One of the most annoying things while actually playing this game is wandering pointlessly in search of points of interest on the map. Entries/exits or waypoints, usually. This gets really annoying when dealing with large dungeons, because it involves a TON of backtracking, which takes away from the actual gameplay. Act 3 jungles are the worst offenders, but the problem is not limited to them and the game sometimes does very well in this regard - Act 1 wildreness always has a path to the next point of interest, act V open maps ( bloody foothills and such ) have a distinct direction to them.
On the other hand - Arcane sanctuary - annoying to navigate as a group, maggot lair - the same. Durance of hate 2 - dear god, who thought making this map a sprawling maze was a good ideaâŚ
Suggestion:
Streamline game maps:
- maze maps should be small and sweet ( nightmare difficulty Forgotten Tower is the best )
- all maps should have a distinct entry->exit direction to them ( in lieu of act V maps )
- avoid backtracking
- always either reveal the location, or at least mark on the map where the waypoint is
- keep monster density somewhat consistent
- add âentry portalâ spell, that transports us to the entry of a given dungeon, just like town portal moves us to the, well, town
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This reminded me of Elder scrolls Oblivion introduced âQuest arrowâ and âFast travelâ, while in Morrowind you had to search and use information at your disposal to navigate.
Generally dumbing down.
I think there should be some concept of âClear everything in areaâ like Act 1 Den of evil.
To make game interesting. Not just teleport over to destination and avoid 90% of enemies. But to make you face your most horrible foes like Gloams, dolls, minotaurs, Lister, etc. Making the game more challenging, not easier. And some reward for clearing the area of every monster.
Iâm of the opinion that a game should be engaging on the level of what it does best. In the case of Diablo - it is character building and combat. Exploration that adds nothing to the game as it is - while backtracking or aimlessly wandering about takes away from it, actively leading to the culture of âRunsâ.
As this game is played - people always want to go from point A to point B and never backtrack - Act2 and Act4 open square maps are explored by licking the sides, Act3 jungles are avoided alltogether - and so on. I merely suggest to be honest with players and cake into the game some sense of direction. Point-A to Point-B with short interruptions to the sides.
Mazes in D1 worked fine because they were tiny - about a quarter of the size of typical D2 map. I would prefer that to the sprawling mess we have now. D1 mazes simply donât scale.
I agree with character building and combat and not exploration. And still you skip most of the combat like gloams dolls minotaurs lister and basically 90% of monsters on map so you snipe bosses or kill cows from afar⌠Thats what i wanted to say. There is no reward for it, so 90% monsters are skipped.
I mean yes, currently game is about mfing Pits, Ancient tunnels, Chaos, Countess, Mephisto, Baal over and over, or speedrunning/rushing⌠for which your ideas of adding entraces would help more.
I wouldnât mind adding of some paths to act3 jungles, that wonât hurt noone.
You get more rewards for killing lots of monsters fast. But the downtime of backtracking makes this moot. Which is why people donât do it. Cows are the best example - consistent path ( round circle ), good monster density, no downtime â good reward.
If, say, âThe abbadonâ in Act 5 was promoted to level 85 and made 10 times longer, but not wider, people would be doing Abbadon Runs. I aim for the entire game to be structured like this.
Okay, I see now that you are either trolling me, or you want Diablo 2 Resurrected to be Diablo 3. Plenty of games already mimic D3. We donât need D2R to do that as well.
ââŚand that is why we need players to skip 99% of the game. Being unapproachable is what we do here in D2R.â
If anything - I want D2R to be more like D1 - small, approachable and sweet with a nice sense of direction and pacing.
Diablo 1 is more approachable than Diablo 2? In what way? Diablo 1 is harder than Diablo 2 and even more brutal in a number of ways. ID an item and it gets worse. item breaks and it is gone forever. You die and all your gear gets thrown on the ground (in multi. In SP you lose all progress since last save).
D1 and D2 have maze like confusing maps. D3 has linear, simple maps with indicators on where to go if you had to actually take a minute. Hand holding is almost always a negative. I am all for informing players of how the game works. Diablo 2 can do a better job of that for sure. But making it linear and telling you where to go and what to do is boring.
We are talking about maps. So lets focus about maps.
D1 has mazes - but mazes are tiny - about a quarter of a size of your typical D2 maze. There is very little complexity you can cram there. Thus you enter a map, clear it out, loot the place, go down. I actually have done so in source port not too long ago. This gives a nice sense of direction. Heck - in hell the map is, in 99% of cases, a loop.
The issue is that those mazes donât scale to maps that are much larger than that and it quickly becomes not really entertaining, because if a given leg of the maze does not lead to the exit, you need to backtrack. It is even worse if you need to find a specific place ( a waypoint, a quest cave ) or if the map was specifically designed to be confusing, like A3 jungles.
Sure - in A3 jungles you always go in the single direction, but all the nooks cause exploring it a chore. I would know, as my âconditionâ requires me to have all the waypoints in an act before leaving it.
Mate - I specifically gave examples of where D2 does it well:
- forgotten tower ( the countess ) mazes - love em - both nightmare and hell they perfectly strike the balance
- outdoors in act1 - always a path to places of interest
- outdoors in act5 - large, but always a clear direction to where to go
- kurast maps ( bazaar, upper, lower, travi ) - same deal, albeit searching for a waypoint is a chore
- mini-hells in Act5 - love em. GO in, murder stuff, go out.
- River of Flame - same deal, usually has a clear direction to it
- Flayer dungeons - small, sweet, get in, do your thing, go out
- Harem levels - same deal
But then - outdoors in A2 and A4, A3 jungles - large, confusing, empty, and explored by licking the walls. Kurast sewers - no structure, repetitive and large for no apparent reason. Durance of Hate 2 in nightmare and hell - dear go why so large?
I see your opinion and respect it. I disagree though. I like Diablo 2 maps more than any other game in the genre. PoE is pretty good too actually, and Grim Dawn is good, but very different because it is static. Diablo 3 is very boring for most maps and doesnât have enough open and sprawling areas for my taste.
Wouldnât this just shorten an already short game? If you only map to important places, then you get the question of why have anything else? Why not just have a path map like PoE does where you canât wander off and get lost, you are just walking a path killing everything there.
PoE already exists. I also think it would be bad to change D2 in any map way. I also hope D4 has areas you can wander around in and find odd things you didnât expect or need.
Letâs pretend that rushing does not exist.
Not really - it would make people spend more time on a map. The issue is that you can make a maze that is 4x4 âblocksâ in size, and players will explore, on average, 6-8 blocks of it. Currently this is how this game is being played. If you made this maze 2x4, they will still explore the same area, because on average the exit and entry are on the opposite sides.
Or you can take the same real-estate and make 2x8 maze, making players explore 8-12 blocks, and still knowing where they are and where to go, because the exit was usually on the opposite of entry.
Years ago I made a mod to D2 which, as a theme, was about polishing D2 gameplay. It had its own little community and people generally liked that I made most maps smaller. It was 2008-ish so years before D3 even came out.