Diablo III is for real

[Chesspiece_face]

Noting that I agree with a lot of what Langolier said, in that D1 is a very strategic game and that D2 simply doesn't share that to the same degree.

But all the same I play Diablo 2 and haven't installed the first Diablo in a while. Why? Because it's fun. And unless you wanna play a geared out whirlwind barbarian, or never leave normal difficulty, then it's just not the mindless strategy-less click-fest that Langolier seems to think it is. It does not have the depth of the first game, but saying that all the game is is 'charge or do not charge' is just silly, or said by someone who is attached at the hip with an ADD-riddled 14 year old powergamer and thinks that's all that can be done with the game.

Honestly, this being the same community that spawned so many D1 variants to make the game harder, why is it that D2 can only be considered from the perspective of a powergamer?

... my de-railing finished, I'd like to say that I'm really looking forward to D3. The sorts of skill synergies and monster combinations seen in the trailer sort of allows for seeing some very interesting encounters.

I talked with a friend of mine about it, and he said that the screenshots posted look a lot like Titan Quest. And I really agree. Of course, Titan Quest looked a lot like d2, but shinier and newer, so that's really not saying much.

Much of the game design in Diablo I that people are speaking so highly about was based on the limited technology of the time. The claustrophobic atmosphere, grid dungeon layout, etc. were all choices made to maximize the limits of the tech of that day. As technology advances you have two choices, either you evolve your game design to maximize the new technology or you keep using the old game design and just layer it over new tech. One of these choices will lead to failure in time.

Lets take another franchise as example: Resident Evil. Many of the game design choices they used in the first game created and enhanced the feel of tension in that game. False 3d movement, unresponsive controls, etc. but these choices were made to maximize the limited tech of the PS1. In RE's case though the developers chose to map those designs over the new tech that came along and you ended up with a floundering franchise with game designs 10 years past their prime. It wasn't until RE4 that they started breaking down those design choices and coming up with new ones for the new tech. And viola! Resident Evil is again a viable franchise.

You could remake Diablo I exactly as it was only using the technology of today and i'm willing to bet that even the most ardent DI fanboy would find it frustrating and limited based solely on the fact that we as gamers are just accustomed to how newer games work.

It's also not a very good idea to compare strategy depth between a 10+ year old game and a limited demo of a game where they admit that the character they are showing is buffed up so that it offers an interesting visual narrative.