Diablo 3

[AEmer]

It's out, it's about, and I've been playing it a lot.
Is it good? I...don't know. It's definitely fun. It has a ton of fun things. But is it good?

Well, first off, it's not dark and gritty. It uh...it really isn't. A ton of things are done right, but compared to the original diablo, this game has finally traded in all pretense of being dark and gritty in favor of large-scale world building. It makes all the lore come to life, don't get me wrong...

...but it's like comparing alien and aliens. It's just not a personal dungeon experience when you know what's what.
It's a dungeon crawler where you're there to try to save the world, right from the get go.

So you know, this game, just like the 2nd game, is missing a crucial part of the hook. You're not some ordinary guy trying to fix a problem with monsters in a church, and then going through a john-mcclane esque transformation as it happens.

You're pretty much tangling with the forces of heaven and hell right off the bat, and you know it, which makes you either a thoroughly disturbed individual, or it dispells all suspension of desbelief.
In other words, the game is a damn dungeon grinder, and it's missing a relateable problem and character to make you give a damn, which makes all the adversity seem...honestly, like it's not really your story at all.

I'd go so far as to say that you'd probably care more about what's about to happen in Magicka than in Diablo 3. It's even worse than diablo 2 where people had a ton of expectations from diablo 1 and where that was basically usefull as a hook to explore the various facets of the world. By the start of diablo 2, there were all these characters people might know, townspeople, a specific town, a specific character, various pieces of lore...but diablo 2 left nothing like that behind. The closest thing was act 5, the one from the expansion, but even then, does anybody even remember the name of the blacksmith from that town?

So...it's a game set in a world that's impersonal to you, and that you don't really have a reason for caring about.

Another nuisance is that the game has a fundamentally bad interface. This was always an issue with diablo, and particularly with diablo 2: The main control mechanic is the left mouse button, but that button is overloaded with move, attack and interact. When you want to attack, that's an issue because you have to click a moving enemy on a moving screen, then you have to click somewhere else to move, then back on target to attack again, assuming you want the downtime between attacks to go into something useful like positioning your ass elsewhere.

Or you have to move, point the curser in the general direction you want to attack, hold shift and click, release shift, click to continue to move, repeat ad nauseum.

You're left with a game that sorely needs 60 fps to even _function_, and where a brilliant little mechanic that's pretty fundamental to a lot of the play is difficult to execute - and for what? So first time users have a very slightly easier time? There's even a move function in the game which isn't overloaded (though there's no attack1 function that isn't), but you can't rebind mousebutton 1 and 2, so you can't fix this.

And then there's the items. You won't care about the items, because they won't make much difference to you.

I'm up to 80% magic find on my first character. The items are sub-par in most respects, and I've chosen to "salvage" a lot of "stronger" items, because this way, I get 7 rare items every time another person might get 4...and I'm still blowing through the game like a breeze. I use the extra magical items I get to get crafting materials, or to get magic find items with better stats. At this point, I could crank out 16 rares of whatever type I desire because of how much I've salvaged. Not that it really matters, right now, I'd only care if it upped my magic find or gold find because that's better long term, but if I have to give up my crafting resources for it, it's probably not going to pay for itself. So I don't craft, because this way, I'm going to be richer by the end when I finally decide to craft.

The only system that's really interesting is the rune/power system, because you don't need the item system, and ultimately, you can't do much about the interface problem I mention, and the story isn't something to really hook you either. For higher level gaming, items will be what it's all about...but for lower level play, or the first playthrough? It just doesn't matter.

The skill system is fucking awesome though, and it's different for all characters, and even a single character can be played very differently.

Anyway, finally...there's the gameplay. How great is the gameplay?
Well, due to the aforementioned issues...the only reason Diablo 3 has supperior gameplay to Magicka, which generally has more interesting enemies, is because it's better balanced, and because there's actually an extra level of depth to it in terms of the various skill builds. But even then...the fact that diablo 3 doesn't have gameplay that's much better than that of Magicka...eh. That's pretty darn sad, imo.

[bobby 55]

Another nuisance is that the game has a fundamentally bad interface. This was always an issue with diablo, and particularly with diablo 2: The main control mechanic is the left mouse button, but that button is overloaded with move, attack and interact. When you want to attack, that's an issue because you have to click a moving enemy on a moving screen, then you have to click somewhere else to move, then back on target to attack again, assuming you want the downtime between attacks to go into something useful like positioning your ass elsewhere.

Or you have to move, point the curser in the general direction you want to attack, hold shift and click, release shift, click to continue to move, repeat ad nauseum.

But even then...the fact that diablo 3 doesn't have gameplay that's much better than that of Magicka...eh. That's pretty darn sad, imo.

I think I'll wait for Torchlight 2.

Thanks for the heads-up.

Added: So single player is only available as long as the server stays up? After reading an RPS article I'm now confused, there seems to be an idea that there are game assets held server side. That could lead to some horrible lag couldn't it?

[Jonas]

I have Diablo 3. But I haven't played it yet. I want to finish Sniper Elite 2 first.

Also I've only been able to install it on my laptop, the servers were down when I tried to put it on my desktop machine.

Battle.net is a fucking joke.

[Jaedar]

Path of exile ftw.

The closest thing was act 5, the one from the expansion, but even then, does anybody even remember the name of the blacksmith from that town?

Qunsk maybe? Something with q I think.

Battle.net is a fucking joke.

Added: So single player is only available as long as the server stays up? After reading an RPS article I'm now confused, there seems to be an idea that there are game assets held server side. That could lead to some horrible lag couldn't it?

There's no single player afaik. It's basically an mmo in terms of server/client stuff. You can choose to play alone though.

I played the beta and I didn't like. The design philosophy seems to have been something along the lines of "Let's maximize profit through the auction house and by making the game really accessible".

[bobby 55]

Aah, cheers Jaedar. That's what was confusing me after reading RPS. There were some saying exactly what you did and others were "but it's single player".

Well there's Torchlight 2 for the dungeons, and Darksiders 2 for the hack 'n' slash.

[AEmer]

@ Jaedar

I couldn't tell you even if I wanted to, but I know the names of griswold, wirt, farnham, gillian and ogden, and adria of course. Don't recall the healers name, though...peregrin? Whereas from diablo 2, only a few names come to mind, like bloodraven and lysander...and from Diablo 3, I can't even tell you the name of the fucking blacksmith. I'm sure you get my point: I personally just didn't give a fuck about the townspeople in anything but diablo 1.

And well, I've played a bit of torchlight, and tbh Diablo does feel a lot more like the real deal.

Diablo has always had this thing where you can blow through your resources to increase your clearingspeed, or to make up for lack of manual dexterity, but that'll come back to bite you in the ass during the elite and boss fights where you generally need to pull out all the stops.

I should also say that around level 28, I made a major respec - basically I chose equipment and items that resulted in my character being around 5 times as tough, but reduced my damage output to around 80% of what it had been. You can see how that turns the game a little more sluggish, but how it ultimately becomes much more safe.

Item specs do start to matter a lot at this point. For instance, you can't disregard vitality anymore - not completely anyway. I just picked up a new weapon with a slightly lower dps, but which increased my hp to 180%. That's just too good not to do it.

In other words...your RPG character design is going to take build and items into consideration, and you can reshape your guy to the needs of your current session pretty well...heck, my wizard can even go full tank if he needs to, and he's going to be playing with ranged and dps characters at his back.

As for the battlenet issues...the game is a single player game, more so than diablo 2, but it does require a constant connection. I don't reckon that the Beta gave you a good idea of what the gameplay is going to be like, having played it myself, but I do see what you're saying re. the auction house. Battle Net's current functionality is actually pretty darn good. You can just pop into your friends game if the game recognizes that you're good friends, uninvited and everything. There's no real potential for grief, though if you do hover 3 people in some dudes single player experience it'll delay his progress, and I guess he might be mad at you for that =P. But then, why are you friends with griefers?

It's very smooth overall. But I do have one complaint: I've spent around 2 hours idling, trying to get in, during these first few days of playing. There was absolutely no reason for this, because a queue system is very easy to do, and blizzard has indeed implemented a queue system. I think they perhaps thought they dimensioned their servers to handle themselves, but clearly they didn't...and I don't know why you'd ever take that risk. So after the first 28 hours of release, they patched in what was essentially an 0-day queue system which should fix that issue. But why oh why did they not have that on there already?

Anyway, who cares, it was a birthing issue and it's fixed now, and aside from downtime yesterday from 4 to 5 am, it's running without hickups now.

[Jonas]

I couldn't tell you even if I wanted to, but I know the names of griswold, wirt, farnham, gillian and ogden, and adria of course. Don't recall the healers name, though...peregrin? Whereas from diablo 2, only a few names come to mind, like bloodraven and lysander...and from Diablo 3, I can't even tell you the name of the fucking blacksmith. I'm sure you get my point: I personally just didn't give a fuck about the townspeople in anything but diablo 1.

I mean no offence, but did you account for the fact that you were 16 years younger when Diablo 1 came out than you are now? Because I know I personally was a lot easier to get involved in a narrative back when I played Diablo 1, it didn't take as much effort to tickle my imagination and get me to engage with fictional characters as it does now. In short, I wasn't as critical back then, and I did more of the "work" myself. I'm not confident that I would be as impressed by Diablo 1's (let's face it, extremely sparse) narrative now as I was back then. And to say that Diablo 1 had many memorable characters... doesn't really match my recollection

[Jaedar]

Stay a while and listen.

[Jonas]

A one-liner is all it takes for you?

Holy shit if only I'd known. So much characterisation in TNM all gone to waste.

[DDL]

And to say that Diablo 1 had many memorable characters... doesn't really match my recollection

Seconded. I was quite surprised when I read your first post, AEmer. I have honestly never thought of the Diablo games as "things that have plot, story or characterisation". They're just the empitome of the mouseclick-hell dungeon-crawler RPG genre, really. Get quest, kill monsters, collect loot, complete quest, kill more monsters, collect more loot, redeem quest, get more loot, evaluate loot, sell stuff, buy more pots, goto10.

I mean, it's great that you actually found the plot/characterisation memorable, but I'm just surprised.

I find that the "solo protagonist" aspect of it tends to detract from character interaction (since you don't have party members to talk to: this can be a really strong way to draw you into the narrative, a la "anything bioware"), and the fact that the emphasis is very much on "bigger numbers" rather than "personal journey": you're not so much working toward a defined end ("you saved us from the darkspawn!"/"The demon has been vanquished!"/"you are the new king") as much as you're getting stronger and finding better stuff. I mean, there can be a defined story end, sure, but this usually simply unlocks the next hardest version of the whole thing...rinse, repeat.

They're not games you finish, they're games you eventually tire of.

[Jaedar]

A one-liner is all it takes for you?

A one-liner is all it takes for you to think I'm making a point?

My real point was that people remember that line, and deckard cain in general despite the sparse characterization. More is less and so forth. Then again, he's probably the only dude in diablo1 that was memorable. I only remember the name of Griswold and Wirt cause they make appearances in diablo2 and Adria because she makes an appearance in d3 afaik.

I have honestly never thought of the Diablo games as "things that have plot, story or characterisation". They're just the empitome of the mouseclick-hell dungeon-crawler RPG genre, really. Get quest, kill monsters, collect loot, complete quest, kill more monsters, collect more loot, redeem quest, get more loot, evaluate loot, sell stuff, buy more pots, goto10.

Lately I've been finding it a bit strange to put diablo 1 and 2 in the same box, when the games are quite different. The original diablo is closer to a roguelike but with stuff like actual graphics and production values and tons of atmosphere. The second is a complete h&s clickfest. There's a difference there and I think it's somewhat significant.

[AEmer]

Diablo 1 and 2 are significantly different games.

And Jonas, I played diablo 2 when it came out in 2000. I played diablo 1 in 98 and 99. I mean, I could still be a different person when I played those two games; after all, I didn't play the expansion for diablo 2 untill that came out in 2001, so there's the possibility of a 3 year age difference, from 13 to 16, and during those years, I played a crapton of games which could potentially have evolved me from a less hardcore to a more hardcore gamer.

Edit:( Oh you meant diablo 1 compared to diablo 3. I see. Uhh...well, I think so. I really do. I listened to everything, all the lore and all the other stuff in diablo 3. It's my honest analysis of the games that this one gives you less reasons to care. The only reason I got into things was a nostalgia trip and a few awesome setpieces, but honestly, diablo 3 just doesn't utilize the same narrative constructs that diablo 1 used. It gives you some degree of framing, but ultimately, the game wants to deliver a very specific narrative and just kindof takes it for granted that you want to save the world, without ever really giving you a reason for feeling like it's particularly imperilled or particularly worthwhile...ultimately, saving everything is metaphysical and philosophical, whereas saving someone specific is personal, and diablo 3 just doesn't make it personal for you, imo.)

I don't think it had an influence this time, though, and I'll tell you why: I attempted to get all the quest dialogue in both games. In general, every character had a gossip rotation, a snippet about quests as you initially got them, and a snippet about quests after you'd left town and come back. That makes for up to 12 or so quest snippets for each character in diablo 2, though I must admit that I don't recall if diablo 1 had the potential for additional snippets when you left and came back...

Anyway, I heard all of those in both games. It's not simply that I blatantly ignored story because I had to work for it; I was a completionist and I got to as much of it as possible. And you know, I think it's completely fair to ask that question; but after looking at it in terms of how I played games or the impression they made on me, I just wasn't that different of a person. Also, if I got jaded or less impressionable since then, it speaks to reason that it happened after I'd played deus ex and system shock 2, both of which I didn't play till late 2000, or for ss2, 2002 I think.

The issue is, as I said, the story of diablo 1 (and not the narrative mind you), was much more compelling. It wasn't "Have you seen this dark wanderer?" it was "holy shit demons are coming out of the church every night and they're raping and pillaging".
The fundamental quest of diablo is to figure out what the hell is going on in that church and to put a stop it. That the hell turns out to actually be going on in it is creepy as fuck because you just don't see that coming.

It's not advanced or elaborate, it's simple, and that's the point. If you'll allow it, look at the alien vs. aliens metaphor again. It's not like the characters of alien are particularly deep, or more memorable as such as compared to their aliens counterparts. They're just fundamentally different stories in nature. And you know, there's no way aliens would have worked well if it had been the first movie. It keys off of alien. Just as diablo 2 keys off of diablo.

The issue is, diablo 2 doesn't have the same kind of compelling story the first one had, so you don't remember any of the characters at all. It tabbed into this resource that was there, diablo 1, and used that to deliver a narrative that build the world of sanctuary...but once established, the fiction was pretty much bare. It was too big, and had very little focus. If you wanted to bring characters from the 2nd game back, it would seem incredibly random. While you're not likely to give many fucks about Deckard Cain or Adrias daughter, or even new tristram, they're the best diablo 3 has to offer...and ultimately, you're fighting to protect a world which you're just not invested in.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not holding diablo 1 up as this brilliant gem, or saying that blizzard should've done things differently. You can't really do things much different from what they did, but it's still fundamentally a problem that you're just all out of fucks to give; compare and contrast with diablo 1 where, if you care to anyway, you know Griswold isn't helping you out because when the townsfolk tried to go down into the labyrinth, almost all of them died, and Griswold barely managed to escape with Wirts mangled body. Farnham the drunk is permanently messed up by what he saw in the labyrinth. Gillian has lost her family. Ogden appears to be the only one who's still mostly ok, but he's clearly scared as hell.

You have sympathy with these people, and that's your key to feeling like you're part of their world. In diablo 1 there's at least a reason for you to give a fuck if you go looking for it.

[AEmer]

oh, and:

Get quest, kill monsters, collect loot, complete quest, kill more monsters, collect more loot, redeem quest, get more loot, evaluate loot, sell stuff, buy more pots, goto10.

I feel like this should be adressed. What you describe here is the fundamental gameplay mechanic, sure, but I could describe Deus Ex' fundamental gameplay mechanic relatively easy as well, "Get mission, subdue adversaries, loot adversaries, get exp, upgrade skills, houseclean inventory, get more missions, subdue more adversaries, goto 10".

Just because you can outline the fundamental gameplay mechanic (nicely glossing over the fact that the "get mission" and "subdue adversaries" are actually pretty elaborate, just as "kill monsters" in diablo can be pretty elaborate) in a relatively straightforward fashion doesn't mean that it necessarily has to feel dumb as you do it.

And that's really the issue here...In Diablo 1 it doesn't feel nearly as dumb as it might.

Look at a game such as Magicka or binding of isaac. Both of these games are essentially parodies on a narrative level, but they still manage to be engaging - they still light up the part of your brain that makes you think you're doing something more intricate than digital chores. You're on an epic pretense adventure (wink), and you're probably looking forward to seeing what happens next, because you know it'll make you giggle or amuse you. Bastion, I'm told, also lights up that part of your brain, for similar reasons, but that one is supposedly somewhat more straight.

My main point was simply this: In diablo 3, your questing feels significantly dumber, significantly less personal, and a lot more like a timesink than it did in diablo 1, in my oppinion.

[DDL]

That was only my personal take on it: diablo and diablo-likes pretty much end up feeling exactly like that, to me. Sometimes I just feel like mindless murder in exchange for levels 'n loot, and when I feel that way, those are the kind of games I go for.

I'm not saying you CAN'T play them for the plot, but I've never considered it a particular..'strength', if you like. Not least because following the plot is usually entirely unnecessary.

[Jonas]

I like what you've written, Aemer, and I completely understand what you mean. The idea that a save-the-world plot can work as long as it starts out more down to Earth is something I've thought about a lot (in relation to TNM, which has roughly that same plot progression), and I fully agree that the fact that Diablo 1 starts out small and relatively intimate and then evolves into saving the world is a huge plus.

I just don't personally think that the characters in Diablo 1 are memorable. At all. I mean I remember their names: Deckard Cain, Wirt, and Griswold. I remember them chiefly because they appeared again in Diablo 2 (in one form or another) and some of them even appeared or were referenced again in Diablo 3. But to me, all they are is shops and archetypes. Cain was the old guy who identified items, Wirt was the kid with the wooden leg, and Griswold was the fat blacksmith. They're barely fleshed out enough to qualify as archetypes.

The plot was great, I'll give you that. Diablo 1 is to Diablo 2 as Half-Life 1 is to Half-Life 2, in my mind. Both series start out with this really encapsulated high-concept plot in a compelling microcosmos (Tristram and its cathedral vs. Black Mesa), and then their sequels expand to much more sprawling settings, throwing out the laser focus of their predecessors. I've always preferred a microcosmos over the globetrotting structure.

I find it interesting that Diablo 1 is being made out to be some sort of paragon of old-school sensibilities though. Maybe I didn't hang out in the same circles as you guys back then, but I remember we grudgingly acknowledged the slick simplicity of Diablo's design while we scorned it for being mindless hack 'n' slash. It was fun, but it lacked depth compared to eg. Baldur's Gate or the Might & Magic series. To hear it extolled as this hard core Roguelike... grates a little bit.