Lawsuits, departures, and editsĪ sweeping lawsuit filed by a California state agency exploded in late July, naming names and describing a toxic 'frat boy' culture throughout Blizzard. Still, as a mega-fan of the original Diablo II, I remained hopeful-until about two months ago, when the above list of missteps was eclipsed by even grimmer developments.

So long-time Blizzard fans like myself are understandably skeptical that Diablo II: Resurrected might see the company return to form. Worse, since WC3R's launch, months of agonizing silence about any updates and promised features have spoken volumes about Blizzard's apparent lack of plans for the game. Months later, Blizzard shipped WarCraft III: Reforged, which did not meet the publisher's usual standards (especially because WC3R wiped out the previous functioning game in favor of a broken, feature-incomplete client). In late 2019, the decades-old game developer capitulated to the Chinese government over pro-Hong Kong statements made by esports players (though thankfully, the decision was reversed soon after). In the years after Diablo's early '00s heyday, its creators at Blizzard racked up some infamy.

(Should you not need the refresher on Activision Blizzard's recent woes, skip to the section titled 'Delivering good work in a bad era' and start there.) We have to hash some other stuff out first, and I appreciate your patience with this, because no review of Diablo II: Resurrected (now live for $40 on PC, Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo Switch) is complete without an explainer like this at the outset. Where do I even start with Diablo II: Resurrected? Unfortunately for its creators at Blizzard and developers at Vicarious Visions, the answer isn't 'the game.' Original cutscene, upscaled using machine learning.

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