Diablo III - OPEN Beta Weekend starting today for EVERYONE!

[lestatdark]

Staude said:

lestatdark said:

Staude said:

lestatdark said:

Braindead NPCs unfortunately are a trademark of these kind of action-RPG games (and most games as well). I agree that it shouldn't be hard to program the NPC AIs so you could have simultaneous conversations or to make them more aware of their environment, but would it be an effective thing to do since I don't believe most players would have noticed it or probably thought it was a mere novelty.

In DII you could also have abilities in quick access (on the Fx keys, all the way to F12), but I hear that now you're limited to 4 hotkeys + the 2 mouse keys. Even though you can quick swap hotkey skills even during combat, I have to see if it's not too clunky for me. 

Maybe, but it helps immerse you in the world in my opinion :P it might just be extra, but it would be nice to see regardless. I'm pretty sure some other games have done this in the past.

I forgot all about that :P - And yes it is. - I also heard you could use Q though I'm not sure. EDIT - Just read the rest of the thread. And yes, it does look like a way for them to make it more console accessable.

I don't like how your unlocking is completely linear with no branching paths in where you want to take your character..

 

But it's easy to talk about what you don't like. I wont be able to properly tell how everything works till I've played the full game. Based on prior games, Blizzard 'usually' knows what they are doing.

 

I do worry that blizzard has become afread to push forward as their latest games seem to play it very safe when it comes to evolution though - Like they, in the fear that it wont live up to peoples expectations deliberately hold back in the creative department.. And I worry if they are going to dumb down the experiences to a point where you feel like the game thinks you are stupid :P

I think when it comes to their franchises, Blizzard knows that they must walk a very thin and critical line. Not only are they amongst the most beloved franchises of all time, they're also popullated with lots of hardcore fans who would be extremely hard to please if they did any kind of extreme change or evolution to their series. By playing it safe, they avoid schisms in the fanbase and give everyone more of what they do best without compromising too much. 

They didn't used to though. Up until starcraft 2, each of their games have been a major departure from the prequal, while maintaining what made it great.

Look at the evolution diablo 2 had over diablo, warcraft 3 over warcraft 2, and even the departure that is world of warcraft from the rest of that series. I think it's likely that many of the newer staff is worried, like you said, in regards to their massive fanbase. I don't really think they should play it safe though. In the past, they've managed to evolve their series in good directions (though I personally could never get into world of warcraft, it's massively popular)

I agree that they used to evolve each iteration of their games before (though Diablo II wasn't a major departure from Diablo, they only added a couple of things that weren't on the original while mantaing a lot of the core gameplay), but that was because they kept the same developing teams around. 

Also, I think that in the past the fans were more open to changes and evolution to their beloved franchises and welcomed them without being too harsh if those changes weren't that good. That doesn't happen nowadays, as most fans literally hate any kind of change that doesn't seem to fit with their "ideal" of what should be in or out of the games. For example, WoW it's, as you said, massively popular, but at the cost of alienating the grand majority of the prior Warcraft fanbase, since the majority of the WoW crowd had/has never played a Warcraft game before, and the previous Warcraft crowd will only accept the series back if Blizzard develops Warcraft IV to the way it used to be.

As for Diablo III, they are indeed playing it safe to please the previous fanbase, while trying to keep it accessible enough for newcomers to the series and taking a few queues from "Diablo-like" games that have been released in these past years, especially Titan Quest (which also doesn't evolve the formula of Diablo II that much, but that doesn't refrain from making it the best game of the genre outside the Diablo games).

I think that if they're succesful with Diablo III, they'll implement changes as the game gets patches and with the feedback they'll get from the players. Remember that Diablo II went through massive changes with some patches (especially 1.08, 1.09, 1.11 and 1.13) that altered some core functionalities, especially in the skills department. If they were able to do that with DII, then the possibilities for DIII are indubitebly bigger when it comes to upgrades/changes in the future.