Oh, so you would call D3 to D2 innovation? It’s really innovative how games aren’t in a list anymore (and that there’s a good replacement lol) and how trading was removed. It’s really innovative that half of the items are gone. It’s really innovative that players are limited to 6 skill and that 0skills, auras, curses and half the item mods are removed. It’s really innovative that your character doesn’t have skill or stat points.
Completely different, not innovative. Seems to have gone backward, if reducing complexity to the bare minimum is your idea of innovation and progressing the series I’m going to have to disagree. Simplifying can be good but Diablo 3 went too far.
Also, when D2 came out half the player base wasnt playing d1 6 years later. I guess D2 innovated and IMPROVED upon the D1 systems. They didn’t change them just to be different. Changes should improve the game. I find it hard to argue that removing so much from the game and taking it backward in many ways was an improvement.
This is the only part I disagree with in what seems to be a very well summarized post. D3 guys should’ve reinvented the attribute system, not scrap altogether. Well, they did the same thing but somehow/someway turned out to be EVEN WORSE (i.e. too binary, either you need the stat, 100% use or you don’t, i.e. 0%)
In general, I’m VERY GLAD that the D4 team left the “traditional” Str/Dex/Int/Vit system and are trying to reinvent the whole thing to something more usable for all classes all times possible
D2 players won’t complain about d4 cause they won’t waste their time with it this time around. The trailer wasn’t that good and the gameplay looks just like d3 (him… guess this would be considered complaining?). Point being D2 fans bought D3 on faith it would be good, it wasn’t no one will faithfully buy D4 this go round we’ll be busy playing Grim Dawn or if lucky Grim Dawn 2.
I played D2 for 12 years. I lost interest in pushing after losing 2 lvl 99s to Win XP virus/worms.
I only got D3 in 2015 when I finally got a computer that could play it.
Thankfully, it was after ROS and the changes that came with it.
There was an adjustment period because I too had hoped for an improved version of D2 instead of the new game that they created.
Now that I am used to it, I can’t make myself go back to D2.
I don’t think Blizzard “hates” D2.
Each of the games have their own, unique identities.
D4 and D:I will, too.
We may or may not like them or play them, but it doesn’t mean they Hate the games that came before.
Off topic: I still prefer the Pre- Michael McDonald Doobie Brothers.
Except it’s not true for D3. I get that you want to enlighten us with your cliché arguements but they don’t apply to this particular case. D3 didn’t offer more to the fans, it didn’t innovate or improve it just straight up scraped systems and simplified everything. D2 on the other hand did exactly that and that is why your analogy falls flat.
Whatever. Blizzard will barely notice and care less whether D2 fans buy D4 or not. They’re going to hate D4 no matter what, so don’t even try to make the game appeal to them. And anyway, for the the vast majority of this playerbase, D3 is their first Diablo game, and D4 will sell like hot cakes, D2 fans or not, and bring in a bunch of new players who have never played either D2 or D3.
Maybe it will be better for all concerned if D2 fans don’t buy D4? Who wants more of this ‘back in my day we did it like this’ rose-tinted glasses nostalgia in the D4 forums?
I absolutely love Diablo 1 2 and 3, I think I would have played d2 longer, if I could have done ladder runewords and ubers on non-ladder. Mainly because by the time I had gear enough to go to Uber’s ladders were resetting… was so annoying. I’ve only seen an Uber Diablo once outside of Uber Tristram. I don’t like the fact that it almost requires duping in order to spawn him.
D2 would belong to do Classic Games team, which is not an easy topic.
Most youngsters are interested in fancy new technologies, not 10, especially not 20 year old coding techniques. So your hiring pool is limited for a start.
There are ongoing projects, SC2 and HOTS maintenance.
Then you have WoW:C and WoW:BC, the latter of which needs resources. While Classic is fine, there are some general issues to resolve.
As for Diablo resources, D4 is ongoing and announced, which suggests that the game is well underway. Announcing D2 would create an urge from the players to release it, which might clash, although arguably could be a preparation.
Yet, WC3 was reforged recently and needs lots of attention, plus it was an eye opener for some.
Overall, the recent classic games haven’t generated infinite love.
Part of it is the internet complain culture, and with so many players, there is no way for all to agree.
If I’d be sitting in the portfolio manager chair, I’d say to keep focused on ongoing projects and make them good, better than recent stuff.
There is also a risk that pulling D2 forward would just generate the need to power creep it to oblivion, similar to D3. Eventually, D2 as you know it would exist no more. It could very well become D3-.
They don’t “hate” it. They simply know that D2 is a very old, very poorly aged game mechanically, so pretty much nothing from D2 is usable anymore for a modern gamer, aside the very core ARPG design (which D3 inherited fully).
You have to realize that no matter how much fun you personally had with D2 20 years ago, and how fond your memories are - that doesn’t mean that today this game is any good. The genre has made a huge step forward compared to 20 years ago.
If I made a new game today with modern graphics but copied D2 design as closely as I possible could (But this game was decidedly NOT Diablo and made by a nameless studio) - That game would be called complete crap. That’s the reality of it.
They don’t hate it. They just thought they made a few mistakes on design choices and infrastructure wise and tried to reverse it. One of the well known former developers of D3 still play Diablo 2 to this day.
In that case why are they bringing back D2 stats and skill levels that makes it more like D2 than D3 otherwise why even bother changing it back to the D2 days?
Exactly. And if D4 is bad or I don’t like it, I’ll just stop playing it. I also won’t come to the forums to publicly whine like an entitled and petulant child because the game isn’t what I wanted it to be.
