08-10-2004, 07:56 PM
I have a long history with games and have worked as a beta tester for years. This does not make me an expert, just opinionated.
If they wanted to make Diablo III and get it right, it would need to be a prequel. A multiple part prequil.
First Part. The Single Player Game. In SP, players would get to make their own character or play a Legendary Hero. Such as Sigon, Cathan, Irathra, etc. And flesh these characters out. From Hsaru to the Immortal King, flesh them out. LOTS of replay there, each one in a slightly different perspective and storyline in DHistory. The Immortal King might see the world very differently being a xenophobic barbarian then say, the mighty knight Sigon. To see the full story, players would have to play each character, gaining much in the way in playstyle and skill. Did I mention replay value? There's probably a couple of months to maybe over a year in gameplay for most folks.
Multiplayer. Stick with the D2 format. Keep player games down to a limited number of players. Ditch predetermined character templates. Check out the Avernum series from Spiderweb Software. (And see my name in the credits. Shameless plug) Character creation is totally open ended. You can make fighter mages, priests, warrior priests, mage priests, mage thieves, it's all open ended. You get a character you want. Just the way you want it. If you spread out, you pay for it. If you specialize, you become very powerful.
By keeping characters open ended, you would hopefully find balance. Most folks would probably Red Mage their characters, balancing out everything for an effective all purpose character. The system would also allow a good deal of variants. If somebody wanted an ubertough bare chested barbarian that feared and hated magic, they could do it.
Set the storyline to tell the tale of how the Horadrim hunted down and destroyed the Three. Have different acts. 3 acts for each of the Three, with one of the Prime Evils being destroyed in the third act of their set. For the first 2 acts, toss in the Minor Evils. Either in dealing with them to destroy the Three, or two thwart their plans to dominate the Burning Hells and the Earth.
In each of the acts, have a chance to learn special skills. Skills you can't add skill points to, skills you could only improve by paying for training. Skills that would allow you to parry, resist magic, attack with weapons or magic, powerful healing, etc. Everybody would start with basic skills, but these skills would be both hard to get, and take a great deal of difficulty and time to gather the cash and the experience to be trained in them. Skills would mean more this way. And make a skill more expensive to get for each level learned. For example. Hrothgar of Horrible Halitosis wants to learn how to parry. Now he is a dual weilding barbarian type character so this would be pretty handy allowing one of his swords to act like a shield. He is in Act I, part II, and has found a crusty old vet living in a hut high on top of a quill rat infested hill. It's going to cost him 5000 gold to gain a level of parry. After doing so, he finds he can't live with out the parry skill. To gain another point, it's going to cost him 7500 gold. And again, 10,000 gold. That's expensive. What does Hrothgar do? Does he buy more of the skill that keeps him alive or does he buy the ingredients to craft a better axe?
Tough call.
I'll post more ideas later if anybody has the slightest interest. Till then, don't want folks snoring.
If they wanted to make Diablo III and get it right, it would need to be a prequel. A multiple part prequil.
First Part. The Single Player Game. In SP, players would get to make their own character or play a Legendary Hero. Such as Sigon, Cathan, Irathra, etc. And flesh these characters out. From Hsaru to the Immortal King, flesh them out. LOTS of replay there, each one in a slightly different perspective and storyline in DHistory. The Immortal King might see the world very differently being a xenophobic barbarian then say, the mighty knight Sigon. To see the full story, players would have to play each character, gaining much in the way in playstyle and skill. Did I mention replay value? There's probably a couple of months to maybe over a year in gameplay for most folks.
Multiplayer. Stick with the D2 format. Keep player games down to a limited number of players. Ditch predetermined character templates. Check out the Avernum series from Spiderweb Software. (And see my name in the credits. Shameless plug) Character creation is totally open ended. You can make fighter mages, priests, warrior priests, mage priests, mage thieves, it's all open ended. You get a character you want. Just the way you want it. If you spread out, you pay for it. If you specialize, you become very powerful.
By keeping characters open ended, you would hopefully find balance. Most folks would probably Red Mage their characters, balancing out everything for an effective all purpose character. The system would also allow a good deal of variants. If somebody wanted an ubertough bare chested barbarian that feared and hated magic, they could do it.
Set the storyline to tell the tale of how the Horadrim hunted down and destroyed the Three. Have different acts. 3 acts for each of the Three, with one of the Prime Evils being destroyed in the third act of their set. For the first 2 acts, toss in the Minor Evils. Either in dealing with them to destroy the Three, or two thwart their plans to dominate the Burning Hells and the Earth.
In each of the acts, have a chance to learn special skills. Skills you can't add skill points to, skills you could only improve by paying for training. Skills that would allow you to parry, resist magic, attack with weapons or magic, powerful healing, etc. Everybody would start with basic skills, but these skills would be both hard to get, and take a great deal of difficulty and time to gather the cash and the experience to be trained in them. Skills would mean more this way. And make a skill more expensive to get for each level learned. For example. Hrothgar of Horrible Halitosis wants to learn how to parry. Now he is a dual weilding barbarian type character so this would be pretty handy allowing one of his swords to act like a shield. He is in Act I, part II, and has found a crusty old vet living in a hut high on top of a quill rat infested hill. It's going to cost him 5000 gold to gain a level of parry. After doing so, he finds he can't live with out the parry skill. To gain another point, it's going to cost him 7500 gold. And again, 10,000 gold. That's expensive. What does Hrothgar do? Does he buy more of the skill that keeps him alive or does he buy the ingredients to craft a better axe?
Tough call.
I'll post more ideas later if anybody has the slightest interest. Till then, don't want folks snoring.
All alone, or in twos,
The ones who really love you
Walk up and down outside the wall.
Some hand in hand
And some gathered together in bands.
The bleeding hearts and artists
Make their stand.
And when they've given you their all
Some stagger and fall, after all it's not easy
Banging your heart against some mad buggers wall.
"Isn't this where...."
The ones who really love you
Walk up and down outside the wall.
Some hand in hand
And some gathered together in bands.
The bleeding hearts and artists
Make their stand.
And when they've given you their all
Some stagger and fall, after all it's not easy
Banging your heart against some mad buggers wall.
"Isn't this where...."