I hear ya…and I don’t doubt your info. But I’m an older gamer and have never really considered streams as THE only metric in which to measure a games success. I’m not saying you’re wrong, I’m just saying, you have to consider the data that isn’t collected.
Streams may pay the bills, but that’s not the only thing that gives a game lasting power.
Yeah, I like Rax. He can be a bit fanboyish at times, but seems like a good guy.
S4 is when the big itemization changes are coming. So yeah, it could definitely end up being a game changing season. However, if it’s just simple QoL stuff like more stash tabs, aspects going to the codex, and affixes being combined, that honestly won’t cut it.
This game needs massive changes to itemization, for example:
Ideally, they’d also double the amount of skills per skill tree and create skill combinations that yield interesting effects, but this is probably asking for an extremely unrealistic amount. And yes, I understand that skill changes aren’t itemization changes.
Anything short of major changes to itemization like those named above, simply won’t be enough.
Oh I totally agree. You’re absolutely right.
The devs have also said they have big plans that they can’t reveal yet, so I’m gonna hold them to that in the mean time.
S3 will likely just be small QoL stuff, 4 is going to be the major update we’re all waiting for and I agree, it needs to deliver - big time.
And there’s every indication (so far) that it will. If it doesn’t, then they’ll really tank D4, possibly worse than S1
at this point i am choosing to not believe them
they said the same thing for s1, telling us how it is filled with content etc and look what we got…
they did redeem themselves a little with s2 but i find it rather hard to trust them right now…
Agree 100%.
I maxed out my firewall/hydra sorc maybe a month or so ago, started leveling a WW barb turned HOTA and then quickly lost interest. Been there, done that.
This game definitely has what it takes and like you, I remain optimistic. That’s why I gave it a break over a month ago (I may have logged in once for 10 minutes). Good things take time and I’m willing to wait. I did with Cyberpunk 2077 and guess what? It paid off.
I don’t doubt that they’ll give it their best effort, but there are two major issues that could prevent them from really doing great things, imo: Lack of time, and a lack of vision.
Objectively, when you look at this game, anyone who has played the past Diablos can name a handful of things that were better about past releases, but didn’t make it into D4, for some reason. Now, on top of that, they seem to put so much stock into player feedback, it makes it seem like they don’t actually know what they’re doing. Essentially, they have too much ego to use what was successfully used in the past, while also lacking the knowledge to actually innovate.
They put so much stock into player feedback, they overly nerfed multiple builds, from player feedback based around nothing more than the first 25 levels of character progression during the beta. That’s completely insane, imo.
With great games, player feedback only functions to gauge whether or not something is enjoyable, or just how enjoyable it is. Player feedback is never supposed to function as a substitute for creativity, vision, or genuine development. And devs should only make changes to the game within the confines of the grand vision they all clearly understand.
But I genuinely think the D4 team just doesn’t have a vision.
I think you need to make new friends.
Problem solved.
Yeah it’s actually crazy just how well CDPR turned that game around.
And the devs do genuinely seem to care. Personally I blame Rod, and it would not surprise me if he is the main reason things went to crap. He doesn’t have the best track record, and Blizzard as a whole has an unfortunate history of upper management absolutely screwing up everything to the Nth degree
dont forget no man sky, i am pretty sure they did a complete 180!
cyberpunk started as a 4 and increased to a solid 8 for me, no man sky probably started as a 1 and now it is a easy 8, crazy
Wow, that’s actually incredible.
Yeah, I certainly think they care. It’s hard to say what is really causing their inability to really create an incredible game. Is it their team’s lack of ability, creativity, or knowledge? Or is it something from leadership, like time constraints, or simply forcing them to refrain from performing the changes that should happen?
I think the biggest reason is piss poor management and secondly, a team that isn’t as good as they think they are. This game reeks of desperation.
Bliz needs to go the phoenix route and be reborn as a microsoft team.
Like I said, it’s probably Activision Corporate.
Just look at what happened to Overwatch. Bobby pissed off Papa Geoff so much the dude resigned after what, 15+ years with the company and being senior VP.
And now OW will never be the same because it’s creator - and his grand vision - are gone.
Unless you want to grind all classes over and over again up to 100 and then spend the rest of your life doing Duriel grind (one of the most tedious activities in the game) after finishing the story, doing 100% map completion and finishing the seasonal journey there isn’t much else to do. It took me about week and a half after I bought the game on the Steam sale to complete all of the above.
Blizzard needs to work like coal miners to improve their game.
14 hour days in the coal mines. I’m not even making a joke that’s how urgent improvement is needed. The more player retention dies off the less Diablo 5 will sell. They need to make D4 a masterpeice now or in 7 years or whatever when Diablo 5 starts being promoted people are gonna say
Oh wow that’s cool! But they will wait. Millions of people will wait to buy. They will wait to hear from others if the game is any good because they will not waste their time again. They learned their lesson from Diablo 4.
So if the game isn’t good. Millions of people will not buy it. Sounds bad doesn’t it Blizzard? Ya it’s bad. So make Diablo 4 good now.
This game has HUGE balance issues. Not only PVP, but PVE as well. And it feels like after every update they make, the balance is so twisted.
You know what this reminds me of? Microsoft. Release content and use the crowds to test it. This is pretty much D4.
I definitely think that’s the amount of urgency they should have, but I wouldn’t force those hours on the employees.
People get bored with games and move on all the time. That wont stop them from trying the new product that gets hyped from everyone. Some of you clearly dont understand how this cycle works.
Unfortunately (and Blizzard has figured this out), the quality of the previous title in the franchise has little effect on the sales of the next game in the franchise, because Blizzard is incredible at marketing. They promise the world with every release, and everyone just crosses their fingers, hoping they actually deliver on those promises.
The only thing that will potentially negatively impact that cycle is another company stealing the loyal crowd that enjoys ARPG’s the most out of any genre. Even then, Blizzard will still have good sales for the next release, they just won’t have that ‘I play more than a casual’ crowd.
I would have to say its The Day After.