 Hello, everyone and welcome back to beta males the game show with the show the game the game show The game show that's all about guessing which beta game we played and I'll give you a hit. It's by blizzard entertainment if we played on Diablo immortal, which is a free open beta right now on Both mobile and PC. I just played it on PC, but um Anyway, I'm your host to me. We're gonna talk about that. We're gonna talk about is it worth even playing We'll talk about what we liked about it what we just liked about it We have some very differing opinions this time and I'm your host the man goose I don't know if I said that already joining me as always is the Viking Jedi. How you doing Viking? I'm doing great man Thank you. Yeah excited to talk about this game. I do think we're gonna have some some differing opinions I'm excited to hear what those are and then joining us again is the jelly knees He's been joining us on our most recent playthrough. So I'm sure he also is excited to talk about his opinions of the game So far go ahead jelly. Yeah, I'm I'm excited about it I put in a ton of hours yesterday, so I'm stoked about it and I mean even though I won't be here every time I'm excited to be here again. So Yeah, I'm excited. Let's do it Yeah, I just want to stress I just want to reiterate that jelly is not part of this show He just has happened to have been on All of them that we've done So Diablo immortal. Let's uh, let's let's go around. Let's start with the Viking Jedi Do you think this is worth playing? Do you think it's worth just picking up and playing? It is free. So I mean Yeah, exactly. I would say I would recommend it but with an asterisk I think my recommendation comes with the understanding of what it is that you're Investing in I guess I think that there's a lot of things to like and dislike about the game I think it'll come down to a lot of yours your personal preference I think if you're really a big fan of Diablo lore as a whole like if that's something that just interests you I would highly recommend it. It does continue the story. You're gonna see some of the Returning, you know characters that you might have fell in love with or hated in previous versions So there's something to be looking forward to in that and if you're just a you know Fan of dungeon crawlers in general and you just like to you know get out there and you know Wack things and get loot and do all that stuff I think the game still fits that niche and will hit that, you know itch if you have it Jill and ease I think pretty much the same thing being free It's hard to say like don't just go try it like you don't have to spend any money on it Go try it if you like it great if you don't that's cool, too It doesn't cost anything a little bit of your time to determine that and I think For most people you'll get that feel very quickly of I am a fan of this or I'm not a fan of this and then Potentially a second time later on as things progress further in the grind gets a little more For me, I made a comparison yesterday to you guys that it was kind of like Lost Ark That I played a lot of Lost Ark when it first came out in the in the West Coast West Coast in the West in general and Loved Lost Ark right thought it was super fun really cool gameplay the whole nine yards and then it got to the point where the grind Turned into Mount Everest like I just it went from. Oh, you know slight incline to just bam And it's either grind or pay money. There you go, and I that turned me off the game really really fast and I Could see the same thing happening with the obloh immortal I'm not quite there yet where that grind is started to do that I'm slowly seeing the incline, but I haven't gotten to that point where it just Mount Everest on me But I could see that happening and in that case I would probably stop playing But for now I intend to continue on playing I would recommend other people at least try it Me personally I disliked this game a lot. I did not feel that it was worth my time I felt that I could have spent that time better playing something else I certainly could save the disc space for something else other than this game There were things I liked about it. I mean that it's not all bad. There's there's good and bad about it And we'll talk about that later, but for as far as I'm concerned Not worth my time. It's a free game still not worth downloading not worth installing not worth playing at all I would not have played it a second time if we weren't Doing it for this show. So that's uh, yeah, you were preloaded there You know what my opinions are of Diablo? Immortal and it's not even the pay-to-win aspect. We'll get into what I dislike about it But first let's talk about what we liked about the game because there is some stuff to enjoy here You two both enjoyed the game far more than me. So Jelly knees let's start with you. What is it? What's something that you enjoyed about Diablo immortal? So far. I mean over the last six months I've been kind of more and more obsessed with visual effects and like watching visual effects and video games And I think theirs are pretty top-notch, right that the the spell effects all look really clean and really nice Even for a mobile game, right? I mean honestly their effects in this are better than some AAA effects We see on PC. So I give them a lot of credit there And it feels when you do things it feels impactful like the the customization and as you start getting into legendaries They augment and modify your spells. So I'm playing a wizard class So one instead of shooting one beam I shoot three beams and like the that feeling is really good And I think they did a good job with that and that's probably my favorite thing So at least that I've experienced thus far Yeah, so I mean I go that point I do think that the visuals and we all played on PC like none of us tried it on mobile, right? I did try it on mobile. Oh, you did okay Okay, I'll be curious to see what you what you thought about it from a mobile perspective versus just the PC See, I have I do like the spell effects. I think those look really good There were parts of it though that were and this isn't necessarily going into dislikes while I do think the spell effects are good I think they're good for mobile And porting over to PC. I think some of it is lost in translation It's not some of like the UI Pull-ups and stuff like that look a little janky on, you know a high-definition Screening from my perspective, but I did think that the spells themselves look really good. I do like the the Minions and the monsters and how they looked the voiceover acting I think was probably my biggest surprise from it I didn't expect being that it's a mobile game that they would have close to full voiceovers for I know that's not something we haven't seen in Diablo's in the past But being that this was a mobile game I thought that maybe they were going to you know short change that they did not and I think the voiceovers are pretty cool Your characters all have their own voice lines You know and the customization was actually pretty good as well for what I wasn't expecting a mobile game to have as far as like How you can make your character look and stuff like that some of those options were pretty unique and interesting And then my favorite thing is the combat I think the combat feels exactly what you'd expect for a Diablo game You want it to be interactive in the way that it is you press button things happen and and I think it's pretty responsive more times than it isn't and It hits well for what you can expect from a Diablo game Yeah, I agree the voice acting I thought was outstanding and like like you said it is for mobile And it is a beta did not expect really good voice acting for almost every cutscene I personally didn't experience any cutscenes that didn't that weren't really well voice acted I didn't get I haven't gotten as far into the game as you guys, but I'm assuming that carry that carries on Yeah, I think I think for as for a mobile game Like the effects and the and just the just everything that is top-notch. It's like a top-notch Mobile game. It's not the kind of game like when I play mobile. I play something like Hearthstone or like various little card games and stuff like that So like an action game. I would prefer to just set down on my computer and play Understand that people not everybody has that sort of time and they might be playing this You know while they're commuting to work or something like that And I think it's a great game for that if if you are a mobile gamer This is a pretty damn good mobile game and especially if you're used to mobile games, but um Yeah, there are good things about it for sure um, I Think for like the voice acting side of things is Genshin impact Re-revolutionized the mobile market mm-hmm when that came out it had full voice acting It had cinematics it had the whole nine yards in addition to all the micro transactions, but which we'll get to right but But I think that showed that there is value in committing resources Like voice actors and all that kind of stuff do mobile games to sell to put them at a national on above The rest and so I think it makes sense to me that to see a blizzard do that same kind of thing Yeah, 100% um Like you said the combat's pretty good. I mean, it's very Diablo. It's mm-hmm. If you enjoy Diablo you'll You'll I mean a lot of the abilities are one for one from Diablo three Yeah, I that was I mean that's kind of leading into somewhat of a dislike but not necessarily a dislike I it is sometimes it feels like I'm just playing it and it's like, you know Diablo 3.5 You know, it's like it's not really its own thing It feels like an extension of Diablo 3, but that's not necessarily a bad thing Diablo 3 was a great game overall Like I mean started off a little rough then it got really good Then it kind of got rough again, and then I think right now it's just in a okay standpoint for the people who are really hardcore Diablo fans I think they're just okay with the seasons but I think Again, if you've been waiting for the story This is gonna scratch your itch if you play on mobile I think this is really going to be your jam like cuz again It's supposed to be really really good on mobile in particular. I think the PC port maybe it was a bit Of a stretch, but it's not terrible on PC. It's just it's definitely a mobile game Yeah, yeah, I think it's a response to the do you not have phones Like yeah, well now it's like don't you guys have credit cards? So I think man goose it was you that said this but for me yesterday Right, I was kind of in a weird like kind of chill mood Right, and I just threw on some music and just kind of zoned out and was playing this game kind of mindlessly And it was perfect sure because I it wasn't a lack of a better way to put it. I didn't have to think too hard I didn't have to Do a ton that like required mental power. It was just kind of do the thing throw my abilities get the kills right and then go from there and For me that was huge that that's probably why I put so many hours into it yesterday is just Being able to just kind of be in that Zen State playing the game, right? It was very Good for that. Mm-hmm What'd you guys think about boss mechanics and the loot progression? Hmm. There's a very different questions, but sure I so I mean I know Jelly's farther along than I am I do think that the few bosses have been what I would expect almost all Diablo games at this point or dungeon crawlers in general like They're they got mechanics for sure Visually, I think that they look really cool And there's one of the first dungeons that you'll do Where I don't want to give spoilers for people who haven't played but you'll be surprised by the level at which they designed Some aspects to become you know to interact with the boss like and I think that was really really Cool, I liked that aspect. I like that. They were you know coming at this with a different thing It wasn't purely just let's take Diablo 3 content and put it into a mobile game They did expand they did add new things and I thought that was Really fun. I haven't wasn't necessarily overly challenged by any of the mechanics so far granted I'm not as crazy into the game as as others might be but I Think what I enjoyed the most was being able to fairly quickly get grouped up and do those boss encounters Seeing the different spell effects and all that stuff while also not being overwhelming I think they layered the the different spells all your spells look really dynamic other people's spells unless it's like a big Spell will look a little bit less so so it's not too overpowering visually, which I think is smart especially again for mobile game and so I really enjoyed the the combat with Fighting bosses and encountering world bosses. It just felt very Diablo It felt exactly what you'd expect from Diablo not necessarily Overpowering but also still interesting and neat that you didn't hate doing it, you know Yeah for bosses, I would completely agree. I think there hits a point where the the challenge I guess from like main story bosses versus Sidequests where they have challenge runs that you can do. Mm-hmm, right? I think the challenge runs become more of the you're looking for a challenge. You need to play this, right? You need to Manage your distance. You need to manage your spells. You need to do those things like so if you really want to try hard There's challenge runs and then just the main story is just the right amount of difficulty For where you're at assuming you're progressing With the story is what you're supposed to as it expects you to I guess I should say So for that aspect, I think it's basically right on point for what I would expect with it with a Diablo game What about you man goose on the bosses aspects? I thought the couple bosses I did were pretty cool. It was nice to see Leoric and him using like in tomb and stuff like that That by the way, that's probably One of the few things I really really liked about the game as they introduced Heroes of the storm characters into the lore because the here's the storm like characters like Zul and Vala and Um Like like butcher in Leoric, of course They were already named but a lot of the ones like Sonya the ones that were just based on classes from Diablo They they didn't have a name. They gave them names for here's the storm It was kind of cool to see them get inserted into the lore with Diablo immortal. Yeah Yeah, I'm a huge here's the storm fan. I love that game Yeah, you look like exclaimed you're like oh and then you're like excited about getting to it to you know interact and fight them Um, and I think a lot of people will feel the same way that that that transition from blizzard Right of keeping things linear is always something they're pretty strong at and again I do think that blizzard hit well the devs did well on Creating a good game the game itself the mechanics of the game feel like a Diablo game and And the boss is are no exceptions a combat feels relatively good overall again I think as you get farther in the comic it's even better as you you know add more Spells and stuff like that into your your kit How did you guys feel with the combat like being fairly small as because again, we're looking at mostly mobile So you only really have the four slots for your spells I know there was a few moments for me and this isn't necessarily dislike or alike But there was like where I had to make a hard decision on which four spells I'm wanting to commit to you once I had unlocked more Whereas in previous I think Diablo's you had obviously access to a few more spell slots and so forth. What did you guys feel about that? I Mean it makes sense especially for mobile and Even in regular Diablo you couldn't equip every single spell that you right have at your disposal You still had to make that hard decision and I think Forcing gamers to make a hard decision like that is one of the things that makes a game fun And then doing it at a fairly low level fairly I think that's a good thing. I I have no problems with with that whatsoever Yeah, I think for the wizard class like I said, that's the one I've been playing is there are Basically like predefined sets that you can definitely see the synergy between them, right and so it's Well, it's basically it's sitting there going like okay. I want these four because they all work together I want these four because they all work together You're pretty defined for the wizards at least of which like if what your play style is if you enjoy this then you'll want these four spells There's an aspect of choice to that but for the most part that's what it seems to be and I think it's For like it like mango said for a mobile game it makes sense to be as limited as that is and it Helps simplify the game a little bit where you're not worried about eight cooldowns Now you're just worried about the main four and your basic attack or ultimate depending No You guys ready to get into unloading on this game about what we don't like about it because I've been holding myself back this entire time I have one I have one more quick like to throw in there because I think it is important at least for PC players Is you can adjust keybinds right away? I know for me. I adjusted my keybinds almost immediately I put some on my thumb buttons and so forth I wasn't sure you were going to be able to do that for again It being mostly a mobile game if they were gonna have that as an aspect so quality of life things You know whether it was small or big or not for them to be able to add it I personally was really excited to be able to change some of those keybinds and make it a little bit more user-friendly for me But yeah, that's the only final thing I have as far as as likes Yeah, that is a good thing. I've heard good things about controller support, too I've heard that controllers work really well with the game If I'm wrong, let me know in the comments. I'm sure people From what I hear it's set up pretty well And I did like the option of either right-click movement or WASD movement I thought that was pretty well done And you mentioned earlier loop progression man goose and I think yeah the loop progression for where I'm at is actually really good is It made like I mean viking and I both thought we were getting items that were already legendaries And at first I was kind of like upset about that. I was like we got a lot of these really fast Right like I the first one drops. I was like, oh sick a legendary like let's go and then it was like Yeah, another one and another one and I was like whoa, whoa, whoa, okay Do these actually have value anymore and then it turns out there's a whole other tier that is actually the actual legendaries and Those you earn definitely slower, but it's at a good pace. It's at it like I've got currently five legendaries On my person out of nine slots ten slots and what level are you? 40 something 40 or 45. Yeah and I Got those gradually one at a time and each one has a unique effect that changes your abilities somehow And then that you then can start building and you go like okay I want this legendary and this legendary and together they help make my kit more powerful or They they make that progression feel more worthwhile than just oh look I do a little bit more damage, right? And having there's a bunch of different legendaries. I've gotten four chess pieces, right? And each one has a different effect And so then it's choosing this one is slightly better with stats But this one benefits the spell that I like to use and trying to have that like you said earlier Mangoes that the decision right adds a little bit of fun to it And I think that's it's really good for where it's at at least up to the point that I'm at right now Yeah, right because I again know that it theoretically everists at some point. Yeah, I Felt the same way about the loot. I know for me like today while me and jelly were messing around I got my first legendary gem and Slotted that into my weapon and it gave me Like an energy thing that as you run around or do damage It'll eventually send out like a lightning chain and that felt really good I'm playing as a crusader class. So I'm doing a lot of melee anyway So being able to add more aoe to my kit was was really exciting and so I do I'm excited for that I don't remember that being in a Diablo 3 as something that they necessarily did with the gems and so forth Again, someone in the comments can correct me or one of you guys can chime in but Because it was forever ago that I played that game feels like so long But yeah, I thought that felt really good I was really excited which is always what you want when you get a new thing and you want to use it and it feel Immediately impactful and I did feel that with the with the gem So again, that's another another plus which is why my recommend is kind of like in the middle Like I'm not necessarily hard thumbs up You need to play this game like I was with v rising And I'm not necessarily like a full-on. This is you know, don't put it onto your PC at all or onto your mobile phone It's kind of like again in the middle area But yeah, I'm ready to jump into the dislikes unless you know can I go yeah Go ahead Mingus eat Mingus guys. He's so excited to tell you about the things that are wrong with this game You're gonna see people all like talking about how it's pay to win and all this I didn't even experience that like as much as I played it. I did not experience any sort of pay to win I didn't feel that I needed to pay at any time what pissed me off Was this fucking mobile UI where I need to claim go here and claim this and then claim this and then claim This and then go over here and claim this and then I just finished a quest. Well that unlocked part of my Blah blah blah so I'm gonna need to go over and claim that part It's like all my fucking God can I not just play the goddamn game and get my equipment and move along And then every time like I I'm one of those people that like if if like I have a little blinking light That says that I have like a new skin or something like I have to hover over it And make it go away Constant like here's this blinking light. Oh, I hit the claim Oh, here's this free one-time offer of 99 cents for the bundle blah blah blah like get the fuck out of my game with this shit Like I just and then the other thing is I just didn't feel that Diablo Immortal did anything Like better Then what's already out there like the way I felt was I could just as easily play a path of exile Which is free or I could I bought Diablo 3 a long time ago I could just play Diablo 3 like mm-hmm. I could play torchlight There's a lot of a RPGs out there that I can play That do things in a different way and do things better than other RPGs and provide a new experience This was not a new experience other than it being a mobile experience. So again Mobile gamers. Yeah, maybe but I'm not a mobile gamer and I cannot fucking one of the reasons I'm not a mobile gamers. I cannot stand that shit of having daily unlocks And it's like a fucking task whenever you want whenever you open up your phone Like I've got to go here that before I play anything I gotta go here and then I got here and then I got here and then I got here and oh my god It just I absolutely hated it could not stay and play in the game And for better or worse, we said it before right but for better or for worse It's Diablo 3 with microtransactions like it. Yeah For if you really love the Abla 3 then there's a chance you'll like this But there's microtransactions, right? Like it's and that that's the added caveat to every aspect of this every time you kind of come out of a dungeon It's like a limited one-time offer for you. I do not care. Thank you Right and I get why they're doing it, right? They so I looked it up while we were talking just a minute ago. They made $800,000 in the first 24 hours that the game was live Which is disgusting that makes me not I'm not changing my thing Do not play this game Well because I'm a big supporter of you know Vote with your money, right? Like, you know when it comes to these games like There's some aspects like I don't mind all microtransactions Like so we talked about the fact that I play League of Legends a lot I know jelly's played it a lot. I've probably spent a few hundred dollars at this point on skins It's cosmetics. It's and this is the thing that I like about League of Legends Is that it doesn't beat you over the head with hey come spend your money. Hey come spend your money No, no, we're gonna make you a cool product. The game itself is going to be good I mean for better or worse good League of Legends is one of those things But they yeah, I just can't stand that you know this whole mobile market And it's been something that's been a pretty You know slow creep I think for for a long time It's just now breaking into you know to the PC space And I think the people who have been mostly either console or PC gamers haven't maybe really been interacting with it But like my daughter has grown up with an iPad or her iPhone in her face pretty much her Most of her, you know adolescent to teenage life. So she's very much accustomed to oh dad That's only 99 cents who cares or oh it's only this why who cares and I'm like no dude Like it starts off that way next thing, you know You spent $50 on a free to play game like you could have just bought a AAA game from GameStop for that same amount of money like what are you doing and But that's how they do it and that's the part where I think I really struggle is it's the predatory nature of it all they they feed on The I need to clear that notification and no thing that pisses me off the most about this one Isn't so much that it's just that they literally make it part sometimes of your quest line to advance You have to click on it and that is a hey We've got you know this battle pass version You're on this battle pass version like and you have to actually interact and click on those things which to me again Is just so predatory. It's just really Unnecessary it's like just make a good game and people will want to support you that like to me That's the way I look at it if you're not making a good game, which I don't think the Diablo immortal is a bad game It's a mobile version of Diablo 3, which is fine. There's a market for that, but you don't need to Crush your your new player base under this But what do I know they made out $800,000 in the first 24 hours So obviously they know what the fuck they're doing is just pissing off us old guys who hate that shit and just want games to Be games instead of fucking money-making machines. Yep bothers the shit out of me. Yeah, I just got repissed off all over There's an aspect to it that I kind of wish it would go back to the old mobile Ecosystem, which was you can play the game for free But there's ads and micros and all these things or you pay $5 and then we remove that stuff out of your face Sure, I would pay $5 to remove all that stuff out of my face in this game. Yeah, right 100% yeah, right I would give them my $5 just to say make it go away Even if it's still in the game make it go away and then if I'm interested I will seek it out I will go find the thing that I'm looking that you want me to buy, right? I would do that in a second because I've enjoyed the game thus far, but that is that is the thing that gets and it's it's The constant reminder of No, I'm not going to spend money, right? If I've developed the hard wall of I'm not gonna spend money on this game, right? It's the constant repissed off of stop asking me to spend my money Yeah, let me get a toggle that says do not ask me again. Do whatever it is, right? Like I realized that makes them less money so they would never do that but that's a constant Cycle back and forth back and forth back and forth And to go back to what mangas was saying the mobile UI thing. Oh, this is me off beyond all reasons because The the work is already done, right? You develop the UI Mobile or not, right? You develop the UI so the functionality of the of Icon goes here a health bar goes here item drop goes here whatever what a quest menu all that stuff already exists All that logic exists. All you need to do is reskin it for the PC market And which is the easiest thing you could probably do in the in the vast majority of the development cycle and you didn't even do that and that I have no forgiveness for at all that like that is Pure laziness, especially from Blizzard, right? If this was some Indie company that then came out with a mobile game They also simul released on PC and then they immediately said like hey, we're working on it a PC UI Please be patient with us. I'd be I'd be a little more forgiving. Sure. This is Blizzard Blizzard Absolutely has the people to develop a PC UI and Make it more accessible that way and they just chose not to right I mean it's not like they didn't even know that people wanted to play this game on PC Literally on their announcement, you know when the whole do you guys even have phones came out? The first few questions were all about PC like wait Do you not have plans to make this for PC? So they knew that the market was there and they were Realistically, especially with things how have they changed for Blizzard? They were gonna have to do something to try and get as many people playing this game Otherwise it would be a failure. I Yeah, I can't stand the UI the UI just looks garbage And this is the thing so I went into my my wife's computer to You know mess with it and see if I could her UI looks totally different than mine Some of her aspect like a way more blown up and so there I don't think they're even consistent against across different You know PCs and different Monitors I think it the native because she's on it. I don't know what all this stuff But anyway, it doesn't matter it look way worse on her her computer than it did on mine And I was like what the heck and I tried to go into the settings and see if we get nothing Dude, I don't understand how they don't have They did it for the mini map, you know like hey make this smaller make this bigger Whatever even if it's still the the UI version that's given to you from mobile if I could just make it a little bigger Or make it a little bit smaller that that alone would be good like the quest thing Dude, it constantly is just like if you have more than two quests it gets cut off or the text message is a little bit long It gets cut off. You can't always tell which quest you're even actually doing and which one's part of it. It's Just like size 36 point font. Yeah, it's just unnecessary. It's so bad having a slider I would take a slider and call this anything percent right where it's at currently 50 percent. Yeah Let me slide it down to zero Yeah, even smaller than that and the UI wouldn't bother me as much But the fact that it takes up honestly I should I should have done the pixel measurements before this but I would I would wager a guess it probably takes 40% of your screen up with just their UI and that's that's too much in 2022 That is far far far too much exactly at this point in gaming development There's no excuse, especially again from a triple-a company like you know like Blizzard is So frustrated you were talking about accessibility, but I want to talk about a different type of accessibility Like back in the 2000s This was a big thing with the Blizzard in particular with water warcraft was player accessibility should all players Be able to have access to all parts of the game because the big part of water warcraft was in order to access Some of the late game stuff you had to have like a 40 man raid not everybody can put together a 40 man raid And that that sort of thing so Blizzard Decided that they wanted to make their game Entirely accessible to all players so that you have stuff like LFG looking for raid or LFR looking for raid whatever so every But it may be a slightly dumbed-down version of the in-game in-game content But everybody was able to access every part of the game that Blizzard made with World of Warcraft They've swung around now to where they've blocked Accessibility to certain features of their game behind money now not skill Not not your social graces of being able to put a team together But behind how much money you make and you're in how much disposable income you have that is bullshit And I fucking hate it. I mean I guess it's just legendary gems and gear and stuff but still if anything is Available to players who pay versus the players who don't pay, you know Sell cosmetics do something. I don't I really don't know. I just think it's so shitty that they've gated Content behind how much disposable income you have Mm-hmm. Yeah, and it's content that people that don't have that disposable income will fucking pay for anyway And then they're gonna not pay their electric bill or some shit like that I'm getting way too far in the weeds with this I think it's a valid point though. Yeah, go ahead and I've hit the point in the game right at 45 Whatever I said I was right that I'm starting to see what I believe is the base of the mountain Right where it's I'm not a hundred percent certain that that's what it is But I'm at the point where the main storyline quest says that I need to be higher level It literally just tells me you need to be level 46 to do the next main storyline quest I've had that happen to me three times where I wasn't high enough level, but I've been doing all the side quests I can do I've been doing all of the Like little dungeons that they have I've done all of those things multiple times over even Probably above the skill level that I should be doing them at because I'm playing them slow and trying to get through that by myself Right, so I'm theoretically ahead of where I should be on the curve And it's still telling me that I'm not high enough level to continue with the main story quest On top of that the daily quest that you can get like on the bounty board Those are not tied to your progression in the main story quest. Those are daily resets You can do eight of those a day and that's it So you hit those eight great now What are you going to go do for your level? so you have to either go out and grind in the area that you were last in and Who knows how long that's going to take? You know to get to that next level so you can continue the main story quest or you have to go do dungeons 500 times over again or you know what you could pay money you can get the XP boosts You can get the the and so this is like I said I think I'm starting to see the base of the mountain right where it's it's at the point where I can say Either oh, I've done my dailies put it away for the day, right? And then I'll come back tomorrow do my dailies and maybe five days from now I'll get high enough level to go do the next story quest Or I can pay the 99 cents to get an XP boost go do a single dungeon and then I can continue with the main story quest now It's just 99 cents. Shelly. It's not even a dollar 99 cents. Don't you guys have phone? But but that's so I'm starting to see that and like for me I've kind of gone into this with the like I am not spending money on this game Right the most and I mean the most I would spend is I would buy the battle pass if I complete it first And if I plan on continuing the game after the fact Right, so it's and it that's it that'd be $5 and I'm done and that's the most I'm not gonna buy these 800% value 99 cent packs weirdness that they're trying to push on me I'm not gonna buy levels. I'm not gonna buy any of that kind of stuff, right? But The fact that at level 40, they're already what I feel the gates start closing down on me Mm-hmm, right where it's and so I'll be the guy that like, okay. I've done my eight daily quest today I did my challenge run. All right, I'll put the game down. I'll come back tomorrow like If I'm gonna continue playing playing the game because I'm not spending the 99 cents every time they level gate me like this To try and push through it Yeah, I have no problem spending money on games Like Paragon find example. I got into Paragon for free via the beta I love that game so goddamn much that I bought the $90 found founders pack just to support Epic games in their production of Paragon. Um, here's the storm another example I've bought skins and mounts in in that game Not particularly because I wanted the mount. I mean, I did want the skin or I did want the mount But it was mainly because I had zero problem Giving them money for here's of the storm because I enjoyed here's of the storm so much I don't think there's anything as enjoyable enough about Diablo immortal for me to ever spend money on it No, I think really what this is preying on and And I know this is good and get thrown around too is it's not just pay to win It's gamble to win and I think that that's why it's going to be successful Is it's going to itch those people who are in this space? Especially the mobile gamers who are used to this kind of content there. It's a gamble like oh, I have a chance It's not even I'm paying cuz like that's the thing if they were just like Oh, if you can spend $10 and we're gonna give you this legendary sword Some people would buy it absolutely, but it's the it's the idea that it's a chance Oh, you can get all these blue or purple items and then there's a chance at that legendary one And that chance is what you're paying for or you can increase the chance for that legendary because that's and that's what these are Praying for and I hate that. I hate predatory You know mechanics and games and I think it feels skeezy again I agree if we if the game is good, I don't mind supporting it like that's just the truth I've played lots of free-to-play games and sometimes it's just like you know what let me throw the devs some money like there's this is a good game I want to support them. I mean like I said with riot right at one point was a relatively small Company I didn't mind supporting them because I enjoyed their game. I thought that they did the game well I know a lot of people who do a path of exile. They spend a decent amount of money on that I don't think there's like really hardcore pay-to-win things in there I know most of it's cosmetic and you can get into our arguments about whether cosmetics are pay-to-win and in certain types of games But like I think the most pay-to-win they have for PoE is like the slots you can buy extra slots for your Or for your stash or something like that, which you maybe is pay-to-win I just the fact that you even have to have a conversation on whether or not like you have the dev putting out on Twitter and doing Reddit posts about it defending their version of a microtransaction Store and how it's not pay-to-win because you're not buying gear directly No, you're buying the gem that enhances your gear or you're buying the the the gem That allows you to go into a raid or dungeon and then get increased chances of getting the gear And so it's it's still pay-to-win, but you're gambling for that win instead of just paying for it right out And and I hate it. I hate that skeeziness. I hate that's where we are getting to in this gaming industry Where you know a company like Blizzard is looking for any way to maximize profit margins And I to be honest and this is me not trying to sound xenophobic But I don't think that they're even worried about North American audience for that I think that they're looking for you know the the eastern countries that are going to be really facilitating that because it's a lot More acceptable in those regions like you know China and Korea to name two that pay-to-win or paid for Access pay-to speed up or whatever is fully understood I mean and and you can see it in a lot of the games that come out of those regions and It's a massive massive market, especially in China. I have bad news for you. Oh, okay Is it all 100,000 is all in a 55% of it was the United States alone. Oh, Jesus Okay, well, I don't know what I'm talking about Actually surprises me you know what kind of shocks me is Blizzard engaging in something like this when their ethics are already heavily in question Money and the thing to it Hurt of stone is also pay-to-win. It's pay-to-win is fine But it doesn't seem as egregious because it's a trading card game and that's how Actual physical trading card games work you go out and buy a pack of cards You have no idea what's inside that pack of cards and you open them up So it doesn't seem as bad in her throne for some reason, but um Got a Diablo where it's they're taking that sort of Approach and then adding it into a game like Diablo and making Diablo pay-to-win. I Mean they tried out with Diablo 3 right with the with the real money auction house and if I can that shit did not work out and They brought it back for this one. Isn't there a real money auction house and Diablo immortal immoral? I think so. Yeah, that's what everybody's gonna be calling it Well, and I think there's like so part of the and there's other creators that have put out lots of videos about this already Like Belly or I think did a really really good job of like, you know going and doing some deep dives on it and we were talking about it earlier today about like the Estimated amount that you would need to spend to fully maximize is in the hundreds of thousands arranged so like hundred ten thousand hundred twenty thousand dollars If you're not looking to use any monetary then if you're gonna play the game Let's say like how jelly is like you get to a point you do your dailies Whatever you take your percentage chances you're free to play could take you theoretically up to like ten years to be able to get Access to the to the final stuff I will say with it with a caveat to this right as much as these things are more annoying And I don't want to support them. They are really only going to impact your average player in PVP So if you're not looking to play PVP necessarily, you're probably not going to Feel necessarily like you're missing out on any power I think you'll get to a point and any end game where you're able to do most of the stuff And you just get to a point where you just stop playing because you've beaten the game quote-unquote But if you're looking to PVP and you go up against, you know, what they switched it from whales to Krakens now because that's how much They're spending so they're no longer just whales. Yeah, so if you go up against a guy who just spent, you know $5,000 to maximize, you know his opportunities and you're playing in PVP you can just get pooped on it's gonna be It's gonna feel shitty, but they won't care and what they're gonna do is bank on the you know Like clash Royale or clash of clans. Oh if I need to spend $10 so I can compete with that guy I need to throw my wallet at the problem. They won't blame Blizzard They're gonna pull they're gonna blame the fact that they didn't spend enough money And that's how these games continue to take advantage of people is that's the mindset they get into I wouldn't be surprised to see some sort of PVP objective as part of the main quest line to oh my god So you have to go in a PVP at least once I'm sure they will. Yeah, and you'll just get I haven't gotten to it yet, but I think I've on the cusp of yeah getting it And another thing that I thought of is there are eight-man raids in Diablo immortal You discover them through part of the main story quest Right, and then you can't you do like a mini version of one by yourself And then it says like okay you want to do the next one you got to do full eight-man raid and you have to be at the 420 gear score in order to go into the raid at all. You can't even like try to do it lower When they introduced that to you you're about 320 to 350 in gear score and that next that next hundred I mean I'm at 410 I think right now Gear score and that but that was that was a good lid of a grind like it was not It wasn't like a cup two hours later, and I was like oh there we go I'm really close to like being able to get the thing or being able to go do this eight-man raid It's it's a bit of a challenge. You have to go out there You have to do I mean story quest you have to do all the dailies you have to do the challenge runs You have to do all of these things and that's still four or five hours of Playtime to get to the 410 mark. I'm not even at the 420 mark yet I'm not even at the point where I can do that and then you have to have seven other people you can do it with or LFR basically Into a random group and hope that they don't flame you for being exactly 420 when you go into this raid because I'm sure people are Going to be higher sure right and it's another it's another place where it's like well. I really want to do that raid Should I just spend the dollar or should I just spend the five dollars to? It's fucking it helps to help myself to get that gear score a little bit faster to go do the raid It's fucking insidious. I hate it. Yeah, I Mean like there's a part of me like it so I'm a World of Warcraft player back in the day Like I started in vanilla and went all the way up and I think I stopped the first time In Cataclysm so when Cataclysm was about to come out. I was like, okay I don't want to play this game anymore and And I've come back a few times because it's just it's wow. It's like nostalgic for me And there's the every every cinematic makes me go like ooh, I could come back I could come play, you know, and but I just I don't mind that they're being like an end game quote-unquote Grind like I don't mind you like you need to like do you know Five or six dungeons consistently to get the gear that you need to be able to move to the raid And then you need to do that raid enough times to get the gear to go to the next version of the raid I don't necessarily mind that that I think that's an end game progression That's pretty common in most, you know RPGs or MMORPGs. So that part into itself is not an issue It's when you feel like you're being artificially held back where like I know and wow it was like this And I think it's it's gonna show itself in Diablo is that you can only do so much in one day And then your progression to play is is is therefore stopped So you're not going to be able to do if I could just like if I'm the of the mindset I'm gonna just run this one dungeon 50 times and gear up and level up and then I'll be fine to go into the raid Then people will do that the thing that's gonna stop them is I get I feel like it's gonna happen It's like oh no you only get the six runs and if you don't get all this stuff If you're not lucky enough to get it in those six Well, then you got to come back tomorrow and then you can only do six and then you got to come back tomorrow Or or you can spend a dollar you can spend five dollars and we'll reset that for you And you can do another run and and that's where I feel like it's going to because they did it for a while Or you could only do so much in your dailies to be able to start unlocking flying for example like you have to do a Reputation grind but you can't just go and grind it you can only do so much in a day because there's only so many dailies And I fucking hate that I hate a game that's stopping me from playing your fucking game like why would you I just don't understand it And it's exactly for those things those predatory reasons to time gate players So they keep coming back day after day, you know what if you make your game good I'm gonna come back like that and that's the part that gets me It's like these they make these games almost lazier on purpose so that you have to come back each time I mean you just get enough or you want to play but you can't play it the amount that you want to play You can't know life it and get farther. Well, there's a currency called hilts Which is the hilts that you get naturally by doing quests and doing dailies and all those things You can spend the hilts on some of the premium Aspects of it right so in the challenge runs they have little crests that you can get they have basic crests And they have legendary crests legendary crests give you better rewards more rewards when you do the challenge run You can use your hilts to buy a legendary crest to so great. That's fine. That's that's something I can earn in game Pay for in game with no real money. That's fine. You can only do that once a week I get one legendary crest a week Because I refuse to spend money on the game right I have another one I don't remember what the actual thing was you spend the hilts on it's once a month It straight up says monthly purchase and then it's zero out of one after you do it And that's it you you get one for the month and then next month you have to come back and buy it again if you wanted to Get it without paying any real money. So I guess I knew I'm fully in the in the main goose camp at this point As much as I actually think that the the game is fun to play This is the part like I like the parts that I like, right? I like Diablo. I like the lore I like the voiceovers. I like the graphics. I like all of those things But I think I'm just to the point where I'm so pissed off with these these companies doing this kind of shit That I'm just like, you know what? I don't want them to get me as an active user I'm they weren't gonna get my money in the first place, but right now. I'm giving them a metric, right? Hey, there's this and I know I'm one of at this point millions But I'm wondering if I mean if enough people say you know what enough is enough this type of shit is done There's not enough whales or crack-ins to keep the game alive It's the people that are still logging in every day and spending just a little bit or not spending anything at all But still adding to those numbers that generate their ability to make this a successful launch a successful game I think I'm gonna uninstall it actually and the more that we've talked about this the more pissed off I've gotten about this kind of shit and I'm just No blizzard has been burning my bridge for a long time like and that sucks because they're one of my staple games I remember the first time I downloaded warcraft like old warcraft the RTS like I I'd love that game jobs done One of my favorite things dude. I loved it and you know, and I played all of them I played warcraft one two or three and then I played starcraft. I played Diablo one two three I Don't know I don't know what we else we can do. I mean making content like this I know a lot of the big creators are out there making their content about it and trying to do it But at the end of the day the masses need to stand up and say we're not doing this We're not supporting these types of games blizzard. You need to do better. You know EA you need to do better You know bungee you need to do better like because otherwise It's just going to keep being catered to this specific style and we're gonna get outrunned We're gonna be there. Nope. This is how games are now It started with like games like Genshin impact making the mainstream Another one now lost Ark hitting the mainstream and you saw some of those Transactions showing up in other types of games. Maybe not to the same level that they are right now But they're definitely in in a lot of the games lost world had a few that were like, that's a little questionable You know what I mean? Like there's our new world not lost world new world has a few of those like Questionable eyebrow eyebrow raises that they eventually pulled out when they got the backlash. I don't know man I know I'm rambling at this point. I'm just pissed. I mean that's so we When we were downloading it yesterday morning We all got on and then Viking your wife was also with us. Yeah, and I When I was first downloading it was before we got in a call together I remember it like going to download the game. It's like you need battle net and I was pissed Yeah, I uninstalled battle net Years ago and never thought back never once was like maybe I download one of these games Nope never went back to it and then this was the thing that made me download battle net again I was already pissed off Downloading battle net was enough and then we got on a call yesterday and your wife said the same thing like yeah Like oh I have to download battle net and I was like yep like Like that was that the fact that blizzard has sullied it so far that just downloading their launcher makes people upset Like that's that's a whole other level blizzard used to make games for gamers now They make money from everyone. Yeah, that's Just what it is and they're not even doing blizzcon, so they don't even have to spend money anymore They're tired of being booed at their own conference. Let's just be honest. Don't you guys have phones? Short guy gonna do oh God It's overwatch too good It's what now overwatch one with one less person. Oh really who'd they take out? They instead of six person teams. It's five person. Oh fiber. I thought you said that I thought we took out a character I know they renamed McCree right because he was one of the guys the developers that was in that whole scandal So they changed his name to something else. I don't know what they changed it to probably Scott or something like that His name is Cole Cassidy. Oh, yeah, that's a whole Cassidy. Yeah, that's a name I Know honestly, I don't have any more. I'm pissed. I just got more pissed than I was Thank you guys for making me angry. Luckily. I've been drinking this whole time. So I'm happy from that Do you guys have any a final? Thoughts have you changed your mind jelly it at all You still recommend are you still a thumbs up on this one? Or have you come to the thumbs down gang like me and mangoes? I think it's one of those if you want to try it try it like I said, it's free. Yeah Just go into it and kind of have a thought process going in which I think is what I did of like I'm not spending money. I'm just not doing it, right? No, it's of getting pinged all the time from it. Fine, right? But just stick to your guns. Don't spend the money when you hit that Mount Everest point Have no problem just being like and that's it. It was fun while it lasted. I'm out That's kind of where I was at with Lost Ark Really enjoyed the game. I hit the Everest point and went okay like I got I got my enjoyment out of it It was free to play even though I paid for the the early access right, but but I got my enjoyment out of it I'm good. I'm happy to step away now and move on to something else that isn't going to scout me for my money at every moment Maybe so you double thumbs down now. Are you are you still the single thumb? I'm still the same same thumbs down as ever There's plenty of other a RPGs cheese out there that you can play and I suggest you play them instead of even fucking with the Immortal but yeah, I don't know that is that going to close it out. Does anybody have any final statements before we sign off here? I think I'm the part that pisses me off. It's like when you talk to your kids. I'm not angry I'm just disappointed but it's both to be honest. I am disappointed and angry man Like I just like I'm just because the part of the game that is good is good, right? Like I love Diablo. I love the lore. We talked about that the voiceovers I think for a mobile game coming to PC They can absolutely make some changes and if that was the only thing that we had to gripe about I feel like hey Do you know what thumbs up? Let's go like that's it But it's all the other shit that really just taints it and makes it gross and and I just I just hate that so Yeah, that's all I have for my final thoughts. I just it just disappoints me Because it's out on PC I want the PC modding community to come up with a mod that removes all the micro transaction I think that's even possible that theoretically it's semi possible I would leave it up to the money modding community at that point, but I would love love to see that so I task any of you modders out there Well, that's gonna close the book on Diablo immoral but If you guys have any other beta games that you want us to try out Just let us know in the comments below But that's gonna wrap it up for this week if you want to check out jelly knees I'll have his twitch and YouTube linked in the video description below as well as the Viking Jedi His twitch in YouTube even though he hasn't really touched him in a while We'll be like you'll find me here more You'll find me here more than you'll probably find me on my channels at this point Just hit that like and subscribe for Mingus But for now, this is the beta male side it up you guys have a good one Fuck I didn't hit start recording man Special shout out to channel members. I bloodhunter jelly knees meow mix for men stunt Raven and Blastoise king