Blizzard - New Diablo Game Coming

Originally Posted by TheSHEEEP
Well… can't be worse than Diablo 3.

… or can it?

Of course it can. In my possible ways (more focus on MP, different camera, less focus on killing and loot and so on and on and on).

Originally Posted by TheSHEEEP
Well… can't be worse than Diablo 3.

… or can it?

1. Release act 1 as the full game then sell the subsequent acts as expansions.
2. Microtransaction lootboxes that contain things borderline essential to advancement, such as abilities and spells and they can't be obtained from drops.
3. Class-specific gear never matches the class you're playing, forcing you to trade with other players.
4. "Energy" system like you see in many Facebook and mobile games, limiting the amount of time you can play before you have to purchase more energy or wait for it to recharge. Linked to account instead of individual characters.
5. VIP subscription that speeds up the energy recharge and makes it so items better than white and grey quality can drop. Also includes access to many quality-of-life features that are standard in most online games these days.
6. Overhaul the artistic style of the game completely and go for a colorful, super-deformed anime style.
7. Make grouping forced by making the content literally too difficult to solo. But only give access to matchmaking and group-finding services to VIP subscribers.
8. You get one (randomly decided) class made available to you when you buy the game. The other classes (and additional character slots) can only be acquired via premium lootboxes.

Alternatively, just go the Call of Duty route and release Diablo 3 as Diablo 4 with marginally better graphics and a slightly different story.

Originally Posted by JDR13
My point was that it's not one of the best selling games of all time from marketing alone which seemed to be the suggestion. It sold another 6.5 million copies over the course of the year after it was released. The best marketing in the world isn't moving that many copies unless there's actually something there that's appealing to the target audience.

I made this exact argument with Fallout 3 recently. Although it's not a popular pick here, it still sold 5 million copies since the year after it was released. And although it rode on the back of Fallout 2 (while still dividing the fanbase a bit), it wouldn't have continued to sell that many copies if it was a truly terrible game, particularly since F:NV had direct competition with it.

But I digress.

I'm not on either end of the spectrum about D3, just somewhere in the middle. I had fun with the game, but I did miss the art design of D2. I played D3 on and off for a year or two, but I don't recall being so invested in it that I rushed home from work to play it. D2 had that effect on me, though. And the original Starcraft, too.

Fallout the third was actually worth playing, though, and you were not required to be online to do so. I've not played Diablo three, and I doubt I ever will, but from what friends have told me and what I've read, it doesn't sound like I'm missing very much. I do miss the days of Diablo two at times.

Originally Posted by Carnifex
Fallout the third was actually worth playing

This isn't an argument, unfortunately. Everyone has their own definition of what is 'worth playing" and what isn't. There is no factual basis for a game worth playing and not worth playing. A game's worth is judged by the user.

Originally Posted by Carnifex
and you were not required to be online to do so.

And yet, it being and online game didn't stop it from making more post release sales than Fallout 3.

Marketing is a major reason a game sells well, sure, but it is not the sole reason. Imagine if Overwatch got the same kind of marketing treatment it did, but came from an unknown studio. How many copies would it have sold?

Fallout 3 is a bad example for the argument at hand; the modding community keeps Bethesda titles relevant long after launch.

Originally Posted by Drithius
Fallout 3 is a bad example for the argument at hand; the modding community keeps Bethesda titles relevant long after launch.

Exactly my point - marketing isn't the only thing that sells games. Mod support, word of mouth, user and critic reviews, they're all contributors to total sales. Marketing budget/skills only go so far.

All your examples, aside from mod support, are a part of marketing though…

Originally Posted by Drithius
All your examples, aside from mod support, are a part of marketing though…

They're more akin to byproducts of marketing, unlike trailers and merchandise, which are direct promotional material.

I bought the PS3 version of D3. My friend and I played a few sessions of co-op and gave up in boredom. We didn't feel the same way about co-oping D2 (back in the day) or Torchlight 2 (more recently), and independently we'e enjoyed Grim Dawn, Sacred 2, and several other ARPGs.
We found there was something truly vanilla and dull about D3's dungeons and character progression. Hopefully D4 improves things for us.

It's probably not an expansion. D3 had a few new zones pop into adventure mode a while back, zones that suspiciously looked like part of a dismantled expansion. That was the unofficial death knell for D3, and why we're getting a new game.

D3 excelled on the moment-to-moment combat; it was engaging, smooth and responsive to your actions. It was a great Gauntlet Arcade game, it was a very VERY poor Diablo clone (ironically.) The character building was flat, each class was the same. The loot drops were universally dull. Everybody was getting +dmg, whoop dee doo.

I thought the art style was lovely, but I can also understand how people would find it "cartoonish." It was actually a bit more family friendly than Diablo 1 and 2, which is easy to forget now but was kind of dark and gruesome back then.

The story was godawful. No way around that. I'm sure there's a better story of how many meetings took place to dilute it down to what it became, which is "safe, but dumb."

I hope the new Diablo takes the amazing engine for action it has and builds a dynamic character model on top of it like Path of Exile's, then provides interesting loot that makes you want to try new builds and classes.

…but maybe with a little bit less grind.

Originally Posted by Drithius
All your examples, aside from mod support, are a part of marketing though…

Word of mouth and critic/user reviews are part of marketing now? That's a pretty strange outlook when you consider that those things are only benefiting sales if they're actually positive, and they're not going to be positive if the game is bad.

in 2018, "word of mouth" is pretty much what you get via social media analytics marketing yeah. And all those PC Gamer, Gamespot paid reviews should be classified as such as well. Too cynical? Possibly, but all too real unfortunately.

Why are 50 reviews from mainstream gaming sites instantly available at game launch? Whereas smaller publishing houses get 1/10th of that if they're lucky? Marketing.

I don't even know what this thread is about anymore. But, anyway, game quality != game sales.

Blind hate is always going to override common sense.

There's no grand conspiracy among the mainstream gaming sites no matter how much we'd like to believe that sometimes. If that were the case, every AAA title from a major publisher would always have a 9+ rating, and that's far from reality.

Originally Posted by JDR13
There's no grand conspiracy among the mainstream gaming sites no matter how much we'd like to believe that sometimes. If that were the case, every AAA title from a major publisher would always have a 9+ rating, and that's far from reality.

As silly as it sounds, wasn't that sort of the problem years ago? They started implementing fractional ratings because of the pressure to never rate anything lower than a 7 unless it was complete garbage. No conspiracy, it was just self-interest, nobody wanted to be dropped from getting access.

When metacritic first launched I remember the great difference between how movies were rated vs. video games. It's definitely gotten better in recent years. I think the most recent version of this was some controversy over companies telling youtube reviewers what they could say as part of the requirements of getting access. The most famous of this was The Shadow of Mordor. It happens.

Diablo 3 launched with very high ratings, but I think that had more to do with the initial experience of the reviewers who didn't get to really dig into it's long term viability. Plus it had that standard Blizzard polish. No Blizzard game is going to feel janky.

Originally Posted by Mosaic
When metacritic first launched I remember the great difference between how movies were rated vs. video games. It's definitely gotten better in recent years. I think the most recent version of this was some controversy over companies telling youtube reviewers what they could say as part of the requirements of getting access. The most famous of this was The Shadow of Mordor. It happens.

Idk. I actually think Metacritic has gotten worse, but I have to admit I didn't pay much attention when it first launched. The problem there are all the trolls who are quick to rate something a '0' in an attempt to drag it down simply because they have an axe to grind.

Of course that kind of nonsense is possible with just about any rating system, but at least on Steam the person is required to own the title they're writing a review for, and everyone can see how much time the reviewer actually spent with it.

They need to bring back old classes, older ones had a clean, direct aestethic, new ones just looked "busy" and lame



I think I clicked a billion times on the Barb…Aarrgh!…now, back in line…Aarrgh!..there he goes again…Aarrgh!…one more time…

Anyways, this is a good comparison

Originally Posted by BoboTheMighty
Ahh, good ol' ramses and his love for action…wait, Grim Dawn is good?

I love good aRPGs. Grim dawn is the best ARPG on the market by a fair margin. Torchlight and Van Helsing are also quite good. I had high hopes for Inquisitor but it is only fair at best right now. D3 on consoles ending up being very fun, albeit quite limited. If you want a more "action" focused game, then the best example is Too Human which had the best combat of any game in any genre in its generation.

by a fair margin LOL. Your fantasy land must be an awesome place.

Originally Posted by Archangel
by a fair margin LOL. Your fantasy land must be an awesome place.

I would mostly agree. I certainly haven't played *every* ARPG because I don't usually enjoy them. But I own Grim Dawn *and* I've actually finished it a couple of times. That alone elevates it above the others I do own. I purchased and finished both Torchlight games as well (but only once each). However, I've never once felt any desire to purchase Diablo 3. Too many red flags when the game came out kept me away, and more of them in the months after release, and apparently that was a good decision. You can't get much fairer of a margin than "I own and finished it" and "I can't be bothered to pick it up years later, even on sale". It doesn't matter to me how many copies the game sold… to me it might as well not exist.

Blizzard is an odd company to me. They seem to do something pretty well the first time or two they tackle it, and then invariably the game flounders (to me) over iterations. I played Warcraft 1 & 2, hated 3. I played WoW until the first expansion. Played Diablo 1 & 2 but passed entirely on 3. I haven't picked up their more recent first attempts, but those games seem to be doing well. But then, I don't buy any of the latest/greatest from anyone because I'm not a fan of shooter/moba/battle games. <shrug> I'm inundated with game choices more and more each year, and yet I'm less of a pc gamer today than I was a decade ago before the industry changed.