Despite only being out in early access for a few days, Diablo 4 is already the talk of the gaming industry for a plethora of reasons, from its great marketing strategy to how important betas can be for a successful launch. The core gameplay loop is simultaneously quite different from what the series has known for all this time and something new entirely, with Diablo 4's classes being all quite unique and fulfilling specific power fantasies. Yet, there is a game-changing feature that the game capitalizes on that should be talked about more, and it has to do with the way Diablo 4 uses in-game emotes.
For starters, Diablo 4 is not necessarily a multiplayer game if players want to travel through Sanctuary and fight its demons alone, and even then, emotes only do so much in a game of this scale. They remain an important social aspect of the game's life, but Diablo 4's emotes are actually much more than they let on at first glance, and this can be discovered as early as the Raising Spirits quest immediately after players first reach Kyovashad. The in-game emote wheel can be used to complete quests, such as Diablo 4's Secret of the Spring, and it can also provide players with powerful boons when encountering a Faded Plaque.
Faded Plaques and Quests Make Diablo 4's Emotes Very Rewarding
Faded Plaques in Diablo 4 are statues with inscriptions that include a keyword or two highlighted over the rest to indicate the action players need to perform in order to obtain that specific Faded Plaque's temporary buff. Since the gameplay experience is primarily focused on storytelling, buildcrafting, and fighting hordes of monsters in the open world or in Dungeons, it would seem counterintuitive to stop and take a deeper look at the emote wheel in Diablo 4. Yet, it's an instrumental part of the game that cleverly breaks away from the bloodshed.
There are several quests in the game that will ask players to use emotes in some shape or form, and given Diablo 4's ARPG drive, Blizzard found the best way to make anything that's not tied to combat not as invasive. The emote wheel can be opened with the click of a button, and then selecting the emote from there is even easier. Players will have to be wary that some quests and Faded Plaques will require more emotes than the emote wheel can handle, though, so it's likely that they will have to go in and change things up from time to time.
Diablo 4's Dungeons too make great use of the emote wheel, with the "Leave Dungeon" emote being key in letting players go back to the open world as fast as possible - something that is even being abused in bugged instances where multiple Elite enemies spawn. Then, on some rare occasions, players may run into a Faded Plaque that will bless them with a boon called Reward Virtuous that will make gold rain out of every enemy killed for a short duration, literally turning emotes into a gold mine.
These are all great ways to keep Diablo 4's gameplay refreshing and rewarding at all times, and with the emote wheel being such a commonly used feature, players are more likely to employ it whenever they run into other adventurers or form parties to tackle Sanctuary's horrors. Either way, when emotes are involved in quests or Faded Plaques, Diablo 4 players can rest assured that they will get something out of their time, all while doing something as simple as a button press.
Diablo 4 launches on June 6 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.
