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Diablo III
Jun. 21st, 2012 12:22 pmSo it's been since April that I have posted here. This mostly has to do with my not doing much of anything. I have been very focused on my academics. However, at the end of May I was gifted Diablo III, so I figure I'll discuss my experience playing this game a little bit now. So far I actually enjoy the game a lot. Although I actually like Diablo II a lot better, this game is still fun. Lots of running around and killing demons. There are four modes to the game: normal, nightmare, hell, and inferno where each represents a different difficulty. You must beat each on to unlock the next, and each mode offers new, better, sets of items to acquire and craft. Although the quests from mode to mode are the same, each replay is a little different as the map generator and encounter generator are random.
Although I do like the game because it is fun to play, there are a number of things that prevent the game from being as good as Diablo II. The first is that after normal mode, leveling is pretty insignificant in and of itself. In normal mode I got stuck, a lot. But if I fought enough enemies, I would either level or they would drop an item that would be an upgrade on an item I have already equipped, and I could continue on in the game. After normal mode that stops mattering as much. Levels are irrelevant when strong enemies are capable of one shot killing characters in a 10 level range (for reference as to how large that range is, the max level is 60). Thus items are king in Diablo III. After normal mode, the only real way to get past a rut is to get better items to improve your character, as leveling typically doesn't improve your character enough. But sadly it's very difficult to get a good item to drop from killing in game monsters. You do have the ability to craft items by destroying pick up items for parts and using them to make new ones. I think this mechanic is awesome. As you level your crafting ability (which is done by giving money and blacksmith plans/tomes/etc. to a blacksmith) you unlock the ability to create better and better items. Each item has a known base damage and known number of stat affixes, however, what those stat affixes are and how good they will be are random. So it often takes a number of tries to get a weapon that is any good. For example, I might craft a bow, but it gets a strength bonus and vitality bonus (affixes that would both be good for a tanking melee character, but hardly an archer). So often to craft a good item you must invest a great deal of money as well as salvaged material. It often ends up being an inferior method to the third and final item acquisition method: the auction house.
At the auction house you can buy and sell the items you find in game both for gold and (more recently) actual currency. This is often the cheapest and quickest way to get the items you want. Using the auction house also allows you to better design your character strategy, as you can search for specific affixes to items to implement the strategy you want, as opposed to trying to work in whatever item drops for you or whatever items you can craft. I like this, as the characters themselves lost a lot of customization from Diablo II (but gained flexibility). However, because the auction house is so much better at item grabbing than either of the other two methods, the game becomes more like playing the stock market than actually fighting demons. You get stuck, so you have to buy better items. But first you have to raise the money, so you try to sell items in the auction house. The items you found suck and won't sell, so you have to try to buy items on the auction house and flip them for gold. It's like I'm playing a bloody real estate game! I don't want to have to waste my time playing the item real estate game. I want to kill stuff!
Fortunately, Blizzard recently patched the game, and made the cost of crafting items much much cheaper. It is still very expensive to level your crafting ability, but this is a one time expense. So it requires a large initial investment, but the production cost is low. This, I think, is a good balance between crafting and the auction house. Because the initial investment is so high, only a few people will choose to use crafting to get their items, and so the auction house won't be flooded with crafted items. On the flip side, if you just want to play and don't want to spend all your time in the auction house, crafting is now a viable alternative to get you past the hard parts of the game as long as you use your money to improve your crafting skills in between points where you get stuck.
Well there you have it, my impression of Diablo III. Overall, despite this being somewhat of a rant, I have fun with the game. I am currently playing a demon hunter (archer), and will post a few screen shots of my character looking cool on here later. Sorry for the length :P
Although I do like the game because it is fun to play, there are a number of things that prevent the game from being as good as Diablo II. The first is that after normal mode, leveling is pretty insignificant in and of itself. In normal mode I got stuck, a lot. But if I fought enough enemies, I would either level or they would drop an item that would be an upgrade on an item I have already equipped, and I could continue on in the game. After normal mode that stops mattering as much. Levels are irrelevant when strong enemies are capable of one shot killing characters in a 10 level range (for reference as to how large that range is, the max level is 60). Thus items are king in Diablo III. After normal mode, the only real way to get past a rut is to get better items to improve your character, as leveling typically doesn't improve your character enough. But sadly it's very difficult to get a good item to drop from killing in game monsters. You do have the ability to craft items by destroying pick up items for parts and using them to make new ones. I think this mechanic is awesome. As you level your crafting ability (which is done by giving money and blacksmith plans/tomes/etc. to a blacksmith) you unlock the ability to create better and better items. Each item has a known base damage and known number of stat affixes, however, what those stat affixes are and how good they will be are random. So it often takes a number of tries to get a weapon that is any good. For example, I might craft a bow, but it gets a strength bonus and vitality bonus (affixes that would both be good for a tanking melee character, but hardly an archer). So often to craft a good item you must invest a great deal of money as well as salvaged material. It often ends up being an inferior method to the third and final item acquisition method: the auction house.
At the auction house you can buy and sell the items you find in game both for gold and (more recently) actual currency. This is often the cheapest and quickest way to get the items you want. Using the auction house also allows you to better design your character strategy, as you can search for specific affixes to items to implement the strategy you want, as opposed to trying to work in whatever item drops for you or whatever items you can craft. I like this, as the characters themselves lost a lot of customization from Diablo II (but gained flexibility). However, because the auction house is so much better at item grabbing than either of the other two methods, the game becomes more like playing the stock market than actually fighting demons. You get stuck, so you have to buy better items. But first you have to raise the money, so you try to sell items in the auction house. The items you found suck and won't sell, so you have to try to buy items on the auction house and flip them for gold. It's like I'm playing a bloody real estate game! I don't want to have to waste my time playing the item real estate game. I want to kill stuff!
Fortunately, Blizzard recently patched the game, and made the cost of crafting items much much cheaper. It is still very expensive to level your crafting ability, but this is a one time expense. So it requires a large initial investment, but the production cost is low. This, I think, is a good balance between crafting and the auction house. Because the initial investment is so high, only a few people will choose to use crafting to get their items, and so the auction house won't be flooded with crafted items. On the flip side, if you just want to play and don't want to spend all your time in the auction house, crafting is now a viable alternative to get you past the hard parts of the game as long as you use your money to improve your crafting skills in between points where you get stuck.
Well there you have it, my impression of Diablo III. Overall, despite this being somewhat of a rant, I have fun with the game. I am currently playing a demon hunter (archer), and will post a few screen shots of my character looking cool on here later. Sorry for the length :P
