This review is specifically for the Hardcore mode of Diablo 4. The game in its current state is simply unplayable for Hardcore players, and Blizzard has made it clear that this mode is less than an afterthought to them. I would be surprised if even a single person at Blizzard plays this mode, that's how bad the design surrounding Hardcore is.
Let's start with the marketing gimmick. Hardcore players know that we are a small minority of overall players. I think many of us were surprised to see a contest specifically featuring Hardcore mode - the first 1000 players to reach level 100 would be immortalized on a statue of Lilith that would reside at Blizzard's HQ. Okay, clearly this is to sell more copies of the early access passes, but still a fun competition for the minority that does enjoy the mode.
Turns out the contest was little more than a competition of who experienced the least amount of disconnects. Within the first couple weeks of the game, Blizzard would release updates that would sometimes result in the game going down for many players. One level 100 player (Quinn, I think) experienced a death on disconnect because they needed to take the servers down momentarily to update the cash shop. His is probably the most famous example, but far from the only one.
The disconnects wouldn't be so bad if they had kept in a feature that appeared to be working in beta: upon a disconnect, if the player had a Scroll of Escape in their inventory, it would automatically be consumed, bringing the player safely back to town. For unknown reasons, this feature was scrapped for the official release, with a new estimated date of Season 2.
Somewhere between 5-10% of players experienced a VRAM memory leak that would also lead to random crashes. People on high end PCs would, without any notice, crash or disconnect and log in to see their characters dead, sometimes losing well over 100 hours of progress. Every major Diablo forum, from their official ones, to Reddit, to their official Discord, was full of people talking about this issue. Players were met with utter silence from a company that earned over $5 billion in profit in 2022.
The issues were so common and well-known that Hardcore players tried to come up with ways to survive a disconnect that they would inevitably experience. Putting on defensive Aspects that would otherwise not see much play, simply in the hopes that they would grant you an extra few seconds of survivability. This was mostly ineffective because your character stays in the world, logged in, taking damage, for well over 20 seconds after a disconnect. This means that a simple white mob would mean death for 99% of players.
The game was clearly rushed out before it was ready. It shows in the story beats, the UI, and the gameplay loops. Perhaps this will be a good game after a year or two of live updates. Maybe grab it for 50% off at that point. Currently, for Hardcore players anyway, the game is nothing at all.
Let's start with the marketing gimmick. Hardcore players know that we are a small minority of overall players. I think many of us were surprised to see a contest specifically featuring Hardcore mode - the first 1000 players to reach level 100 would be immortalized on a statue of Lilith that would reside at Blizzard's HQ. Okay, clearly this is to sell more copies of the early access passes, but still a fun competition for the minority that does enjoy the mode.
Turns out the contest was little more than a competition of who experienced the least amount of disconnects. Within the first couple weeks of the game, Blizzard would release updates that would sometimes result in the game going down for many players. One level 100 player (Quinn, I think) experienced a death on disconnect because they needed to take the servers down momentarily to update the cash shop. His is probably the most famous example, but far from the only one.
The disconnects wouldn't be so bad if they had kept in a feature that appeared to be working in beta: upon a disconnect, if the player had a Scroll of Escape in their inventory, it would automatically be consumed, bringing the player safely back to town. For unknown reasons, this feature was scrapped for the official release, with a new estimated date of Season 2.
Somewhere between 5-10% of players experienced a VRAM memory leak that would also lead to random crashes. People on high end PCs would, without any notice, crash or disconnect and log in to see their characters dead, sometimes losing well over 100 hours of progress. Every major Diablo forum, from their official ones, to Reddit, to their official Discord, was full of people talking about this issue. Players were met with utter silence from a company that earned over $5 billion in profit in 2022.
The issues were so common and well-known that Hardcore players tried to come up with ways to survive a disconnect that they would inevitably experience. Putting on defensive Aspects that would otherwise not see much play, simply in the hopes that they would grant you an extra few seconds of survivability. This was mostly ineffective because your character stays in the world, logged in, taking damage, for well over 20 seconds after a disconnect. This means that a simple white mob would mean death for 99% of players.
The game was clearly rushed out before it was ready. It shows in the story beats, the UI, and the gameplay loops. Perhaps this will be a good game after a year or two of live updates. Maybe grab it for 50% off at that point. Currently, for Hardcore players anyway, the game is nothing at all.