Atmosphere runs down the walls in shiny rivulets, winds howl and rain lashes the bloodied mud. The story is pulling no punches, and looks set to burrow deeply into the macabre lore of the universe. In the first few minutes your horse is eviscerated by an unseen terror, and by the end of the first hour you’ll have witnessed some pretty gruesome, maybe even shocking violence. But in Diablo IV, Blizzard are leaning heavily into the Gothic horror themes of the universe. Only the Wanderer can hope to stand against them, aided by a handful of crestfallen and desperate heroes. Reawakened by an ancient cult, Lilith has raised an army of demons that are sweeping across Sanctuary. There’s no sign of Diablo or his siblings this time around (at least, not yet), and instead the big bad is Lilith, Daughter of Hatred (Mephisto is her dad, apparently), a powerful prime evil credited with the creation of Sanctuary itself. Once more the world of Sanctuary is imperilled by the forces of Evil. The UI and inventory screens have been overhauled unidentified items are out, as is Adventure Mode, but the skill tree is vaster and more intimidating than ever – and I count that one as a positive. For a start, the game-changing combat roll introduced in the console version of Diablo 3 is now an evade move on a 5-second cooldown, which is still useful but seems arbitrarily restrictive. There have been many changes to the formula though, not all of them good. While we’ve yet to see exactly how they’ll monetize Diablo IV – and they surely will, one way or another – one thing we can be assured of is that Blizzard are, quite simply, still the best at this genre.
Diablo 3 is one of my favourite games, full stop, but the mobile iteration of the franchise, Diablo Immortal, left a sour taste in my mouth thanks to Activision-Blizzard’s predatory free-to-play model. I had my reservations going into the Diablo IV early access beta.
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