I think this is why Blizzard has been vague about the release date. They are still deciding what changes (aesthetic, QoL, etc…) to introduce in the game and realize that some changes are quick to implement and some longer.
Corporate speak translation of “second half of the year” for D2R typically means not early in the second half of the year and Blizzard wanted to be vague is it takes longer than we think and release will be in December.
I suspect that the beta will be at least a couple of weeks. In addition, the technical alpha was single player only, 2 acts, and 3 classes. There may be many, many more things that come up in the multiplayer beta given that it is multiplayer and I assume will be more than 3 classes (or at least different classes than the alpha) and more acts.
They are giving us a hotbar with mouse and keyboard, because while they initially thought it would no longer feel like D2, it turns out feedback was positive for the idea.
They’re not going to make the game easier, only easier to play.
They are considering further QOL changes. (survey stuff maybe?)
They are surprised and happy that the community is asking for changes and find it nice to be on that side of the fence, instead of being the ones to change things and the community being negative about it.
So overall?
Expect more changes. Hard to say what. Definitely no increased inventory space, that’s for sure, but that’s all they confirmed isn’t happening for now, with tons of statements otherwise implying they are looking at or considering other things.
Read the interview again. They explicitly said they are currently looking at more changes.
The team also wanted to gauge the fanbase’s reaction to some of the small quality of life changes that had been implemented, such as automatic gold pick-up. “For the most part people really liked them,” Gallerani says. “In fact they want to see more. The game is still a work in progress - this was a tech alpha - so even from the design side we have a lot of thoughts about [additional] quality of life updates and ways we can make them better.”
“We can’t promise that we can or will change everything,” Lead Artist Chris Amaral adds. “But when there are things we agree with, we can push them a little further.”
“We do prioritise things though,” Gallerani continues. “If something isn’t communicating how to play the game, that needs to be fixed. The next thing would be if it’s betraying something, if something doesn’t feel like Diablo, that’s important. If it’s ‘hey, here’s my personal preference’ well let’s make sure we go through the bugs and other things first. The fact that we have this huge list is awesome.”
Mostly this shed light on how they think and how they feel about the community asking for more changes. The fact they’re positive about it is a huge deal.
"In a sense we’re on the other side of that hill, a place where people are talking about things we could add or change. It’s a much better place to be than, ‘it doesn’t feel like D2 anymore’.”
This shows that they prefer asking a few people for changes, than having people mad on the forums about the game not feeling like D2 anymore.
So - yeah - we might get an ingame clock now - and thats gonna be okay for everyone.
Sadly people who would prefer more changes will be disappointed - since that would lead people to feel like they are not playing D2 anymore.
If you want to be selective about how you read it and choose the tightest possible interpretation that also ignores all of the context around it (TWO rounds of official surveys containing mostly the same change ideas), sure. The idea those surveys were sent out for no reason whatsoever is pretty laughable, though, because it implies a company like Blizzard would waste money paying people to do something they won’t use at all.
Making the inventory bigger means more charms in your bag and that starts to change what the game is.”
which is the ENTIRE POINT of why u have that new space not be usable for charms…
we call the old 4x10 we used to have a “charm inventory”
we solved this like YEARS ago… this is what we are asking for…
what a STUPID comment… no one in their right mind would suggest increasing inventory space and still allowing that new space to have charms work in it.
NO ONE is asking for that.
that wouldn’t even BE a “QOL” change… it would just be a straight buff with no QOL at all because it would make the exactly same issue because we would be forced to fill our inventory with even MORE charms for more efficiency.
Notice they didn’t say anything about a charm inventory. They only commented on making the inventory larger. Which, yeah, you definitely should not make the inventory larger under the current system.
What feedback? A skill bar for mouse and keyboard wasn’t in the technical alpha.
It sounds like he was referring to the technical alpha as it was, so without a skill bar, and a skill bar would change that. I would have to watch the full interview to be sure.
Hotbar questions were in the second survey they sent out, actually. I assume when they talk about feedback they are including those two official surveys, and they mention the unofficial survey earlier in the interview, so they are definitely paying attention.
You don’t need to actually test something to know whether or not it still feels like the same game to you.
And I’m pretty sure most people would not call D2 a different game if they added the controller hotbar to mouse and keyboard as well. Which is what I definitely expect the survey said, because I know that’s how I answered the question, that the addition would not bother me at all.
Example: do you actually need to play a version of the game with rainbow-colored spells to know it won’t feel like D2? do you actually need to play a version of the game with the in-game clock at the top to know it’ll still feel like D2?
Accessibility is pretty important, I don’t see the issue with offering the hotbar to people who want it. As long as it’s optional.
