(https://www.gamesradar.com/games/diablo/diablo-4-tried-to-repackage-diablo-2s-grind-for-the-modern-era-but-series-overseer-rod-fergusson-says-the-consumptive-nature-of-a-live-service-made-it-unfeasible/)I was part the target audience for that d2 style chase. At least Rod has come out and pretty much admitted defeat and closed the door on that now. That will keep my expectations in check even going into the next expansion and beyond.
it wasn’t the “very long” chase, it was the variety of loot to obtain. There were so many tradeable (useful) items in D2.
In D4 95% of the uniques are garbage, and loot was replaced with “aspects”
D3 already proved this system doesn’t work, even without set items, its busted.
If D2R had personal loot (players see their own drops) I probably wouldn’t need to play another game as I’d be playing D2R, it would also bring the real-money value of these items way down because it would obviously be a little easier to acquire them which wouldn’t be a bad thing. Unfortunately this still hasn’t been added and I can’t be bothered to deal with pickit bots, been there and done that years ago lol. Pretty much the only reason why I don’t play D2R or D2 anymore. Everyone scrambling to grab the loot as soon as it drops, was done with that years ago.
This is silly because it didnt play anything like D2 at launch. The only comparable item is environment which was a bit draker and grittier.
I mean the D3 playerbase rejected the idea of an “end game” starting before max level. They want to hit max level and then have a leveling system at max level which I will never understand.
If it was modeled after D2 we would have had:
Yes they did take the rares are bis from original D2 which was boring imo. 1.08-1.09 was the best timeframe of the franchise.
Well, when you force us to play the season, of course we will want our characters to be better IN THAT SAME SEASON.
This is why your long chase don’t work.
Well, I said since the beta it was apparent they wanted to (or at least attempted to) do a hybrid of D2 and D3 - the original leveling experience alone was a huge indicator. It’s also apparent that due to feedback, they abandoned that idea and have pushed development toward D3 more than D2. At least they admitted it.
Even though there’s a lot of stuff I downright hate about D2, there’s definitely things I would’ve liked to see in D4, like Runes. And the mercs…which apparently they’re doing.
Never really felt like d2 to me, game has always been d3.5
And this was I believe the biggest problem. It had an identity crisis. It didnt know what it wanted to be. For better or worse im glad they finally chose a path.
D2 and D3 at the core are incompatible with each other.
What they failed on was breadcrumbs. D2 has a ton of mostly useless but fun items that could drop and a bunch of runes or gems that were actually useful to save or craft with along the way while waiting for that great item to finally drop.
D4 was literally nothing but boring text rich items until maybe after a year or two you might get something good.
Some truth in that for sure. I don’t think it’s that a live service can’t work for a long chase, but in a season reset model, with not a lot of attention given to eternal realm, then yea you don’t have years to chase. You have weeks really. I can see that.
Rod Fergusson: I’m the Lead Developer for Diablo 4.
Also Rod Fergusson: The D2 fans were the real Lead Developer all along.
Farming in D2 was fun, so much good stuff that could be found.
I mean…you say it didn’t play anything like D2, then point out it did in that end game started prior to max level and reaching wasn’t originally intended to be breezy or something everyone did. To this day, I have yet to get a level 99 in D2 and never will.
But yeah, can’t argue with a lot of your list. Even though a lot of that list are things I hate about D2 like pvp anywhere.
I should also add, at least on launch, combat was a lot slower. Switching to WT2, I remember having to do a lot of kiting and actually struggled on the first Capstone boss. One major difference is no potion spam. World bosses were also tougher, and there were a couple times my groups didn’t clear before the timer. Now, it’s faceroll for capstones and WB.
Skill trees are also more like D2. If you took out the passives, they’d look a lot like D2 trees, more than D3 anyway.
Its more like that all loot is soulless that is the issue.
You cant really compare the itemisation of D2 and D4. Just look at the Occulus in D2 - now look at it in D4.
First, the aspect thing is a real bad mechanic IMO as it makes the essence of what you found meaningless. The only things that matter “are the stats rolling good?”. You can slap an aspect on every single item and therefore “overwrite its essence”. That makes all legendary pants equal, they only differ in the stats roll.
Second, 90% of the aspects are just “get 20% more dmg”. My barb runs like 7 of those on different gear slots. Even tho more dmg is always welcome its boring and doesnt add much to the game beside world bosses going down in milliseconds. Why not fun and unique features, skills, shields, procs, aoe, shiny pixels etc.
Bash Barbs are the perfect example this season. Its the same basic attack it always was but now it does 100x its former dmg. Even tho I´m playing it, this is not really fun and by far not unique.
Last but not least did they bring this game out with a super tiny pool of uniques. Like as if all the unique loot from D1-D3 just vanished and didnt find their way into D4. 1-2 uniques per slot, and most of their powers are way below what you would get when slapping an aspect on your lego gear. Stll not a single unique focus for the sorc, or a totem for the druid.
Also, no belt - wtf why no belt 