#10 - Diablo IV

 

Happy Halloween month! It’s my favorite holiday of the year! And to celebrate, I’m going to attempt to post only screenshots from horror-themed games all month long! Starting with one that’s literally about hell on Sanctuary (i.e. Earth), Diablo IV!

For those unfamiliar with Diablo lore, here’s the TL;DR - The game franchise is set on Sanctuary, a neutral realm between Heaven and Hell. The angel Inarius and the demon Lilith created the realm as a safe haven for any who wanted to escape the constant war being waged between their home realms. The merging of angels and demons created a race of mortal beings that are both angel and demon, and yet neither one. Called Nephalem, but basically human beings.

Diablo IV has Lilith being summoned from the void she had previously been banished to, in order to fulfill a prophecy to “save her children.” She then goes around Sanctuary, corrupting people into following her. You play a wanderer who was nearly corrupted by her followers, but escaped and can now see visions of her actions in the realm. You’re sent on a quest to stop her. Also, Inarius wants to help you kill her, because he thinks it’s his fate to stop her and that it will grant him passage to his home realm of Heaven. I guess he’s a little homesick. Here he is, tired of you and your kind’s shit:

No intentional spoilers (because I haven’t finished the game, so I have no idea where the plot is going), but I keep predicting we’re eventually going to turn on everyone and join Lilith. Because, despite all the supposedly evil things she’s been doing in Sanctuary, her ultimate goal is to save “her children” (i.e. everyone). I feel like it’s building up to a reveal that she was a good guy the whole time and we need to stop Inarius, who is being an asshole and doesn’t give a damn about anyone in Sanctuary. His own son refused to trust him! So I feel like he’s being set up to be the bad guy and Lilith will be revealed as a protagonist in the end. Or maybe they’re both evil and we’ll end them both. I dunno; I guess I’ll find out when I finish the campaign.

My friends and I have been playing this game almost daily for the past couple weeks now. It’s a bit of a nostalgia ride, as we used to play the original Diablo together over dial-up Internet back in our childhood. I still remember when Diablo II released and we were absolutely floored at the in-game weather events. We would be playing and it would randomly start raining! We’d never seen anything like that in a video game before.

Below is my current party. From left to right: My wife (Rogue), a childhood friend of mine (Druid), myself (fire Sorcerer), and another childhood friend (Barbarian).

We’re trying to play through the campaign together, but it’s hard to match up all of our schedules, so we spend a ton of time fooling around in game and doing side quests on our own. I’m level 58 and we’re about halfway through Act III right now. I read online that you can beat the campaign by level 45 or so, and I got to level 50 before we even started Act II. Hopefully we’ll finish the campaign in the next couple weeks.

UPDATE: I just upgraded my cosmetic armor set to this season’s Awoken Archenemy set. I have the full set, but I don’t like how the flaming horns cover almost all of my head, so I opted for the Waning Sun Diadem for my helm instead. I definitely feel like a fire sorcerer now! Check it out:

#9 - Nightingale

 

I had an extremely busy day yesterday and didn’t remember to post until about 11 PM, so I decided to skip a day. I was almost too busy to post today, too! Good thing I’m not tying myself to a daily posting schedule. 😅

Nightingale is a new MMO that’s still in early access. You play a person from the early 1900s who passes through a portal into the Fae Realms. I forget what’s happening on Earth, but some sort of ominous fog called “The Pale” or something is spreading across Paris, forcing you and a bunch of other explorers to travel through the portal to escape it. And then you find yourself trapped in the lands of the Fae.

A fae named Puck offers you assistance in finding a safe realm to visit and gives you a card that helps you cleanse the realm so its inhabitable. Knowing what I know from stories of the fae, I was very hesitant to trust him, but the game doesn’t really give you any alternatives. So… into the Fae Realms we go!

From there, the game is an open world crafting game, kind of like Enshrouded. You learn how to craft tools, defenses, houses, etc. You can make extravagant fantasy homes, or just rudimentary structures to keep you safe. There are all sorts of things to explore in the world, too. Plenty of questing, discoveries, enemies to fight, other humans to interact and trade with, etc.

The screenshot at the top of this post was taken after cleansing my first realm. Below, you can see a couple shots of what it looked like when I first arrived there. It was dark and dreary, with an “enraged sky.”

Also, here’s a look at my custom character and her inventory and stats.

I’ve only played a couple hours of it so far, but it’s been unique and enjoyable. I hope it only gets better as it nears a full release date.