But there are lots of moments that break through the bleak coat of paint. Often indoors you'll see shafts of light illuminating certain areas from windows or what have you, there are some fantastic sunsets that paint buildings and fields with lovely tones, and many of the costumes, setpiece areas for unique encounters, and that kind of thing stand out from the rest. I love those moments... but the bleakness is what gives them more power than they might otherwise have. A pretty little tavern full of happy drunkards is dime-a-dozen stuff in a game like Fable, but in The Witcher it's a refreshingly bright bastion in a long expanse of darker stuff, because you don't see trees with blossoming flowers every time you turn around, and the sky gets overcast a lot, and you see the filth on the streets and the dead from the plague. Even in areas where things are nicer, you get the social problems to cast a nice shadow over the more pleasant-looking architecture, you work the story to bring those dark fantasy elements flooding back when the player least expects it. The game isn't a cartoon in any sense (other than some of the technical shortcomings which add unintentional humor, heh), and I think I'm realizing now that this is why I'm so afraid of Diablo 3's potential for being more cartoony.
Because Diablo is really a fucking cartoon. Run into huge hordes of dudes, swing away, watch them all explode and fly back in showers of blood, then go follow the totally comic-booky fantasy story and love the hell out of it. I mean, there really isn't much character drama, that much concern for people, that much that draws you into the world as a whole. And that part is totally fine being a sort of caricature, because the dark visuals back it up and make it feel like it has some real substance. But take away the bleakness, the rawness of the visuals, what with giant pools of blood full of naked rogues, or the tree where all the dead hang above the graveyard... and all you've got is the mechanical parts of the game that made it so great. Which are still great, but it's a big loss. Warhammer 40k is totally awesome, but how much would it lose if you took off that gritty, gothic, bitter, nasty edge? Even if it was still dark, it's defined by the sharpness of that edge in so many ways, it's just something that has to remain intact. I think Diablo would simply lose a lot of what made it feel more poignant within the context of its own silliness if it was to move away from the sheer decadence of its prior art. It needs that to help drive it, at least for me.
So maybe I just figured out why this bothers me when it doesn't seem like such a big deal. The Witcher has a ton of subtext which means the visuals could merely compliment what is an inherently deep, dramatic, emotional experience... much more isn't needed from them, even though they often do more than simply compliment something else. Diablo fundamentally lacks subtext and the ability to emotionally engage on a deeper level. It doesn't have any deep-set nuance. I don't mean to say it's ultimately shallow, because there's definitely more there than its commonly given credit for, and what's there is totally fun... and engaging, even if not emotionally. But still, take away the punchiness of it, and I think the experience as a whole is going to suffer. We have a lot of really good Diablo clones out there, but I think simple mechanics may be less of a reason why so many of them failed, and the lack of a deep, dark chain of striking imagery may be the real culprit.
