I ROSE UP!!!

I've spent 36 years shacked in the basement of my mothers home, living off medicare & medicaid on disability, with extra cash coming from adsense ads on various blogs and such

but I ROSE UP and tossed off the shackles of oppression

and I LOGGED INTO GUILD WARS 2 WITH THE PASSION OF A MILLION NERDS CRYING OUT AS ONE!


or something like that....


level 60 Engineer so far 20 more levels to go then its dungeon raiding time

Classic rebellious punk tunes. If the dumb asses had just let it be, the world wouldn't be talking about this. Instead its going to bite Putin in the ass even harder now that he exercised his form of so-called 'justice'. Oh well. More political prisoners for the king's dungeons.

My bad on D1 dungeons.

There will always be cookie-cutter builds. And besides, when you're talking about 'the' build, you're talking about the ideal items to have, the vast majority of people will never get there. Meanwhile, the options for 'best with what you have' varied heaps. I played D3 through with a Monk, and the entire time, the only stats that felt worthwhile chasing were damage, dexterity and vitality.

I'm not saying it didn't have dark elements, but vast portions of the story, dialogue and tone, particularly after Act 1 (which I thought was best part of the game), where juvenile and completely off for a Diablo game. I mean for christ sake, the game delved into damsel in distress territory multiple times. Anyway posted this elsewhere, going to just copy paste:

1. Story tone is horribly off for a Diablo game. Act 1, the tone is almost that right mix of dark, macabre & grim horror albeit with overly colourful graphics. Then, in Act 2 and especially 3/4 the game becomes flat out goofy. It's almost like different studios designed the two parts. Regardless, it's obvious the whole gothic, cheesy but serious tone of previously Diablo games has been thoroughly ditched.

It becomes obvious there is a reason that most of the prime evils were mostly mute & why your characters was kept to making sarcastic remarks and one liners in D2. Diablo beretting you with grating "if it wasn't for your meddling kids" dialogue completely ruins the game's tone. Overall the mix of occasional ultra-violence and the overt colourfulness and childish NPC banter gives it an almost surreal and contradictory theme. As if a design house was of two minds, fighting over dominance over the franchise's feel.

There was just no need to muck with what was not broken to the point that it's hard for me to NOT imagine Activision sitting behind the developers dictating them how well the WoW tone sits with target demographics. There is nothing wrong with WoW existing in its own space with it's own unique identity. There's a problem with creative variety between Blizzard games becoming non-existent because they've caught on to what sells best and decided to stick to that.

As for launch issues, I didn't play D2 at launch, but that's not what really bugs me. It is abundantly obvious though that foisting online-only is part of the reason they're having so many launch issues.

Here's my full bitch session - http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/5149543659

>> ^mentality:

>> ^RedSky:
@mentality
D2 felt like a huge leap on D1. Randomized dungeons, huge increase in class and especially item variety, introduction of a vast swathe of new environments. In comparison critically looking at D3, while it does have an expanded skills system, at the end of a prodigious 11 year development cycle, D3 has far less item variety at launch, and arguably simplified gameplay mechanics on a number of levels.
Personally, I happen to also think the story is a let down, the tone of the game has been inappropriately been made cartoonish (art design non-withstanding).

D1 had randomized dungeons. Item variety in D2 was very limited because there often was one set of unique item that was 'THE' item for a specific build. The expanded environments in D2 were also very cartoony compared to the dungeons of D1, and calling D3 cartoonish with levels like the Halls of Agony is outright ridiculous.
The fact of the matter is that the grass is always greener, and we all look at the past with rose colored glasses. History repeats itself, but it seems like few people remember all the problems, controversy and bitching surrounding Diablo 2's launch.

>> ^RedSky:
@mentality
D2 felt like a huge leap on D1. Randomized dungeons, huge increase in class and especially item variety, introduction of a vast swathe of new environments. In comparison critically looking at D3, while it does have an expanded skills system, at the end of a prodigious 11 year development cycle, D3 has far less item variety at launch, and arguably simplified gameplay mechanics on a number of levels.
Personally, I happen to also think the story is a let down, the tone of the game has been inappropriately been made cartoonish (art design non-withstanding).


D1 had randomized dungeons. Item variety in D2 was very limited because there often was one set of unique item that was 'THE' item for a specific build. The expanded environments in D2 were also very cartoony compared to the dungeons of D1, and calling D3 cartoonish with levels like the Halls of Agony is outright ridiculous.

The fact of the matter is that the grass is always greener, and we all look at the past with rose colored glasses. History repeats itself, but it seems like few people remember all the problems, controversy and bitching surrounding Diablo 2's launch.

@lv_hunter

Normal difficulty compared to D2 simply feels far too easy. I recall D2 Act 1 was also quite easy, but from Duriel, really through to the end of normal, the game picked up substantially. I found almost the opposite here, while it is fair for them to ease players in early on, for me the difficulty spiked towards the end of Act 1, maybe early Act 2. From there the game was just a complete steamroll through to Nightmare.

Sure you get to replay it 3 more times, but plunging through the game at this pace for first impressions really ruins the gravitas of the stakes the story is trying to paint.

@mentality

I've heard this notion bandied around, but combining ideas from multiple games and perfecting them is still a form of innovation. And even on that measure they played it far too safe on D3.

D2 felt like a huge leap on D1. Randomized dungeons, huge increase in class and especially item variety, introduction of a vast swathe of new environments. In comparison critically looking at D3, while it does have an expanded skills system, at the end of a prodigious 11 year development cycle, D3 has far less item variety at launch, and arguably simplified gameplay mechanics on a number of levels.

Personally, I happen to also think the story is a let down, the tone of the game has been inappropriately been made cartoonish (art design non-withstanding).

>> ^Jinx:

End of the day, doesn't matter much whether you play it with friends or not since the gameplay is so fucking boring. Not that I don't ever play dungeon crawlers, sometimes I quite fancy mindless button pressing where the only real incentive is the next level or the better item, but I don't kid myself into thinking its a good game. Sometimes I watch truely terrible movies just for the fun (which also happen to share the characteristic of only being really enjoyable when watched/played with friends) but again, lets not pretend they are good movies.
Anyway, I'd like to see Blizzard develop a new game rather than these sequels. Diablo3 must be the safest money they've ever made, even SC2 had more innovation, how about taking some risks?


Blizzard was NEVER about innovation. They have always been about taking existing gaming mechanics and polishing them to a level of quality that no other company can match. They do an excellent job of NOT reinventing the wheel and retaining the qualities that makes their games so successful in the first place.

To expect Blizzard to change a formula that brought them millions of fans over the years, to alienate their core audience just so they can appease someone like you, who never loved dungeon crawlers in the first place, is ridiculous.

And while I'm not a big fan of Diablo, I don't pretend that they are terrible games just because I find them repetitive and boring.

End of the day, doesn't matter much whether you play it with friends or not since the gameplay is so fucking boring. Not that I don't ever play dungeon crawlers, sometimes I quite fancy mindless button pressing where the only real incentive is the next level or the better item, but I don't kid myself into thinking its a good game. Sometimes I watch truely terrible movies just for the fun (which also happen to share the characteristic of only being really enjoyable when watched/played with friends) but again, lets not pretend they are good movies.

Anyway, I'd like to see Blizzard develop a new game rather than these sequels. Diablo3 must be the safest money they've ever made, even SC2 had more innovation, how about taking some risks?

>> ^AeroMechanical:

Hold the phone. The dungeons are randomly generated? I played through it one and a half times and they didn't seem any different to me...


It should be like in the original Diablo games.

Hold the phone. The dungeons are randomly generated? I played through it one and a half times and they didn't seem any different to me.

It was better the second time through, though, when it let you select a difficulty that isn't ridiculously easy--and I don't normally play these sorts of games. Anyways, I liked it though. Probably the best time killer ever made bar Windows Solitaire.

I've been in the beta for awhile, but the recent attention its been getting has gotten me to fire it up again. First thing I'll say is its fun, especially when you gain a few levels/skills and better weapons.

I think its graphically appropriate for Diablo, one of the issues I have visually is that special monsters and mini-bosses glow shiny yellow or blue, and I find it distracting from the rest of the game's visuals.

As fort he skills, I kind of understand what they're trying to do, but for all its flaws I still prefer the skill tree/stat assigning. Though I do appreciate that you can change skills with ease. I never liked feeling stuck to one build with few opportunities to re-spec.

The always online thing does suck. Despite the online AH and achievements they could have added an offline mode for those who just want a single player experience and aren't concerned about the other stuff.

But its still monster smashin, loot grabbin, dungeon crawlin fun.

"One time I was walking around these dungeons, I found... I found a strawberry. It was just sitting there I ate it."
That's pretty F'ing accurate if you ask me!

>> ^oohlalasassoon:

This never worked for me with Dungeons and Dragons, WTF.


You know why? d&d didn't have Pandas :-)

This never worked for me with Dungeons and Dragons, WTF.

I'm still waiting for the follow-up historical epics The Dungeons of Ulysses S Grant and The Passion of the Nixon.

>> ^mentality:

@Fletch
"You'll have to stop barking first."
Classy. Nice tone you set for the rest of the discussion.
"Not surprised that you have nothing to say about this, as it is, probably, the primary reason so many former Diablo players won't be playing D3.
How many is so many? Did you do a survey? Diablo's core audience, many of whom continue to play D2 to this day, are those who played D2 on BNET. That's where the meat of the game is, and that's where the community is built around. Who do you think Blizzard keeps on patching and adding new content for, more than a decade after D2's release?
" Nothing in D2 required you to go to "sketchy websites" and spend money. [...] Sure, you still don't have to, but both drops and crafting have been nerfed in order to encourage spending."
Did you know that D2 had a huge online item black market? It has basically the same effect as an auction house, except people had to go to 3rd party vendors for it. But guess what? This kind of stuff only matters if you're playing on the ladder. Want to have a nice quiet solo game, or run through the game with a few friends? Who the hell cares if you have elite gear? Play the beta - they definitely did NOT nerf drops and crafting.
The rest of your post is nonsense. D3's stash size is 10x7, larger than the one in D2. And blizzard manipulating drop rates for players depending on their auction house usage? That's just pure bullshit.
Have you even played D2 or kept up with all the interface "streamlining" in D3 at all? Those pets I mentioned above don't do anything except pick up your gold. Talk about "dumbed-down". This game is headed for consoles.
Those pets were removed from the game due to player feedback. "Streamlining" - have you even played the beta? The additional skill slots make this game LESS console friendly than D2. Face it, D2 was already perfect for consoles. And Torchlight? ALREADY on consoles.
SOME randomized dungeons, last I read. Although, if I'm wrong, it doesn't really matter. I said "linear", not "non-random". One does not mean the other. I have little hope you can understand the difference. I'll try to use them both in a sentence for you later.
I said randomized dungeons and quests. If the first time you play the game you get quests ABC, and the second time you play the game you get quests XYZ instead, is that NON-LINEAR enough for you? It looks like you're the kind of person who, rather than play a game, justs makes up bullshit instead and then bitch about it.
Oh, please. The textures look like they shot primary-colored paint balls onto an easel and captured it through a shear stocking.
Like I said, people seem to forget D2's graphics. In D2 you were fighting against red, green, blue, yellow colored monsters while your character was decked out in purple. D2 was cartoony. D3 is less. You complain about D3 being cartoony, then you talk about playing Torchlight? Are you fucking kidding me?
It's Blizzard's loss, not mine. I don't get too emotionally attached to "things". With Torchlight2, Grim Dawn, Path of Exile, and even Legend of Grimrock in the works, I won't miss D3 one bit.
With D3's sales, I doubt Blizzard will miss you one bit. And the Diablo community won't miss you one bit. One less whiny brat to clog up the BNET forums.


Ugh...

Ok, you win, Fanboy. Have fun. I hope it lives up to all your dreams.