"The infernal waves generate a special resource: embers. Do not confuse them with sinister favors, which are exchanged at the tree of whispers for nightmare emblems. Beware, nothing to do with the seeds of hate, which are converted into red dust." With five months to go, one thing is certain: Blizzard has already succeeded in creating a hack'n'slash with rules that are more terrifying than a German wargame.
It's almost official and hardly believable: Diablo IV will be released, in all likelihood and according to the latest rumors, next April. The corridors, which are definitely noisy (we should think about bringing in an acoustician), even suggest that pre-orders will open in December, which is when you'll be reading these lines with your little eyes squinting. The announcement, let's face it, came as a surprise to many: maybe because everyone was expecting a late next year release, maybe because after the hecatomb of late 2022, the mere possibility of a AAA game not being late seemed off the table. Still, Diablo IV (unlike, we hope, its developers) has begun the final sprint to release, so this is our chance to take stock of everything we know. Hold on to your hats, it's brutal.
It's a good crowd. Let's start with the main course: Diablo IV will be the first truly open-world hack'n'slash. Breaking with the tradition that the adventure is divided into acts, it will instead offer us a world divided into regions, which can be explored by the player in the order of their choice, since their level will adapt to that of the hero (or the group leader in the case of a multiplayer game). The adventure will not be devoid of structure, as each region will offer a series of main and side quests, with most likely a big bad guy to beat up each time to "conclude" the area. As in any good open world, the player will gradually increase his control of the world by liberating enemy camps (the game developers' obsession with liberating camps could be the subject of a thesis) which, once conquered, will become allied bases where it will be possible to resupply.
Illustrations : © Blizzard Entertainment
There will be five regions, covering just about every classic (or cliché, depending on your mood) fantasy genre. Scosglen will be a rainforest on the edge of coastlines that look suspiciously like the first act of Path of Exile. Fractured Peaks, unsurprisingly, snowy mountains similar to Act 5 of Diablo II. Hawezar, a swamp full of witches and giant snakes. Finally, you'll have not one but two deserts: the Arid Steppes, an arid plateau full of cannibals, and Kehjistan, a more Middle Eastern inspired desert. To these five regions, between which you can move on foot or on horseback, you will of course have to add a sixth one, the underworld, because a Diablo in which you don't make a detour to the abyss is like a trip to Normandy without going to see the Mont Saint-Michel: a waste of time.
On the surface of this somewhat hostile world there will be no less than 150 dungeons, a number that would command respect even in the most popular Parisian neighborhoods of the BDSM community. If the layout of the rooms and monsters will be determined randomly at each exploration, each of these dungeons will nevertheless be unique in its bestiary, its appearance and the type of object that will most frequently be found there.
A family bestiary. Let's talk about the bestiary. The creeps will now be divided into seven families, yes that's right, just like the card game: cannibals, the fallen, the drowned (undead with an aquatic theme), ghouls, butch-men, skeletons and cultists. While some of them, like the goatmen, will be present all over the world, others will be specific to certain regions, like the drowned who will enjoy the humid climate of Scosglen (why would a drowned guy want to go back to a humid climate, I ask you) and the cannibals who, as a good medieval-fantasy version of the Mad Max villains, will prefer arid corners. If each family will have its own speciality - the drowned ones will be for example pros of synergies between various creatures -, all of them will have in common to be divided into different archetypes (specialists of group attack, big tanks full of life points, bastards who harass the player from a distance...) intended to create varied and interesting combat situations.
As far as bosses are concerned, we'll have the return of some great classics like Duriel or Andariel, some new ones like the drowned witch (too many drowned in this story, if you ask me) and at least three "world bosses", very powerful enemies reserved for multiplayer that can only be killed by a group of very well coordinated players. In other words, they're not too risky.
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The skill system marks a return to that of Diablo II.
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A good dose of heroes. To kill all these people, there will be five characters who, in a fair and just society, would have already been able to retire: the barbarian, the druid, the necromancer, the rogue and the witch. As in Diablo III, it will be possible to choose the gender of your character independently of his class but also - finally something new! - to modify his appearance to make him unique. As in Diablo III, each class will have its own resource generation system (some will gain energy by fighting, others by casting spells, others with time...) and will be able to choose between several specializations offering different play styles: a necromancer specialized in summoning or curses, a rogue specialized in traps or critical hits, etc.
They've been waiting around this campfire for 22 years. Next to them, Vladmir and Estragon are just rubbish.
The skill system, meanwhile, marks a return to that of Diablo II with a real tree where the acquisition of some of them opens access to others, as well as synergies when particular combinations are unlocked. The system, according to the developers, will make it possible to create a good character without having to follow a guide (we ask to see) and will give a certain weight to the player's decisions since if he can go back on his choices, it will cost an increasing number of gold coins as he gains levels. Experience levels which, by the way, will go from 1 to 100.
The end justifies the means. If level 100 represents the absolute maximum, the character will only be at about level 50 once the main quest is finished. The endgame will then begin. Unlike the endgame in Diablo III, which, before the Reaper of Souls expansion, was basically limited to the auction house, this time it will be very extensive.
To begin with, there will be paragon levels, or rather "paragon tables". Each level after the 50th one will indeed bring four paragon points that the player will be able to spend on tables whose labyrinthine aspect will have nothing to envy to the Path of Exile's skill tree. As in the Grinding Gear Games puzzle, you'll have to place your points intelligently to reach the nodes offering the desired modifiers, especially since, as an added complexity, you'll be able to combine and rotate several parts of the board to customize your path through the tree.
And more if infinity. After level 50, it's time to face the infernal waves, random events during which an entire region of the world will be invaded by more powerful monsters but offering better loot. These monsters will sometimes drop embers, which can be spent to open special chests where you know in advance the type of item they contain (two-handed weapon, piece of armor...), which will allow you to spend them only on items adapted to the build you are aiming at.
Another nice activity of Mr. Blizzard's big spawn center is the Whispers of the Dead. These will be dynamic quests, quite similar to those in Diablo III's adventure mode, which will appear randomly on the map. Each completed quest will bring back a sinister favor that can be given to the tree of whispers, a very nice plant since it will give out experience and loot in exchange, unlike the ficus in my living room which only gives me dead leaves and weird little white things, I wonder if they aren't scales.
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After ten years of trying to integrate PvP into Diablo III, Blizzard has finally come up with an interesting system.
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The whisper tree will also sometimes spit out nightmare emblems, which can be used to transform one of the game's dungeons into a "nightmare" version with, once again, more dangerous enemies and more loot. Finally, the difficulty levels we've known since the first Diablo have not disappeared. They will now be called "world levels" and will have to be unlocked one after the other by killing a special boss each time, just to prove to the game, and to your mother who never believed in you, that you are worthy of the higher difficulty.
Show-off against show-off. What else? PvP of course! After spending ten years trying to get one into Diablo III, Blizzard has finally come up with a system that looks interesting. It will take place in restricted areas of the world, the "Fields of Hate", whose name answers the question that everyone is asking: what would be the name of the TV show diametrically opposed to Happiness is in the Field? Inside these zones, where it will be allowed to kill your friends, chests, enemies and other sources of loot will drop "seeds of hate", whose name answers the question everyone is asking: what would Steinbeck have called the sequel to The Grapes of Wrath? These seeds will have the particularity, unlike the other objects, to be dropped when you are killed by another player, which will encourage you to rob your friends. Once enough seeds have been acquired or stolen, you'll still have to go to an extraction altar (near which players will not fail to lurk in ambush) in order to transform them into red dust, which can be exchanged for cosmetic items such as mounts or skins, in order to show off in front of your little friends.
Drama as a service. But my word processor's word counter is spinning faster than that of Roger, the famous Parisian cab driver whose exploits in robbing tourists earned him the nickname "Japanese shearer", so it's time to wrap things up. For the moment, we have to admit, this Diablo IV is looking good. Blizzard seems to have swallowed the pride that led to the disastrous launch of Diablo III and, this time, listened to the community.
Visually as well as in terms of mechanics, Diablo IV wants to reconnect with what made the success of the second episode without, as we feared, becoming a remake. Because, despite the irascible fanboys who continue to convince themselves that they love doing the same actions in the same order three times in a row and killing Pindleskin ten thousand times, Reaper of Souls and its adventure mode, which allows you to play in total freedom, is still the greatest evolution of hack'n'slash in its short history. By building on these mechanics, by giving the player more freedom, by offering a varied endgame that doesn't just consist of repeating the same runs and bossruns, Diablo IV should - and this is Blizzard's intention - be an action-RPG capable of keeping players busy for years. It remains to be seen how all this will be financed in the long term and if, lured by the smell of fresh cash that Diablo Immortal brings in by the wheelbarrows, Blizzard will be able to stay true to its promise of selling only cosmetic content in its ingame store and its season passes.
Genre: Hack'n'slash
Developer: Blizzard (USA)
Publisher: Activision-Blizzard
Platforms: Windows, PS4/5, Xbox One/Series
Release date: expected April 2023
