Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

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JaySevenZero
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Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by JaySevenZero »

Here is where you can leave your thoughts regarding the Diablo III / Reaper of Souls for possible inclusion in the podcast when it's recorded.
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dezm0nd
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by dezm0nd »

For those interested in playing along, Diablo 3 is £12.49 over at base.com for Xbox One.

http://www.base.com/buy/product/diablo- ... eexbox.htm

It's definitely time sensitive so be quick. Only posting here as you don't normally see this game at such a discount.
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macstat
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by macstat »

Oh right, it did come out on consoles. PC got significantly more support after release, so is it safe assume you guys will focus on PC but mention differences between those platforms ?
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ratsoalbion
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by ratsoalbion »

I think more of us probably played it on console to be honest. Well, I did, but then I'm not on that particular show.
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dezm0nd
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by dezm0nd »

I've put in 100+ hours on PC and will endeavour to make a play-through on console with some post-game time, for comparisons sake.

I'm hosting the show!
skidoosh

Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by skidoosh »

Is there something wrong with the console version? I've put about 40-50 hours in on PS4 and it's great. Is there more content ect. on PC? I've not looked at the history/comparisons of it all yet. Just coming to the end of my Hardcore run.
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by dezm0nd »

I'm not sure on what the differences are between the two and i'm trying to keep it that until I experience it first hand. I only know about a dodge roll mechanic on the console version which isn't present on the PC.

To be honest, these kinda games don't (or didn't as often) make it to console so I think to have it at all is a bit of a gift :)
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by ratsoalbion »

As far as I'm aware the console versions are spot-on, especially the current gen versions.
skidoosh

Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by skidoosh »

Yeah I have a friend who plays it on PC and he did refer to it as "kite simulator" jokingly which makes sense if dodge roll is missing. All I can say about the console port is it's the most wonderfully usable control+inventory system I've used in an RPG. I've just got into the reaper of souls part with my Hardcore character now.
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by AndrewBrown »

The Console versions don't get Season support, which injects quite a bit of staying power into the experience since it requires you to start from scratch every few months if you want to compete on Seasonal Leaderboards and earn the Seasonal Rewards.
skidoosh

Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by skidoosh »

That sounds really good! I might have to investigate that version too....
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macstat
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by macstat »

As far as im aware consoles didnt get as much after-release content as PC which get new seasons every couple of months. Those usually have new legendary sets that alter gameplay of classes, balance changes, but also fairly major changes like new maps, new end-game systems (bounty, rifts, greater rifts etc). Some of those systems probably are in console version, since i assume they were present during the release but i havent heard about later ones.
Im also curious about new DLC that will introduce new class (necromancer). I havent heard anything about it in regards of console version.

There's also a sad story in it. First couple of seasons were really rich in content, but last two were very lackluster. They didnt even added new armor sets (they were a sort of standard, at two new sets per season). That combined with changes to staff (some people left blizzard story here http://www.polygon.com/2016/7/1/1208349 ... e-director ) might mean that they are ready to move on from diablo 3 and just do a minimal support from now on. Its not really a secret that both Heartstone and Overwatch are now Blizzards most precious franchises with first one giving them amazing income https://mmos.com/news/activision-blizza ... -up-20-yoy and second being the new hottest thing. Also WoW while getting older and older still has a lot of players (probably less than 10 millions reported at the start of new expansion) with price of 13euro per month is nothing to sniff on ;). Im afraid that Diablo 3 is kinda in a spot where they just dont generate any additional income to them and that's why they wont commit more manpower to it.
skidoosh

Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by skidoosh »

That's amazing mate. Thanks for all the info. I'll give it all a read now!
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by dezm0nd »

I've begun my playthrough on Xbox One if anyone cares to join me on my run through then feel free! I'll leave my game open to public so just add dezm0nd and hop on in.
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by ThirdDrawing »

skidoosh wrote:Is there something wrong with the console version? I've put about 40-50 hours in on PS4 and it's great. Is there more content ect. on PC? I've not looked at the history/comparisons of it all yet. Just coming to the end of my Hardcore run.
I played through co-op on the PS3 and solo on the PS4. Both were great!
skidoosh

Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by skidoosh »

ThirdDrawing wrote:I played through co-op on the PS3 and solo on the PS4. Both were great!
Agreed! I've had to ban my ass from it. Diablo ate xmas!
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by Suits »

£12 !!!

I'm having some of that.
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Some Thoughts on Classic Diablo III

Post by AndrewBrown »

I wasn't sure how much time was going to be spent on classic Diablo III or how much experience people really had with it, so I wanted to put down a few paragraphs on the state of the game pre-Reaper of Souls as I saw it.

To put it in simplest terms, when Diablo III was released in May 2012, it was not ready.

Its beta test was a farce, infamously going months at a time without updates and not once letting players progress past the Skeleton King, i.e. the first third of the first act of four with four successive difficulty levels. In other words, the public beta test covered less than 1/36 of the total game in spite of running for over a year. The result was when Diablo III was finally released, everything past the Skeleton King felt unbalanced. It was not uncommon for certain standard enemy attacks to be one-hit kills; the Bull's charging attack in Act I, the Bee's projectile attacks in Act II, and the Demon Lord's ram attack in Act IV all spring to mind. Environmental effects, like burning floors or the bursting plant pods in the Far Oasis, could also kill your character in one hit. Certain enemy affixes bordered on abuse of the player; "Invulnerable Minions" is probably the most infamous of these, and my good friend Major Gamer and I had a standing policy to drop the game if we ran into it.

I don't mean to suggest that Diablo shouldn't be difficult, and indeed they've probably gone too far in the other direction, but playing Diablo III at launch felt more like a chore than a videogame.

One criticism that could be leveled at Diablo III's development process is it was too open. Perfectly normal pitfalls of game development were seen as double-backs or "broken promises," like how Runes were originally random drops or the Horadric Cube was an inventory item that could be carried around, freeing players to return to town only when they wanted to. Both of these design decisions were reconsidered before many even got to experience them, but they had already been announced, resulting in much churlish outcry. Other pre-release concepts do feel sorely missed, though. I remember an early developer video, perhaps the first, which described how important "controlling the battlefield" would be, showing the dev using a Barbarian's Leap ability to bypass some smaller enemies to kill Cultists before they transformed into a bigger threat. "If you let them transform," he assured us, "you'll regret it." I play Diablo III today and never trouble myself with any such things; anything and everything short of a boss is meat to be ground into sausage. I lament the tactical aspirations which this videogame never reached, but at the same time, grinding hordes of enemies into chunky salsa is a lot of the appeal.

And then there's Diablo III's content itself. Once you reached the level cap, which required beating the story three times over on three ascendant difficulty levels, "endgame" consisted of Inferno difficulty, which was... the same story all over again on a fourth difficulty level. For the sake of efficiency, endgame was reduced to playing and replaying Act III over and over and over and over again. Additions like the Infernal Machines tried to force players to spread out more, but instead resulted in them grinding on bosses they were already grinding to begin with. It felt like another casualty of the game never being publicly tested past the Skeleton King: There simply wasn't anything to do once you'd beaten it.

But probably the biggest sign of classic Diablo III's design woes was the Auction House. Diablo II had a thriving third-party auction house which worked with a combination of real-world money and Stones of Jordan, a rare Diablo II item that became de facto currency when Gold inflation reached points that you couldn't actually carry enough gold to buy things. Recognizing this, Diablo III launched with an in-game Auction House. But to keep the Auction House relevant to players, the Legendary and Set drop rate had to be moderated to keep the market from becoming oversaturated. The result was a comically low drop rate, and only players willing to spend real money or spend dozens of hours farming gold had a hope of assembling a complete Set. This ruined what made Diablo II so much fun: Killing things and looting what dropped, as the source of items became the Auction House and not the game world itself. It might astound some who are not aware, as today in Reaper of Souls you can see two or three Legendaries drop in an hour, but in all my time playing classic Diablo III for two years, I saw only two or three Legendaries drop total, and none of them at level cap when Legendaries are actually useful. It's no accident that the biggest and most immediate change that Reaper of Souls brought was dropping the Auction House entirely. It was an utterly ill-conceived idea from the beginning.

I think it's actually incorrect to say that Diablo III never got a proper beta test. It did receive a beta test, only it was sold as a finished game and a lot of us paid money for a retail copy to participate in it. I've heard stories about Blizzard cleaning house with the Diablo III development team, and Reaper of Souls is a testament to those rumors. With tweaks to difficulty, drop rates, and actually giving players something to do at endgame, it's a far superior product to its original release. But I'll write about that more—and have far kinder things to say—when we get closer to the podcast recording date.
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by dezm0nd »

Patch 2.4.3 - The celebration of Diablo's 20th Anniversary and season 9 is rolling out across servers now.

I've played the Darkening of Tristram and it's fun! :)
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Re: Diablo III / Reaper of Souls

Post by macstat »

Changelog for season 9 here http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/blog/20407576. Unfortunately its PC only .... for now!
I found a info that from season 10, consoles will get those updates along with PC's and macs. Given about 4 months for every season you guys will probably get it on spring. Source http://www.playstationlifestyle.net/201 ... ming-2017/ :) Rejoice :)
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