Still getting disonnects, but they don't seem to be as bad as before. Anyway, played some more of Act III, random thoughts:
-The atmosphere and design of Mount Cievo is gorgeous. Like, really, really, gorgeous. Gorgeous, as in, "why yes, that IS lava everywhere, and skulls carved into cliffaces, and basically every nasty thing you can think of," but yes, gorgeous.
-Lorath: "Baal is behind every war in human history."
Me: Bullfucking shit.
Yeah, the writers had a derp moment there - Lorath even contradicts that line in Book of Lorath. I get that the Primes are responsible for a lot of shit on Sanctuary, but not by that much, there's clearly been wars that have stemmed entirely from human hands.
-So, go through Mount Cievo, where you have to get a blessing from one statue of each Prime Evil. First, it's nice (in a horrific way) to see the Triune back, to have the mask removed (so to speak) from their Sin War incarnation. Second, I've commented on the details of Mount Cievo, it's a clever aesthetic reversal from places like the Cathedral of Light and Alabaster cathedral. It's kind of let down by the isometric perspective, given how your character reacts adversely to each blessing, but take what you can get I guess.
-So, the Bloodied Wolf turns out to be Mephisto. Granted, that was a twist that was spoiled for me ages ago, and even before release, many were guessing (myself included) that he was Mephy, or at least, related to him. The reveal is actually low key, since the Wanderer identifies the wolf as Mephy, and Mephy doesn't deny it. Since we've met the wolf in Act I, but the acts can be played in any order, I'm assuming the dialogue would change in both cases, but can't comment if this is true or not. That being said, treating it as a reveal...I don't think the reveal itself is actually impressive, but it's what comes after that makes it work from a character, if not plot perspective. Mephisto doesn't deny, points out (correctly) that he's never harmed the Wanderer, that Lilith is the more immediate threat, that he's already saved them (twice, if you're keeping count). I know that the Prime Evils are, by their nature, relatively simple figures in terms of character, but as best as you could categorize Mephisto, this absolutely fits him. Calm, collected, willing to play all sides. The Wanderer has no reason to trust him, but they're forced to play Mephisto's game.
-Getting into the vision sequence here, where the player has to fight through a dreamscape of Sescheron, again, this is really well done. Considering what happened in Sescheron in Diablo II, considering how we play through its ruins in Immortal and III, this could have worn out its welcome, but here, it works. Partly because it's deeply uneasy (for me) to kill Barbarians, even if they're just dream simulacrums. Partly because of Mephisto's explanation - that this is Baal's memory, but because things are out of whack at Cievo because of Elias, Mephisto is living Baal's memories instead, and loving them. Because, y'know, there's nothing a demon likes more than setting slaughter. And like the Tristram dreamscape, look into the background, the entire landscape twisted by Hell...yeah. In the scope of this game, when it comes to Mephy's dreamscales, Tristram did it first, Sescheron did it better.
-Fought my way through Mount Cievo, then we get to a cutscene that makes me wish I had the graphics pack installed, because the blood of Elias's intended sacrifice is terribly rendered. That Elias is effectively immortal didn't surprise me (again, spoiled for me), but it plays out so awkwardly, it's like he has teleporation given how Lorath looks away from his body for one second, and the next, he's gone. Also, the Brol boss fight is...okay, but nothing special, nor is Brol as a character.
-So Taissa and Lorath head to Kehjistan on the other side of the map. One of those weird game contrivances where a cutscene ends, and NPCs have effectively teleported to where the story demands that they be.
-Deciding to take a detour, headed to the west coast of the Dry Steppes. One of the side quests involved what's effectively a scavenger hunt, finding one relic after another, to find the place where the Crusaders sailed across the Twin Seas to the western continent. Okay, and? First, the Crusaders' departure wasn't exactly advertised in the lore, so I'm not sure who was farewelling them. Second, it doesn't really provide enough rewards (from a story/lore perspective) to really justify it. Which is a shame, because there's another side quest where you need to follow the ghosts of those caught up in the Zakarum Crusade centuries ago, that works much better on a narrative level.
-Also, not sure why an entire section of beach is just burnt. There's a demon that you can kill here that turns into a man (who's apparently unhappy about the whole demon-slaying thing) that respawns, but no context is given. Maybe there's a side quest there, dunno.
-Heading back east from the beach, I got to Alzuurda. Now, I don't know if this was intentional or a gimp, but you can meet a friendly guard at the town entrance who wants you to kill undead because he wants a quiet shift. By itself, this side quest isn't worth mentioning, apart from his comments that the Zakarum Crusade probably created more undead than removed them (the implication being that while they were killing undead, they were also killing so many innocent people that the undead grew in number as a net increase). However, the reason I bring this up is that as perky as the guard is, Alzuurda itself is fucked up.
-First, there's nothing explicit about it, but there's the sense that something's just plain wrong in this town. The soil itself seems stained with blood, but not overtly - if you're not looking carefully, you might write it off as the soil's natural colour. Second, it's right by the Fields of Hatred, so a priest who gives the lowdown says "hey, hatred is bad, dontcha know?" Third, I don't think the people do know, or if they do, they have to live with it. For instance, there's a pile of corpses just sitting in the town attracting flies (the implication being that they're those who fell in the Hatred fields), and the description reads that while any items of value have been stripped, people still need to pay coin to retrieve the corpses of their loved ones. Yeah...
That's where I had to stop playing. I don't have much interest in the Fields since I'm not really into PvP modes in this genre, but overall, game is still mostly solid.
