[The Australian Ads Standards Community was forced to respond to a flood of complaints about billboards in Melbourne. The Australian Ads Standards Community dismissed the complaints out of hand, but Josh Taylor, a reporter for The Guardian Australia, tweeted:

One concerned motorist filed a complaint on the grounds that the billboard was "promoting an evil and demonic tool for religious reasons." The full incident report is like stepping back in time to a time when Dungeons & Dragons was shrouded in Satanic panic.

"The words [Welcome to Hell, Melbourne] and pictures of demons that are part of the game's advertising are offensive to me as a Christian. Also, the images are inappropriate for my children to see and have already given them nightmares."

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"I feel it is inappropriate to display such disgusting and disturbing content on a billboard that children see on a daily basis. It had no context and was unsettling to a 43 year old adult."

One complaint cited the Covid-19 pandemic as the reason for the upset: "Even as an adult, it brought back memories of two years of confinement hell in Melbourne.

The billboards are stunningly tasteless, with a character who spends most of Diablo 4's storyline killing, doing the devilish act of just standing there menacingly. Those with pride in Melbourne might resent their city being likened to hell, but a hilariously dry advertiser response clears that up:

"'Welcome to hell' is a gameplay visit to defeat the fictional villain depicted in the advertisement as part of the gameplay of the It refers to a fictional place.

So in this case, what Blizzard's advertising department means is the Hell of Diablo 4, perhaps the endgame torment so severe that players begin to worship rats, or more likely, a molten landscape filled with twisted corpses. This should be a relief to drivers who worry about being transported to hell by billboards.

With regard to giving children nightmares, the advertiser's response is this: "The complaint states that the ad was viewed on a highway billboard. The average person driving a car on the highway is likely above the target age for the game." This offers a very sensible perspective that children should not drive, and if you are dreaming of Lilith as an adult, it is probably not Blizzard's fault.

It is appropriate that some of Blizzard's 1980s-esque tactics, such as putting Megan Fox in a corset, have generated a 1980s-esque reaction, a hand-wringing over a harmless billboard. That said, this is the first case report of any kind I've enjoyed reading, and I'm glad I did.