Diablo IV Interview’s Questions From ‘Fans’ Are Very Questionable

Last week a video was released featuring two senior developers working on Diablo IV: Associate Game Director Joseph Piepiora and Art Director John Mueller. In the clip the pair were presented with a series of questions from “fans”, which they answer at length, but it didn’t take long for some digging to find that the questions were…oddly specific.

Here’s the video, posted on the Future Games Show channel, and made I guess to promote both the game and the event, which is an annual showcase for the British media publisher, and in particular its video game site GamesRadar:

Philtacular was watching and was among those who thought the questions were a little weird, though, and with the Future Game Show so helpfully providing each question-asker’s social media information, they looked up each one.

Uh oh, only 1 tweet, 13 years ago 🤔 pic.twitter.com/FV1Jv1Sic1

That’s not a one-off, though! There are loads of these!

Uh oh, looks like that account was literally created TODAY after someone on twitch found out it was made by an account that never existed pic.twitter.com/BFkH2kfedr

I won’t keep pasting them, but there are accounts from other sites too, like Reddit, which also have zero trace of ever having actually asked those questions. This has of course led to allegations that the questions were fabricated, a ruse that could at least partially be explained by the fact the FGS asked for community questions for a Diablo IV interview back on May 13 and…didn’t receive a single reply.

We're sitting down with Diablo IV developers next week to answer community questions!

Reply with YOUR questions for the devs….

#DiabloIV pic.twitter.com/LTRJBRPR5Z

I asked both the FGS and Blizzard for comment, and Blizzard has responded, telling Kotaku “Blizzard was not involved in the process of gathering questions”. A community rep also posted about the video in the Diablo subreddit, saying “this was an interview Joe and John did on a EU press tour last week with numerous outlets. [These] interview questions came from the media outlet and we just answer them. The team is following up with the outlet to ask where the questions came from.”

If the questions were indeed made up, this is simply the funniest example possible of the pointlessness in putting these forgettable pre-release promos together; what was so immovable about this arrangement that, having apparently received zero actual questions, some shit was seemingly made up rather than, I dunno, getting staff at GamesRadar — a video game website putting the event together — to ask some questions instead? Why bother? It’s such a dumb scandal over something nobody would have cared about otherwise!

Cinco de Mayo: These are, we kid you not, actual questions people ask about the holiday

By Brandon Griggs, CNN

You know the old saying, “There’s no such thing as a stupid question?”

Turns out, there is.

And when it comes to Cinco de Mayo — the annual fiesta that gives Americans an excuse to load up on tacos and margaritas — people ask a LOT of them.

These are actual questions people asked on Google and other search engines about the Mexican holiday, which is a bigger deal in the US than it is in Mexico.

Cinco = 5. de Mayo = of May. So, May 5.

Cinco de Mayo.

On Cinco de Mayo.

*Sigh. On Cinco de Mayo.

We’ve been through this already.

There was no Cinco de Mayo war.

The holiday celebrates Mexico’s victory over France in the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862. It was a relatively minor battle — the French reclaimed Puebla a year later — but a symbolic one because a small Mexican army defeated a larger occupying force. By 1867, Mexican troops had driven France from the country.

Many Americans assume Cinco de Mayo is Mexico’s Independence Day. It’s not. That holiday falls on September 16 and commemorates the Grito de Dolores, a priest’s ringing of a church bell in the town of Dolores in 1810 that triggered Mexico’s War of Independence from Spain.

It’s not a federal holiday, although the day is celebrated in the Mexican state of Puebla with parades and fireworks. In the US, the day has become a marketing tool for restaurants, bars, beer companies and makers of tequila.

No. Día de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead, is a three-day holiday in which families across Mexico gather to remember deceased friends and family members. It’s usually held from October 31 to November 2.

No. But you should avoid wearing items that reinforce Mexican cultural stereotypes, such as sombreros and fake mustaches.

Wherever you want it to be! If your party game is strong, Cinco de Mayo could even be a state of mind.

And our absolute favorite question …

We give up.

This previously published story was updated in 2023.

The-CNN-Wire™ & © 2023 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.

Cinco de Mayo: These are, we kid you not, actual questions people ask about the holiday