Diablo III

bento · Jun 30, 2008

The sound effects for the barbarian's feats were so sickening that my wife left the room!

Won't be playing that with the kids around!

Gladius Legis · Jun 30, 2008

Can ANYBODY tell me what the appeal is supposed to be behind the Diablo series? Because I just don't see it.

It's mindless point and click ad nauseam.

fba827 · Jun 30, 2008

Gladius Legis said:
Can ANYBODY tell me what the appeal is supposed to be behind the Diablo series? Because I just don't see it.

It's mindless point and click ad nauseam.

It is mindless point and click, and sometimes that is entertainment enough when you're brain is dulled from working all day and you just want to veg.

There is also the multi-player aspect of it if you want to do something with your friends but can't get together.

And (I am not completely sure of this since I haven't actually played any of the series before) but I believe you build up your character (leveling up) and can choose which skills to improve on, thus making it somewhat "your character" rather than just completely predetermined path of skill increases.

But, really, yeah, it is mindless point and click -- you aren't missing any hidden feature. I do enjoy mindless games now and then (but, yeah, it's not always my cup of tea either).

Edit: though, i reemphasize that i've never actually played any version of diablo, just basing this post off of what i've read and know from friend's that play/played it.

Banshee16 · Jun 30, 2008

Thanee said:
Hopefully they manage to bring back the fun from D1... D2 was nice, but somehow missing something...

Bye
Thanee

Personally, I liked D2 better than D1. D1 was original, but it was basically just a dungeon crawl. There was very little variety to the environments. I enjoyed the outdoors parts of D2 as added "spice" to the dungeons. Played that game to death..

To each his/her own, I guess.

Banshee

Hand of Evil · Jun 30, 2008

Visually the graphics look like Dungeon Siege. The game play looks kick ass.

Elephant · Jun 30, 2008

Banshee16 said:
Personally, I liked D2 better than D1. D1 was original, but it was basically just a dungeon crawl. There was very little variety to the environments. I enjoyed the outdoors parts of D2 as added "spice" to the dungeons. Played that game to death..

To each his/her own, I guess.

Banshee

IMO, the atmosphere in D1 was superior - it had this creepy horror aspect that D2 lacked. OTOH, the interface for D2 was so much improved (running...) that it was really hard to go back to D1 after playing D2.

I'll agree that the outdoors areas in D2 were a nice addition to the dungeons though.

Kaodi · Jun 30, 2008

I will be interested to see how much the environmental effects really make a difference in the final version. When the barbarian hit the wall and it fell down in pieces, squooshing the... things, it was pretty cool. His own violent death was awesome too.

Vocenoctum · Jun 30, 2008

Gladius Legis said:
Can ANYBODY tell me what the appeal is supposed to be behind the Diablo series? Because I just don't see it.

It's mindless point and click ad nauseam.

You never played Gauntlet? Same idea.

(I used to have Gauntlet for the Genesis that also let you build up a character.)

It shouldn't be taken too seriously, IMO, and it's basically point and click with a plot. It's like a roleplaying game in that you build up your character with skills and powers.

(This aside from the obvious thing that a LOT of video games could be reduced to "point and click".)

Shade · Jun 30, 2008

Gladius Legis said:
Can ANYBODY tell me what the appeal is supposed to be behind the Diablo series? Because I just don't see it.

It's mindless point and click ad nauseam.

Kill things and take their stuff.

There's always the carrot dangling in front of you of what to improve at the next level.

The thrill of exploration.

Essentially, the same stuff as D&D.

Thanee · Jun 30, 2008

Banshee16 said:
Personally, I liked D2 better than D1. D1 was original, but it was basically just a dungeon crawl. There was very little variety to the environments. I enjoyed the outdoors parts of D2 as added "spice" to the dungeons.

Of course, D2 was an improvement over D1 in many aspects. No question. The diversity with the different levels was nice, even though, as the talking Elephant (

) said, the atmosphere was not as intense as it was in D1. It was a lot more arcade. I still played it a lot, so it wasn't half-bad, it just wasn't as good as it should have been.

D1 was simply the better game overall (when you compare it on a fair level, not directly, but with what was possible at that time in mind).

In D1 you actually needed tactics, in D2 you just needed better stuff, do more damage, etc. The difficulty scaled by how much more damage the monsters did, and not much else. That's an exaggeration, of course, but hopefully you know what I mean.

In D1 you could do some absolutely ridiculous stuff... like kill Diablo in Hell at level 30 (solo, including getting there; I still have a screenshot from that, heh), which wasn't nearly as tough as what some guys did... a party of four warriors with ZERO magic (no spells, no magic items, nothing; just healing potions and white equipment) made it through Hell and defeated Diablo (this took *veeeeery* long). Stuff like that is completely impossible in D2.

But the worst thing about D2 was... it ruined the fun in D1, because you wanted all the improvements with the style of the old game.

Now, if they manage to put the best of these two together, that would be awesome!

The gameplay vid definitely looks interesting (and the little subtleties, like the breaking furniture and the bodies flung off the bridge, or the goons climbing the walls in Moria-Orc style are very nice), even though Barbarian isn't exactly my favorite character there, and I didn't watch the other one (Witch Doctor).

Bye
Thanee