Diablo IV - Open Beta 24 - 26 March. Release 6 June 2023.

[Captain Kelsten]

41 minutes ago, Kryptonian said:

The original author of this thread doesn’t seem to be around any more, would a Diablo fan like to take over it? Just for updating the title if needed and that kind of thing.

Yes please

[Ry]

3 hours ago, moosegrinder said:

The online persistence with other people is really ruining this for me. It shouldn't be, it's such a nothing problem but it's bothering me way more than I thought it would.

 

Is it online only?

 

I was tempted to get it for deck rather than Xbox but it's not playable offline then there's no point. 

 

Also hoping it still comes to gamepass anyway. 

[Kryptonian]

23 minutes ago, Captain Kelsten said:

Yes please

👍

[footle]

The other folk are there; but only in the overworld where everything is inconsequential anyway. And they’ve worked it so that your world can still change (through the story) independently of other folk.

 

and chat isn’t visible by default.

 

perhaps this is a PC only problem?

[moosegrinder]

10 minutes ago, footle said:

The other folk are there; but only in the overworld where everything is inconsequential anyway. And they’ve worked it so that your world can still change (through the story) independently of other folk.

 

and chat isn’t visible by default.

 

perhaps this is a PC only problem?

 

It's not a gameplay problem, it's entirely a thematic problem. It's probably only me that gives a fuck about it but it's there and I hate it.

[Thor]

Hmmm, despite myself I am finding this incredibly moreish, I've pretty much played it all day. 

[Kryptonian]

7 minutes ago, Thor said:

Hmmm, despite myself I am finding this incredibly moreish, I've pretty much played it all day. 

Don’t say that now! I’ve not played all day as I’ve been busy and wasn’t going to give it another go 😬

[footle]

43 minutes ago, Kryptonian said:

Don’t say that now! I’ve not played all day as I’ve been busy and wasn’t going to give it another go 😬

 

It's ok, there's a 40 minute queue on console.

[Thor]

51 minutes ago, Kryptonian said:

Don’t say that now! I’ve not played all day as I’ve been busy and wasn’t going to give it another go 😬

It seems to have got its hooks in me. 

[Kryptonian]

Dammit @Thor

[Thor]

42 minutes ago, Kryptonian said:

Dammit @Thor

I'm still playing it, I've just taken breaks for food. 

[Gloomy Andy]

Can people in the over world grab your loot?

I did a public event and was sure that someone ran in and grabbed stuff that popped out of the chest. 

I just can't be 100% sure they got stuff from my chest or I only got a single drop + gold from the chest. 

 

I agree with @moosegrinder, people in the world is very odd putting. 

D3 was always a single player game for me. This is coming across as Diablo MMO seeing everyone else running around. 

[spork]

13 minutes ago, Gloomy Andy said:

Can people in the over world grab your loot?

I did a public event and was sure that someone ran in and grabbed stuff that popped out of the chest. 

I just can't be 100% sure they got stuff from my chest or I only got a single drop + gold from the chest. 

 

I agree with @moosegrinder, people in the world is very odd putting. 

D3 was always a single player game for me. This is coming across as Diablo MMO seeing everyone else running around. 

Loot is all personal.

[Gloomy Andy]

Ah that's good to know. 

They must have been grabbing their stuff from the public chest.  

[Mr Ben]

Necromancer is a bit good isnt it. Corpse explosion is silly, but so satisfying 😁

[PeteJ]

Only had a quick go this evening - zero queue by the way. 

 

I've never played Diablo on a console/ pad before, so that was a first. I'll probably find it's actually the better control method but early on in the beta I'm finding myself very disconnected to the events taking place. It's been a while since I played D3 but I seem to remember that clicking much sooner. 

 

That said, I'm also playing as necro and that isn't normally a class i'd play. Doesn't seem to have anything wrong with it, just different.

 

Otherwise it's definitely one of those games! I haven't seen anything I haven't seen before, but it remains weirdly compelling. 

[shirubagan]

Just hit level 20 and will be a bit sad to see my character and gear get nuked. I think I’ll get this for Steam Deck as it’s the perfect game to grind away and explore while on the sofa. 

[moosegrinder]

It's not convinced me to buy it, which I'm a bit sad about Tbh. Ah well. It's not like there isn't anything else to play.

[Captain Kelsten]

3 hours ago, moosegrinder said:

It's not convinced me to buy it, which I'm a bit sad about Tbh. Ah well. It's not like there isn't anything else to play.

Say it ain’t so, Moosey! 😩

 

I haven’t managed to play the beta - I wasn’t planning on it but then downloaded it and got stuck in a queue anyway - but I’ve already bought the game, I think it looks great and I can’t wait! 
 

Can’t decide between Druid or necromancer first, though…

[moosegrinder]

3 minutes ago, Captain Kelsten said:

Say it ain’t so, Moosey! 😩

 

I haven’t managed to play the beta - I wasn’t planning on it but then downloaded it and got stuck in a queue anyway - but I’ve already bought the game, I think it looks great and I can’t wait! 
 

Can’t decide between Druid or necromancer first, though…

 

Everyone else seems to be loving it, so just ignore me. I think you'll dig it a lot.

 

There's a lot to like. I've not had chance to roll a different class but Drood is fun. I got a staff that made my wolf companions Werewolves and I've switched through a few builds and landed on a tanky werebear build.

 

Also shout out to Blizzard for making the Druids big, hefty fuckers.

[Gloomy Andy]

Completed the story quests and got to level 22 last night. 

Wasn't going to day 1 this anyway but I'm now not sure how I feel about it. 

 

As I said earlier Diablo (3, seeing as that's the only one I've played, got the Ultimate Edition back on PS4)) is a single player game for me. 

Not only did I not like having other people running around the overworld in this but getting into the menus and seeing Guilds etc fills me with dread. 

 

However the moment to moment gameplay of looting and making bigger numbers appear was still enjoyable.

 

I didn't realise til the end of my session last night that the over world dungeons tell you the class of the upgrade thing on the map. 

Not sure how I feel about getting rewards for a class you're not playing, although I guess that happens with loot anyway. 

 

I'm coming away from the beta unsure if I want the get it early doors, wait for a while or not bother at all. 

 

One thing I do know is I won't be getting involved with the £100 version or the paid path of the season pass thing. 

 

 

[Captain Kelsten]

Name checks out

[Andy_Why]

I have been trying to get into a Diablo game for years and have bounced off both the 2 and 3 in the past, despite spending a fair bit of time with both. I think Diablo 4 is finally the game to do it. Have been really enjoying it this weekend after trying the Sorcerer and the Barbarian. Played a little with my friend, but can see this really shining in multiplayer too.

[Sumire]

17 minutes ago, Andy_Why said:

I have been trying to get into a Diablo game for years and have bounced off both the 2 and 3 in the past, despite spending a fair bit of time with both. I think Diablo 4 is finally the game to do it. Have been really enjoying it this weekend after trying the Sorcerer and the Barbarian. Played a little with my friend, but can see this really shining in multiplayer too.

 

Yeah, it is basically the best bits of Diablo 2 and 3 in one package. That is the way I see it at the moment anyway.

[spork]

3 hours ago, Gloomy Andy said:

 

I didn't realise til the end of my session last night that the over world dungeons tell you the class of the upgrade thing on the map. 

Not sure how I feel about getting rewards for a class you're not playing, although I guess that happens with loot anyway.

 

 

 

 

You're not playing Diablo if you don't get half way to level cap and end up switching to another class and so on until you have one of each on the go.

 

[Siri]

Alright, got to level 25 on Necro. I think I'm happy to call it there.

 

In all, I think I like it. Not to a fever pitch amount like Diablo 3 before it came out, but those were different times.

 

I'm glad that the itemisation is mostly a lot better than Diablo 3's core stat hunting wankery - there's actual affixes that give +1 to skills for one, and quite a few legendary mods do give some nice benefits early on. The lack of sets on launch might hurt, but it sounds like it's more a long tail thing, so fair enough.

 

Also, looks like some passives have a lot of impact - gaining essence on consuming corpses was a big QoL on corpse explosion in my time playing.

 

But most importantly, it just felt right to play. A bit slower than D3 and a lot slower than peak PoE, but combat had weight, played well on a controller and I felt compelled to keep playing.

 

And as mentioned, even on low, it looked gorgeous on the Steam Deck and generally held together at 40hz. And yes, I'm fully aware that the game's online only and playing on a portable doesn't make sense - I've used phone tethering to run PoE maps on a work lunch break, so I know what's up.

 

Unfortunately, I think one of the main reasons I jumped at Diablo 3 on launch because you could pick up a PC boxed game for cheap from retailers, and I wouldn't be surprised if that will no longer be the case after umpteen years. We'll see, I guess.

[Gloomy Andy]

18 minutes ago, spork said:

 

You're not playing Diablo if you don't get half way to level cap and end up switching to another class and so on until you have one of each on the go.

 

 

Yeah I didn't really do that with D3. 

Early days I played a character til I hit cap with them and than ran some G.Rifts before moving onto another character. 

 

Later I focused on a character per season (I think season 21 was the one I managed to complete everything on with a mage).

 

I did eventually get all to cap on PlayStation (Crusader being the last and getting me the Plat) except Necro which I did on Switch (with a couple of others).

 

It was just interesting to see the change from random stuff dropping for other classes to knowing upfront that you can play a dungeon that will definitely give you progression for/boost another class. 

 

A bit like how number of healing potions you can carry seems to be at an account level by region. At least that's how it seems to me from the beta. 

(Did anyone else get Lego City Undercover vibes from opening up the region progression screen from the map? I think it's triangle in both games too!)

 

 

These sort of things remind me of when I played FFXI and you could play all the jobs on your character so things like storage etc were account based rather than job based. 

All of this is why the D4 beta felt like it was leaning more into MMO territory than I'm used to having only played D3 (and even then I only started playing once it had been out a few years).

[Gloomy Andy]

2 minutes ago, Siri said:

 

 

I'm glad that the itemisation is mostly a lot better than Diablo 3's core stat hunting wankery - there's actual affixes that give +1 to skills for one, and quite a few legendary mods do give some nice benefits early on. The lack of sets on launch might hurt, but it sounds like it's more a long tail thing, so fair enough.

 

Also, looks like some passives have a lot of impact - gaining essence on consuming corpses was a big QoL on corpse explosion in my time playing.

 

 

 

Yeah I loved being able to use skills without investing in them. 

 

I also got some pretty sweet abilities on legendary items. 

Chain reaction corpse explosion was amazing, would just clear whole rooms for basically no essence.

[Thor]

Not sure if I'll buy the game at launch, this open beta has been a meaty enough slice to sate me for a while. Think I'll wait until it's on offer or something. 

[moosegrinder]

Hit 20. Definitely not buying at launch but in enjoyed it in the main.