as long as a tenure as he commands some natural aura of intrigue and consideration. Luckily, though, the rot beneath the flesh is never quite so easy to hide, and Bobby leaves us all glaring red for all of his many faults. So let us all shout them out before he publishes a book deflecting all of them onto other people.

Kotick has been a plague which has slowly picked up more and more steam as the years have gone by to the extent of serious business wide ramifications. We know that Kotick made significant effort to do nothing about and cover up the sexual harassment claims bubbling about his office- facilitating it's perpetuation into the work culture. Kotick was revealed to have voiced a message for assistants back in 2006, threatening to have them killed. Bobby is implicated in several improper termination disputes wherein he is alleged to have cut people from the payroll that might be considered 'problematic' or 'trouble starters'. And to round things out I do believe he is also listed in the Epstein flight logs- which is just a really bad look ontop of everything else, now isn't it?

Of course, the real measure for the person that someone truly is does not fall on solely on their public perception. Afterall, who's to say that Bobby isn't just the lightning rod martyr absorbing all of the controversies of a rotten system, burning on the cross for everybody else's sins? (Excluding the flight-logs thing. Not much can be said in defence of that.) But you can get a better grasp of who the person is by the opinions of the people they leave behind. Afterall, what is legacy but the living imprint of our lives left on the faces of all those who remain? And what exactly does Bobby's Legacy say about him? Hmm? Oh, the moment he was officially out the company there were already tweets of former employees wishing upon him to digest faecal matter. So we'll call his legacy 'mixed', shall we?

A senior world designer for WOW leapt up to let his feelings known with a very aggressive "Eat s*** Bobby Kotick you pathetic ghoul, waste the millions you didn't earn from people whose talent and light you will never understand." Which highlights one of the key contentions about the man. You see, Bobby wasn't just morally bad, but the guy was bad for business. On the level of who he is drawing controversy, and by the account of some even to the decisions he made that ended up scuppering the quality of products under his supervision. This is a real 'he said, she said' sort of situation, but it can't be denied that Blizzard's reputation has gone off a cliff in the past few decades, whereas once they were a bastion of player-championing heroes- now they are a cistern for the worst practices across the industry. How much of that is directly Bobby's fault? Well, even if none of it was due to his direct interference, that reputation dithered under his watch- thus he takes responsibility.

We have a COD designer coming out to label Bobby directly as a cause for their games being made worse. (Which is quite the change in tune from the last time we heard about COD devs discussing their games! I though COD gets more playtime which makes it the best game ever made and better than multiple award winning title: God of War!) Another claims that the Overwatch team was well aware of the hate storm they would receive for launching on Steam- (which was somewhat deserved given their blatantly misleading advertising selling a key design aspect of the game that was scrapped before launch) but received no additional support thanks to the executive choice of Bobby; who probably couldn't have cared less when he made that decision.

Although few have more bones to pick with Kotick than the nation of China, from whom every beloved Blizzard game was ripped following a dissolution in the relationship between Activision Blizzard and their Chinese partners- because of Kotick's many controversies. World of Warcraft's gigantic Chinese player base had their servers indefinitely withdrawn thanks to his machinations and that counts literal decades of gaming history thrown in a vault and locked away. Needless to say those effected were bitter, burning effigies and raising metaphorical middle fingers across the ocean, and they among the rest of the world see Bobby's flight as a happy development in these companies trajectory- although that bridge won't be automatically healed anytime soon. Bobby's destruction lives past his departure.

Bobby's reputation has made him the boogey man of the games industry for many years, and I'm quite curious to see just how much of the industry he helped shape is going to take advantage of his absence to mold itself into something better. My suspicion, is that the vacuum he leaves is only going to become clotted up by the deluge of identical sycophantic cronies he has groomed into following his every tradition. Activision Blizzard aren't free of the monster, they're simply orphaned and helpless for the next despot to don their crown and become the subject of the industries spite and hatred. And Bobby will just be remembered as the old dark lord. Like the Morgoth to our coming Sauron. That's just my take though, who knows where we're going?

Overwatch- how to ruin everything

 Then they came for our lore, and there was no one left to speak up for it

Is Overwatch 2 really THAT bad?

 In the eye of fury

The Balance game

 Losing the will to grind

The slow and painful death of Overwatch 2.

 I hardly got to play thee. Literally, I never even downloaded the thing.    

Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls Review

Pandemonium. 

Well that certainly didn't take long, did it? Barely a week after beating my first run through of 'Diablo II: Resurrected' I jumped right back into the crucible to get myself good and caught up before the beginning of 4 by playing the game which first intrigued me about the franchise to begin with. Diablo III, often decried as the 'black sheep' of the franchise- at least until 'Diablo Immortal' showed up as the degenerate black hole of quality, creativity and purpose that it ultimately is. Back when I was a fiddler around with demos, Diablo III was all I had to go off to assess what this popular franchise was like, and I remember somewhat liking what I was seeing. (After a few playthroughs to get to terms with the game, that is.) But now I've approached the game from another angle, having experienced all that Diablo II has to offer- what now do I think of Diablo III?

The most striking aspect I've always heard grumblings about when it comes to this franchise is that apparently Diablo III sacrifices on the higher design ideals of the franchise just a tad too often. Diablo was supposed to represent the dark underbelly of gothic diabolism, with brooding dark dungeons littered with corpses of the slain in a fatalistic aesthetic that reminds the player constantly how they are staring into the foulest side of the world. It should be moody, dark, or fiery and chaotic. And Diablo III is... well it is quite cartoony in comparison. I know that Diablo II has a 4k lick of paint, but it must be said that in terms of sheer design Blizzard did noticeably aim for a more stylised design approach that better suits there other titles. Games wherein the sillouettes of characters are immediately notable for how distinctively exaggerated their bodies are, or the way each character stands. It's also quite colourful in every instance, finding deep blues and effluent greens even in the pits of it's darkest dungeons- and it does quite stand out.

Initially I'll admit that Diablo III felt like a toybox version of the franchise I got to know, probably not helped by the fact the game hadn't seen any sort of visual remaster since release. (The character models could certainly use some kind of face lift.) But when it comes down to it I go generally prefer games that have the style to find colour and highlight the depth of the environment even in the most realistically monochrome settings. When I compare the first dungeon of Diablo II and III, the Den of Evil is pretty same-y across the board- Diablo III's world in every respect has more life and vibrancy that immediately makes it more fun to explore. Admittedly, I ended up spending a lot more time with Diablo III then I did with II, so I did kind of just 'get used' to the visual style, but I don't hate what III went for. That being said, given the themes and tonality of this franchise, I do agree that Diablo is usually better off finding colour in the bouncing of light off the slick of the blood pooling around the cobblestones. (In that regard, Diablo IV appears to be headed in the right direction.)

Speaking of design and the world, I should probably commend Diablo III for working on one of my gripes with II. Namely the layout of dungeons feeling largely samey with a different tile set swap-out being the only distinction one can usually make between one dungeon and the next. The randomised map layout would sprawl on an obviously square and typically boxish grid, making exploration less interesting when you know pretty much what you're going to find in any given dungeon (Albeit in very broad strokes.) III dispels that utterly. Dungeon layout and maps have depth, the illusion of verticality, shape, distinct design motifs- tombs have special rooms design to be cairns, hellish siege engines have giant ascending central staircases- everwhere feels distinct and intelligently hand designed- which in turn makes it so special when the player comes around and discovers that these too have the hand of randomly shifting design thrown into them. Also: Diablo III's dungeons all have the restraint to not be more than two floors deep without changing the environment or setting, which helps so much for not getting bored. I really appreciate that.

But visuals aren't the only common sticking point with players whenever it comes to the Diablo versus Diablo grudge match- there's also the actual RPG levelling itself. In Diablo of the past you'd be awarded perk points and attribute points to spec into the skills of your choosing. Spending points where you need to in order to the best at a particular skill meant that an explorative player would be less effective than a power player who knew exactly where to spend their points throughout the entire game- rewarding familiarity with the game systems, and necessitating stat perk reset mechanics for higher level play. Diablo III does away with all this in it's entirety for a system which is much more hands-off and casual friendly- and of course that's going to meet the accusation of being 'watered down'; as the gaming community are pretty predictable in that regard. 

The way levelling works in Diablo III is simple; you gather the experience and the game does everything else. You don't need to assign attribute points, the game handles all that automatically. You don't even need to unlock skills with perk points, every skill is provided to the player level-by-level until they have the full class unlocked at the end- allowing for the player to switch up their playstyle on the fly in whatever way they choose. On one hand this really does dispel that dawning horror of "Oh god, I'm 10 hours in and I've specced my character horribly" which is a grim realisation that all casual players trying out their first ARPG (or even any RPG that isn't a modern style one) will realise at some point. You're never more than a few skill switches away from changing your playstyle completely. On the otherhand, there's a layer of skill and stat understanding that becomes lost until the very endgame of activities because a typical player just never needs to think about it. You can pretty much just slap on the more powerful gear and worry about nothing else throughout the entire game and have a fairly swimming time.

And when you do reach that endgame? What then? How do you really customise your hero and how they play to suit your specific playstyle? It all comes down to gear rolls and set bonuses. Diablo III's gear all roll with boosts, and legendary gear roll with powerful specific skill manipulating effects that a smart player will change their move-set for in order to capitalise on. For example, my Necromancer hero received the legendary 'Funerary Pick' weapon quite early on; a weapon that allowed his 'Siphon blood' ability to scale by %300 and split off to hit two other mobs at the same time- tripling leech healing and destroying most rooms of small mobs. As such, that gear spurred me to slot in the 'Siphon Blood' power and make great use of it. And thanks also to the 'Kanai Cube' (the successor to Diablo II's Horadric Cube- this one owning tons more customising) I could extract that specific power and place it atop of my character as an all around buff in the late game. Whilst at face value this change to design seems wholly limiting, the Diablo III that exists today probably offers a lot more intricate and varied late-game builds than any Diablo released before it. It just happens to have a more player friendly intro levelling system slapped on top.

Although whilst we are on the topic of being 'player friendly', I do have a gripe to mention with regards to Diablo III and it's gameplay- how bloody easy it all was! Diablo II wasn't the most difficult game in the world but I got stuck at least once. (on Duriel) I had to level my character carefully and play within the confines of my class. (as a Trap-Assassin) With Diablo III I literally breezed through the intro area without getting down to three quarters of my health bar. Thankfully Diablo III allows you to switch difficulty up without restarting the entire game, so I pushed up to hard. Same problem. Then Expert. A bit of challenge. Then Master; now I had a fight every now and then. In pretty much any difficulty level before Master the game is painfully easy, and even at Master and beyond the only real 'threat' is from the Greater Rift post-game challenges- and I think that's kind of a thematic shame.

To explain what I mean; in narrative, Diablo is a game about staving off the overwhelming forces of hell that are always on the verge of taking over the world. (Or heaven, in the case of 'Reaper of Souls') Thus you'd expect the biggest challenge to come from taking on those monsters and demon lords in the main story, that just makes sense. However because of the way the game progression is laid out, silencing hell is just power-level training on your way to the true hardest activity- going through endless Nephalem training exercises. You see the disconnect in story and gameplay there? I know it's a loser's game to judge a system heavy game genre like ARPGs by it's gameplay and narrative cohesion- You'll find the same sort of problem in any game with a main story and endgame content pilled ontop of it- expect for, perhaps, World of Warcraft, which always knows to keep it's toughest enemies tied to it's narratively significant raids. I just think a happy medium accord could have been reached here if Diablo III had a bit more design consistency from the get-go.

Which I guess brings us around to the great re-design; because yes, I know the story as we all must. When Diablo III first launched it was actually something of a shallow mess that failed to step up from, or in some people's eyes even meet, what Diablo II had achieved before it. All those systems which felt dumbed down had no slap back endgame make-up round to justify the choice and Diablo III kind of felt like a dud to some diehard fans. The expansion to the game, Reaper of Souls, and subsequent updates saw drastic changes to the game's fundamental design, with reworked gear stats, totally new endgame systems (some of which I've mentioned on good terms right here) and a more coherent path to recurrent play for die hard lovers. They pretty much pulled a Final Fantasy XIV 'A Realm Reborn' with Diablo III and the resulting game is, in my opinion, more fun to grind out than II was. Hell, I actually completed the core journey path of this season (Season 28) before starting this review, something which I held no desire to do for Diablo II.

When it comes to narrative, my thoughts of Diablo III are a little more complicated in how they compare to the previous entry. In contents and scope I'm much more a fan of Diablo III's full bodied narrative with it's plethora of properly written characters, appropriately placed stakes and solid grasp on player agency so I'm not running around chasing the plot again. I also like the abundance of lore that the game has, much of which is spent fleshing out the previous games so players can better contextualise the world of Diablo without having to resort to ancillary reading materials. (Even if such lore snippets are pretty horrible placed, just dropping into the world in vaguely related places with no discernible rhyme or reason. Unless you expect me to believe that Lilith left her plans to corrupt Inarius in the exact same place that Inarius left his and I guess the silly bugger just never bothered to read one of her explicitly detailed betrayal plans.) 

An interesting way that Diablo III chose to present it's characters is by having the 'hub' of each act be populated by the same vendors, and having your 'mercenaries' of this game be actual specific companions who have their own stories which play out across the game. All these characters had their own little quirks and personalities that brought them to life, even if some choice members felt a bit 'whimsical' within the world they were supposedly placed. (Does the rogue need to be womanising in the middle of a demon assault on the city? What is this: D&D?) It really does build this feeling of community around the player so they feel as if they're progressing in a unit, instead of on their own in this grim world, which perhaps somewhat suits the intentionally different feeling world of Diablo III. Perhaps I wouldn't have appreciated this approach as much in II, and I don't think it's making a return in IV; but for what it's worth I feel that the camp-like presentation of supporting characters is at least congruent to this game's ethics and presentation. But somehow all of this that Diablo III does right still isn't everything.

Because when I think back to Diablo II, specifically the remastered version of it, I prefer the way that game feels. It comes down to presentation I think. In it's framing as a tale told of the past, (Like Diablo IV appears to be doing) in the fantastically gothic cutscenes in the design of the world that seems to seep deeper and deeper to hell the further your progress- Diablo II feels more dire and diabolical, whereas Diablo III feels more like an adventure tipped with bouts of excitement. I don't think it would take much to meet those two styles into creating the single ideal narrative for this franchise, and I get the feeling that is exactly what Diablo IV aims to do- but it should be said that whilst I certainly felt more involved following the story of the Nephalem, I did so with wistful longing for the emotion sparked in me by the tale of the Prime Evils.

Although whilst I'm talking about the 'Nephalem', there's a couple more points I want to cover. Firstly, for such a hugely important plotpoint, the 'Nephalem' story point is absolutely brushed past so quickly I didn't even notice it happen, and I really thought some more explaining would go into unveiling exactly how it has occurred. (Maybe there's a log book explaining it hid up some demon's rectum if I just kill enough of him.) And secondly; Reaper of Souls felt like it's own add-on adventure rather than a continuation of the Diablo III narrative. I know it does, actually, continue directly on- but all it really serves to do is justify the return of Diablo in future entries, nothing that happens in the expansion itself feels really important to the grand scheme of the Diablo narrative. Not like how 'Lord of Destruction' was a core-port of Diablo II which couldn't be skipped by if you wanted to.

Summary

Diablo III is a game that has lived a very long life and gone through a whirlwind of change since it first launched, having to carry the weight of a legendary predecessor as well as marking it's own path on the world. When I look at Diablo III I see a game that is almost lockstep with the general feel of other Blizzard properties, even whilst it tries to maintain the uniqueness of the Diablo brand, which can lead to some cohesive friction at first. Once I got used to this version of the Diablo world, however, what I found underneath was a enjoyable and decently expansive game which made up for a lot of it's shortcomings with great swap-out class customisation, a moderately engaging endgame loop and solid narrative that felt satisfying to beat. For diehard Diablo fans, III will always be a black sheep which unforgivable sullied their beloved brand- but for me it is a fine, if wobbly, successor which- probably more due to the general trend of design rather than direction- was actually more appealing to stick with than Diablo II Resurrected was. I certainly do recommend the game, and award it a respectable slap-bang B Grade in the arbitrary review scale for surpassing my expectations. If the franchise has your attention, this is as fine a place to start as any. And for what it's worth, streaking past max level in Diablo III has me near feverish to pick up the cause again come Diablo IV! (Maybe I will get it on release date...)

Diablo 2: Resurrected Review

 Looking for Baal?

Talk about a wild card! When have I ever shown more than a passing interest in the Diablo franchise outside of playing that Diablo 4 beta? Well, actually I've always wanted to get more into the ARPG genre ever since I first played the demo for Diablo III almost eight years ago. That cycle of monster slaying and loot collecting whilst weighing damage values against higher philosophies of levelling always appealed to me in that puerile 'number goes up' manner that only really blossomed for me when I finally got into Borderlands. My only real hang-up has been the storied history of Diablo and how impenetrable it seemed to get into. 3 players all yearning for 2 and begging for 4 to be more like their faithful dark love rather than the cartoony style of the sequel- and I couldn't follow any of that discourse. I just thought the games seemed fun and wanted to try them out. Diablo 2 seemed to loom over anyone who wanted to play this franchise as some sort of unattainable masterpiece standard that any true fan had to play and love or else they were a pathetic faker. So I just didn't bother with Diablo at all.

Which isn't to say I've never tried to play any other ARPG. I have tried, on several occasions, to play through any one of the Van Helsing APRG games- only to fall to sleep before completing the first act of any of them. (In fact, I only even reached the first hub city in one of those games. They really weren't for me.) But I did manage to stick it out with a colourful and vibrant Xbox 360 ARPG that I played back in my secondary school days called 'Torchlight'. Diablo fans who critique the apparent 'cartoon-like aesthetic' of Diablo 3 would just vomit blood at the whimsically exaggerated body shapes, the warmfully glowing palette and goofy random-name generations of Torchlight, but those were the aspects I found so inviting to get involved with. I actually completed the first Torchlight, before finding the second a bit too 'absorbed in itself' to stick with. I also played quite a bit of Path of Exile, so I kind of jumped right past the 'hardcore' position of the Diablo player base without realising it.

But after playing Diablo 4 and realising that I really wanted to give the full game a shot, I realised that it was probably time I worked my way around to the past Diablo games, and that I had little excuse not to now that 'Diablo 2: Resurrected' exists: a high quality remake of that original 'series zenith' for my perusal. Thus was born the whim, that which has slipped me into various franchises I had no business playing with before. The whim that could steal my heart in seconds as it had when I fell for Persona 5, or for Yakuza 0, or Baldur's Gate. I've come to anticipate that whim. To yearn for it's guiding spark. And what of Diablo 2? Has that proven to be another awakening moment for me, unveiling a side of my tastes that I never knew existed? And am I still prepared to play Diablo 4, or has 2 got me hooked forever more?

First I should start by establishing that as far Remakes go, Diablo 2 Resurrected is faithful to an almost frustrating fault. It's not a retelling of the narrative done with the gameplay lessons of a modern design stance, it's pretty much the exact same game as Diablo 2 remade using a modern engine so that it plays as close to the original as possible whilst not making your eyes bleed on a 4k screens. It's so faithful, in fact, that Diablo 2 Resurrected actually runs an emulated version of the same game in the original visual style underneath your game that you can switch to at any point in order to affirm how spot-on the comparison is. Like The Master Chief collection before it, Diablo 2 Resurrected relies on the timeless quality of the original game to stand out even in the modern age, albeit with the added boons of better stability and a more readable higher resolution UI.

What that essentially means if that all of those classic old rough design elements are kept in for better or for worse in this more polished frame. You'll find this reflected in the layout of the world which employs a computer generated layout that can feel very maze-like and disorganised. You really start to recognise each tile being used after a while and start navigating by guessing how the generation engine is slotting it's assigned tiles together; maybe that's totally fine and what some people out there are looking for from their dungeon crawling experience: I prefer a more hand-crafted tailored feeling to my dungeons. At least those tiles look fantastic rendered under the Diablo 2: Resurrected engine.

Sticking with the old gameplay also means that some of the strengths of the more tactile and less 'streamlined player friendly' version of the Diablo playloop shines forth. You'll actually be deciding what skills and talents to sink points behind when you level up, with different skill trees pertaining to different skills so that you'll always be improving in the manner you choose instead of the blanket 'learn every skill' approach of Diablo 3. The stat blocks themselves aren't insanely in depth and mostly just pertain to either raising resource pools or tiny +1 boosts to maximum and minimum damage ranges every now and then. Though there is this concept of 'attack rating' in the game which feels like a hold-over from an older age of ARPG design. The way I think it works, and I could just look this up but I want to impart the exact ideas the game left me with when I played it, is that the higher the attack rating is the better the chance you have of hitting certain enemies when your attack lands. Because yes, we're dealing with Morrowind rules of 'hit doesn't necessarily mean a hit'. If I'm correct in that assumption then this stat is something of an annoying arms race to keep up with throughout the game as enemies seems to require higher and higher attack ratings to make hit contact against as the game plods on. I just gave up on using weapons altogether by the midgame and rerolled into being purely skill based, because none of the skills seemed to miss their hits ever.

The randomised nature of the world generation is decided every time you start a session, which makes it so that the average player can sometimes feel locked into a play session until they reach the next waypoint (the only immutable spot in the world outside of hubs) for fear of losing all their dungeon crawling progression by logging off for the night. Dying doesn't just cost you 20% of your gold (even if it's stashed) but also drops all the player gear that then needs to be recollected from your corpse. (A genuinely non-sensical design decision that does nothing except make the gameplay loop just that little bit more rocky and plodding.) The armour 'slot' system is so rudimentary that there's no way to create new slots on items beyond an increadibly rare resource expensive ritual or the reward of a single quest in the final act that gives one socket a playthrough. Meaning that high level players will start a fresh character and speedrun to that quest just to get that socket reward and place it on an item they'll then transfer to their main. Ain't that a pain?

But for everything that is annoyingly cumbersome about the older elements of Diablo 2, Resurrected has stuck with me for it's boons. The enemy designs are great and varied, with fantastic models and some distinct enough styles of attack that I would at least acknowledge who was who and plan my attacks accordingly. (At least I did until I respecced into favouring my Assassin's Trap skill tree. Don't really need to even know which mob is which when you melt them all that quickly.) Specialising and honing in on your build feels a lot more impactful when magic items are rarer and every level-up contributes directly to your chosen skills. And the game was just pick-up and play friendly enough for me to get sucked into multiple hour play sessions from just a passing fancy, which to me is the sign of a winning game formula.

Yet, some of my biggest gripes that aren't just mere 'annoyances' do stop me from seeing the game as some legendary gem of yore. Perhaps the relative infancy of the genre is to blame for some of them, such as the fact that the bosses are largely uninspired and straight forward, lacking in creative attacks or complex fight rules of any kind. Pretty much every boss is just a really big guy with a lot of health and a bunch of wide berth attacks. And leading on from that, the difficulty curve of the game seems a little blind at some points. Sure, the acts step up in level and difficulty for the most part, (I think the mobs of Act IV were significantly more dangerous than the mobs of Act V) I often found the major quest bosses proved much harder than any challenge around them. Typically you'd expect surrounding side quests and lead-up trash mobs to prepare you for the major main quest fight- but anyone who has survived the Duriel fight from Act II knows the futility in that belief. Again, these just weren't the angles that developers thought they needed to cover back when the original game was developed.

Another issue which I came up against with more and more as I played on was the Online components. Anyone playing a Diablo game knows that you're pretty much always going to want to engage with the game in it's seasons, enjoying seasonal content and racing to max level- but Diablo 2: Resurrected' comes with a strangely draconian 'always online' stipulation I ran afoul of painfully often. Basically, any character you make who is involved with the series 'ladder' (Diablo 2's version of seasons) requires you to play with a constant server connect that, should it falter, will kick you back to the home screen. There's no 'play in offline mode' either. If you make an online character, they're online for life. And as is always the case in these sorts of systems, that meant I got kicked in the final moments of slaying the final boss of the game. Ain't that just the way?

The narrative of Diablo 2 is a classic gothic faire which in itself doesn't necessarily present anything special or mentally stimulating if you've come looking for a narrative. All you need to know is that the hero of Diablo 1 seems to have become possessed by the very monster he slays and is on a very one minded journey to get the 'big bad mcguffin' which the player follows along with. I've said before how I'm not a fan of the "Oh, you just missed the big story thing, it happened a while ago" style of storytelling, and that makes up Diablo 2's entire campaign. I felt like I was playing catch up right until the final moment where the game actually couldn't run away from me anymore. But at least the plotpoints were coherent, the story was passable, (the pertinent lore drops were a little garble-mouthed at points; and I cringed everytime I heard someone pronounce 'Baal'. It's so wrong it upsets me.) and the newly rendered cutscenes are utterly gorgeous. You'd never know these new scenes were shot-by-shots reanimations of antiquated 2000's era animated scenes. (You should see the side-by-sides- it's wild how good of a job Vicarious Visions and Blizzard did.) 

And finally, as always, I must cover the music. I was quite impressed with how memorable the orchestral soars of the Diablo 2 soundtrack were, to the point where at it's best I genuinely found the music to be emotionally swelling. It's quite easy in games of these genre for the music to slip into being generically appropriate and indistinguishable from the other dark fantasy titles around it, (having just started Diablo 3 I'm getting that feeling over there) but Diablo 2 marks it's own territory with it's suites to a great and moody effect. Personally I think the best track is the overworld theme for Act V which seems to perfectly slide into it's role as the rallying cry of the final action set piece of an epic movie. I really did appreciate this soundtrack, more than I expected to.

Summary

Which leaves me with the unenviable job of having to summarise all these disparate and conflicting thoughts into a coherent notary. I wonder, do you know the way I'm leaning with this one, because I don't. To be clear, Diablo is a series of games designed to be played over and over again, and I finished this blog after a single playthrough to which I can affirm that I do have a desire to play again. The smoothness of the gameplay, the fun of levelling, the randomised nature of the dungeon layouts- all are enough to draw me back in to push through a 'nightmare' difficulty playthrough at some point in the future. Perhaps because this game flitters perfectly into that space of a 'background game' you can mindlessly push through which watching something else, whilst still being quality enough to demand your attention in the bigger scenes. But the unfriendly systems around the endgame, particularly with the insanely restrictive slotting system, makes me unwilling to really invest myself in the game in any dedicated fashion. I'm at odds with the quality of the game and how it's design choices make me feel, which is probably why I'm erring towards a respectable B- grade on my arbitrary review scale. The game shows it's age, not in it's face but in it's design, and the ugliness therein does tarnish what might otherwise have been the superior Diablo experience to play for the moment. That being said, Diablo 2: Resurrected is still an absolutely fine title that shouldn't deter anyone looking to get into Diablo or ARPGs in general. It's still just janky enough to miss my blanket recommendation, but for a Diablo fan getting ready for 4 the game is pretty much a must play that I'm sure they've already rocketed through more times then my sensibilities can stomach. 

Overwatch is Over party

 Let the cancel bells ring

I don't like to just throw the coffin lid atop a game that does anything I don't like and declare it 'dead to me', because that's a very narrow-minded way to look at any artistic endeavour. I like to examine what it puts out, compare it to competitors, assess it's unique charms and use my experience of gaming built up until that moment to decided exactly how I feel about them and how it appeals to my tastes. It's with all these factors taken completely into account that I can finally give up on my long-term plan to eventually get around to Overwatch 2 once it finally gets to it's more interesting ideas, because as we recently learned in perhaps one of the most shocking developer town halls of the past few years: there is nothing new coming to Overwatch 2. That's right, the big selling point of the game around which a hundred thousand ships were sailed in hopes of the future has fallen apart completely and Overwatch has totally scrapped the PVE dedicated mode... I can't even fathom how heart-breaking that is.

Overwatch came around as a loud and proud competitive shooter with an easy barrier to entry and a huge skill ceiling for the dedicated to chase- and also an apparent rich and bountiful fountain of context and lore that absolutely never made it's way onto the screen. The world of Overwatch, brought to life with the iconic character designs who pop all the way down from their colour choices to their silhouettes, was only ever paid lip service in the intro video that played everytime you booted the game- in play Overwatch was just a fully competitive hero shooter with nothing narrative focused within it whatsoever aside from limited time tiny PVE co-op missions that would pop up once every 3 months or so and told mostly forgettable stories anyway- such as the first time Tracer went on a mission for the Overwatch police force. (Who cares?) 

Such effort went into creating the characters of Overwatch that it always felt like a distinct disservice that nothing significant was ever made out of those bones! We never got to learn about the characters enough to really care about them, to discover what the Overwatch agency stood for and what it's weaknesses and strengths were, to discover any character nuances- there was never an opportunity for this story to flesh itself out! Oh sure, we got the odd animation every few years, maybe a comic if we were really lucky- and maybe you could spend the time in between analysing the ambient voice lines between characters among the throngs of sweaty redditors who are forever stuck arguing about whether or not Mercy is dating Genji. It was a pathetic and sad waste of potential, but one which nobody seemed to care about other than me because nailing the core Overwatch experience was so important. Or at least that was the case until Overwatch 2 was announced.

Following the very next day after the intro video to Overwatch 1; (showing how little any actual story had been established or progressed in the many years since the original Overwatch launched) Overwatch 2 threatened to actually present what Overwatch was, who it stood for and let us play that journey of discovery. There would be actual dedicated PVE mission content which put us in the shoes of legendary heroes with RPG development trees and narrative missions, all developed to the high quality standard of your typical Blizzard product. And that would come atop the inherited legendary multiplayer of Overwatch 1 that was going to be brought to the new game with a host of improvements like... the teams being knocked down from 6 players to 5... There's more changes and tweaks, but that's literally the only significant difference... So yeah, the PVE was really what was going to set out Overwatch 2 as a totally different game to it's predecessor! 

And you can see where I'm going with this, can't you? Overwatch 2 dropped all of that promised PVE content with practically no warning and an 'IOU' letter attached to the forum community post with a hands up shrugging emoji. The very point of Overwatch 2, reason why there needed to be a new game to begin with when the old one worked just fine, has just been scrapped with nothing more than a 'whoops, our bad'. Overwatch 2 had been struggling, for ages, to justify it's existence against a severly critical public who just didn't want to deal with any of Blizzard's crap, and their patience has been rewarded with a steel-toe boot to the thorax and a spit in the face. Now all that Overwatch 2 is can be summed up with increased monetisation. That's it. Everything else could have been handled in the base launcher. Blizzard have made fools of it's community once again.

What gall it takes to dedicate actual years of development to making something new for your sequel to then just give up and assume people will be happy with the copy cat product hardly worthy of being called a successor- and how very unbefitting a company once renowned for it's unwavering dedication to how the players felt. It's clear that the Overwatch 2 development train was lagging behind, new maps and characters weren't showing up quite as often as we expected them to; but that was a necessary sacrifice for an interesting reward done the line. Every bit of development not sinking into Overwatch 2's multiplayer content was instead making something brand new that would recontexaulise the franchise and open it up to more people revitalising the Overwatch brand. And now that time is wasted. Overwatch 2's early development years and slow release support is just disappointing now, with no payoff whatsoever. That a cold pill to swallow.

It's not as though I don't sympathise with feature reshuffling. I know how plans change and deadlines shift all the time, that's just the flow of development and there's nothing we can do about it. But we're not talking about some piddling mingame or a questline or even a support feature- this was the spine of Overwatch 2. Without this mode, what of significance has the development team of this game got to present for their years but maintenance? Just look at the roadmap that the team have proudly touted as Overwatch's 'biggest year yet'. Some maps, a new hero... nothing that couldn't have been expected from any old roadmap. Nothing to get excited over. Because all the excitement died off with the unjust conclusion of the Hero mode development. 

So what should be done? Quite honestly; the mode shouldn't have been cancelled. In the order of priority for what Overwatch 2 needed to be a complete game, this should have been under the 'must haves'. It was a flagship selling point and if it's taking a while to create, if multiplayer updates needed to be toned down whilst they work on it, then that should have been the cost paid so as to not make liars out of themselves. (Blizzard and 'community trust' is a thorny enough union...) I only hope this decision came from higher-ups than the entire development team, that corporate themselves struck this down with almighty prejudice because otherwise, if the team themselves consider this an acceptable sacrifice, then there's no hope for the Overwatch franchise ever reclaiming it's withered lustre. Consider me extremely disappointed.

Diablo 4; hairs from release

 Return of the devil?

Perhaps it was Destiny that first secured the idea in the collective consciousness of the advertising world that an 'Open Beta' served best as an advertising campaign rather than an actual testing of an online title's servers. I mean sure, I'll bet to some degree the Betas of that time put strain on the Bungie Servers which helped them guess how those same systems would stand up to a full launch- but there's plenty of services available that can test that exact same thing without resorting to the public. What an Open Beta really is, when we break it down, is a free trial to test out the game before launch but with a timer attached to it, thus incited that all-important FOMO encouraging the industry to pay it more attention than it otherwise would or should have. The Destiny Beta was a success for it's time, becoming something of a landmark event that united everyone with it's freshness for a new property that looked great and played better- so thin was the 'server test' veneer, that Bungie even did a special sneak preview review of the second world space, the moon, during the final day to really blow everyone away at the same moment.

Of course, then spawned the era of 'open betas' for every game that could feasibly get away with it, which of cause led to over-saturation and now I don't think these events are quite as special and platform unifying as they once were. Perhaps the death knell in my eyes was the beta for 'Homefront: Revolution'; a godawful shooter with even worse online functionality that decided, insanely, to present it's ugliness proudly out to the world and gawked when that world thoroughly rejected them. Honestly, I tried my hardest to try and find anything of value out of that game and all I saw was a total mess, which would go on to pretty much represent the full release of 'Homefront: Revolution' and kill the illusion of the 'magic' behind the 'play an upcoming game for free' marketing ploy. I think some companies missed the tongue in cheek and thought this was actually meant to be a public showcasing of a Beta Build game. It's not. That would be ridiculous.

Such was my disillusionment that I don't partake in these events nearly ever when I see a new one pop up, now I merely watch from the sidelines as these events flare up and take a mild interest in hearing about the general public sentiment of how they was received and how that might effect the final product. (Honestly, the effect is always negligible.) But then there comes Diablo 4. I've always been morbidly fascinated with the legendary Diablo franchise, but I've never bitten the bullet to actually play through one beyond some preliminary taps at Diablo 3 throughout the years. 4, however, appeals to me in that primal, near subliminal way that a fresh game can whisper sweet seductive nothings when you least suspect it. I love the look of the world, the visceral nature of the blood splatter, the grimly gothic design sensibilities, the appealing pop of the magical abilities. Truly the game rang in tandem with some cave-man part of my brain.

Diablo, thus, got my attention when they decided to host a public beta not exclusive to those who pre-ordered the game like nearly all modern 'betas' tend to be. (Further hinting at their true status as 'early play' marketing tactics.) Although, I guess to say 'decided' would be a bit of a misnomer. In truth, these betas serve more as a plea from Blizzard to the general public to put some trust back in them after the years of negative press coverage, the abuse allegations, the awful CEO's antics, and most pertinently, the apocalyptic hell-hole of greed called 'Diablo Immortal'. The mobile port which everyone said was going to be a soulless phlegm ball from hell, Blizzard swore that it wouldn't be upon their honour, and then the game turned out to be exactly what everyone feared and, if possible, somewhat worse. The Diablo 4 marketing path has been more of an apology tour since then.

Diablo 4 has been similarly 'mask off' with it's 'server slam beta' which tasks it's users with speed-gaming it's systems in the race for level 20 and then murdering a periodically spawned world boss in the brief beta window in return for carried over prizes to the main game. A suitable enough incentive for anyone to pick up the job and try their hand at delving into the bittermost depths of hell- or at least as far down that path as they can get in the provided open world space of the game's first act- a giant snowy tundra brimming with small quests, randomly spawning loot events and expansive optional dungeons to delve through. Honestly, you can really see the absolute step upwards in sheer scale compared to what Diablo 3 was working with a decade ago.

I think what constantly surprises me is just the level of visual detail that was gone into a world that is designed to be viewed isometrically. Muddy tread paths look soaked in grimey water, clumps of snow glisten and splatter with blood and the character models look absolutely incredible up close. Even though you'll only ever see your hero from up top in gameplay, just tapping into your inventory reveals a model good enough for up-close cutscenes, which the game will then present in it's decently cinematic main story cutscenes rife with camera changes, quality animation work and a respectable amount of effort sunk into every step of the rendering. Blizzard went above and beyond in the presentation department and it shows.

And the gameplay- it's solid so far. With your simple attacks, specials tied to mana and balls of health exactly where you would expect them and playing exactly how you'd expect them to. Diablo 4 meets the very definition of the APRG genre so far with nothing really wild to add to the formula in it's moment to moment, at least not by the early hours. Even as someone only lightly invested in this style of game and playing on a Tier 2 difficulty realm, I didn't really have to think about differing types of enemies and how to counteract their abilities until it came to bosses; whom were both admittedly a little more interesting. The Main narrative boss was a creative puzzle of dodges and weaves with focus damage opportunities and the world boss was... so long. She only spawned in a few times and I never had the opportunity to beat her, but god that boss bar barely seemed to move throughout her entire 15 minute battle time. Both times all 12 of us threw the everloving daylights at her and only got her down to the final quarter of health before she despawned. (Then again, she was scaled five levels above the max level limit for the beta...)

Diablo 4 seems to be going for the AAA presentation of a polished ARPG game, instead of anything wild and interesting to win back the crown of 'king ARPG' from Path of Exile. Right now, Diablo 4 has everything it needs to welcome people back to this genre who've felt starved since the Diablo 3 support started to dry up, but in the face of other new releases like 'Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom', I can't help but get the sense that the game feels a little... safe. Maybe there are surprises and tricks waiting up the sleeve of the game as it goes on (I haven't even experienced the horse gameplay yet) but as of so far  Diablo 4's greatest selling point is it's visuals- which are unmatched in this genre. Is that enough to get me to buy the game? Not at release price, I can tell you that much...

China loses its Blizzard

Divine Tether Severed

There is something to be said about backing the winning horse. It's a safe bet, simple, low risk and an utterly pathetic move. I mean, come on; where's you sense of danger? Of adventure and risk? If you're going to gamble- then gamble those odds! Make something special all for yourself, defy the possibilities! And if you're an artist- then going the easy and risk-free route is the surest indicator that you've lost that edge which kicked you to the world you enjoy so much. And considering that the team at Blizzard used to be considered artists, then their pathetic move would be flushing away all their integrity, morality and empathy to guzzle up the drip-feed of their pay masters whenever a potential situation with China could reflect badly on the western audience. They never left any illusion obfuscating the horses that they backed, never failed to take a bullet for the good image of China- took the safest and surest path to mutual success. But it would seem that Karma has a way of getting to everyone who wrongs it, because somehow China has now turned around and spat away Blizzard.

The details are surprisingly vague given what a huge development this is for one of the most beloved successful developers in the world (or 'formerly beloved' as the case may be.) but I don't exaggerate on this. Blizzard and NetEase have ended their partnership just as they announced it would be happening at the end of last year- and as China refuses to allow foreign companies to operate on their soil without partnering with one of their locals- this marks an end. An end to over 10 years of World of Warcraft coverage in the country, a premature end to Overwatch 2's tenure, and a decisive end to Blizzards extensive plans to shift it's game design philosophy to better exploit the easier cajoled Chinese gaming public. Or perhaps I should say, an 'indefinite pause'; because this wasn't some seismic bout of morals that shook Blizzard free- it was cold, hard business.

As I mentioned, details are criminally sparse as to what could have ended Blizzard's extended partnership with NetEase, all we know is that both companies are slinging mud at each other where they can and neither of them have proven to be trustworthy sources of information in the far and near past. But doing the rounds is the infamous Tweet wherein one high ranking Chinese NetEase official lamented his many hours dedicated to Azeroth and ominously declared "One day, when what has happened behind the scene could be told, developers and gamers will have a whole new understanding of how much damage a jerk can make." Vague, but the popular conjecture on the 'Jerk' in question tends to trend towards the one man who can never be held accountable for his many breaches in ethics and professionalism, Bobby Kotick- CEO of Blizzard's partner Activision. Which would imply that NetEase broke off their renewal with Blizzard based on their sheer disgust of Bobby's conduct and lack of accountability; which is certainly a lot of damage for the jerk to make, if indeed the assumption holds water.

But whatever the cause the consequence is obvious. Gamers on Chinese servers have had their access to Battle.net entirely revoked with servers that, it would seem, have been totally scrapped. At least, that's the only thing I can assume given that Blizzard decided to pass the onus of keeping player character safe onto the player, but making them back-up their World of Warcraft characters locally on the 'of chance' that they manage to sneak in another deal and return. And, of course, the other consequence is that Blizzard has just lost it's biggest single market available. Now all the sacrifices in development ethics, the pivot towards ugly monetisation strategies and everything that Diablo Immortal was... well, it all feels like wasted effort now. And so it should. Blizzard deserves to feel cold and alone across the world right now, with nary a single candle flame in the blanket darkness for comfort or succor. Do not cry for them. DO NOT CRY!

And how has NetEase handled their side of the divorce? Not... gracefully. NetEase have done pretty everything they can to make it abundantly clear that they consider Blizzard solely responsible for the breakdown in communications, have disparaged Blizzard's operating methods and professionalism and got straight petty with things. I'm talking petty like livestreaming the destruction of the giant Blizzard Orc statue in the middle of a forest, for which all of the participating workers were served green tea because that's apparently a popular slang slur going around these days in China. I'd tell you what it means, but none of the sources I've read can really agree. It's just not very nice. Short of calling up all of Blizzard's new business partners and spilling dirty secrets; I don't think NetEase could possibly summon anymore 'crazed ex' energy.

But that isn't to say that Blizzard is at all squeaky clean. Beyond everything I've already discussed, alleged rumour is that when Blizzard sent their ultimatum for a six month licencing extension it coincided with their active search for a replacement studio once the deal was up. Which is certainly... pretty crappy conduct. If something like that became public during negotiations it would certainly lead to frosty relations. Frosty enough to clean break away from Blizzard in order to set all their Chinese fans against them? Perhaps. I would ordinarily say that no company would possibly be so personally attacked and petty in this day and age, but NetEase is proving to me just how different Chinese companies can be. I'm sure that both sides of this equation are at least equally terrible in their own ways if we were to compare and contrast.

Of course, this isn't by any means the only scandal that Blizzard has been caught up in, with another being the recent reveal that Blizzard is employing an archaic 'employee rating' system which not only digitises performance of humans in numbers, but apparently mandates a certain percentage of 'underperforming marks' each month in order to justify lower bonuses and promotion prospects. Which is just both insanely evil and right up the alley of a Chinese government subsidiary company- Blizzard should really look into partnering with Tencent, I bet they'd have tons in common. Of course, at it's route this ties back to the Activision influence in Blizzard, which is allegedly also responsible for the NetEase split. Wow, when it put it like that it almost sounds as though Activision's mere collusion is enough to tarnish the good names of those around them, like some sort of evil corrupting font of diseased miasma that seeps out of it's mortal bounds and sickens the earth it touches. Oh wait, no that's just a vivid description of Bobby Kotick's personal office. My bad.

At the end of the day the real victim are the Chinese players who are already being bent over the coals by the anti-gaming Chinese Government as it is. Now they have to deal with the few companies that were supplying their games cutting off and the ecosystem of entertainment in China has been cut off by one more rung. It's a sad fate to be locked in that sort of state and the players who are having to safe guard their character data on the maybe-chance of a return don't deserve this sort of treatment. But thus is probably going to become more the standard as the art of game development shifts further up into the ethereal clouds of hook-nosed executives tossing insults at one another atop thrones of broken worker bones. That's the modern world of gaming, we're just being crushed to dust in it.