Im curious about an alternate universe where they didnt get rid of david brevik + his team.
Ive watched a few of david breviks interviews on youtube and his design philosophy is what d3+4 needed.
Im wondering, will blizzard ever rehire david brevik and the shaeffer brothers
No. Usually never say never. But it is safe to say no.
They don’t bother giving them a tribute, inviting them to new releases as mentors or have any sort of input.
This is absolutely normal since Blizzard’s headquarters haven’t been visited by a gamer or developer in the past 15-20 years.
Nobody actually knows if the words “game development” aren’t banned there. It could be censored, we will never know.
Yeah, it kind of sucks. Atleast poe chris wilson gives them their flowers inviting them to exile con and their own panel.
No king rules forever. Diablo fell when Diablo 3 was scrapped from Blizzard North and given to another team. It’s good to remember the past.
I hate to break it to you, but despite how much I loved Marvel Heroes, everything Brevik has touched since leaving Blizzard has failed. Torchlight fell apart after TL2, as well. Not to mention a lot of people complained about bright colors and cartoon graphics with D3; what was Torchlight? Bright colors and cartoon graphics.
Not sure we’d be better off if those guys stayed.
Well said, no king rules forever. It was basically a coup what blizzard did to brevik
Marvel Heroes had a big fanbase, it stayed until the end, and even did a massive gathering before the servers fell down. It was due to Disney not giving the license.
Torchlight 2 was mostly Blizz North, I don’t see where the failure is, its an iconic ARPG.
2/2 from what you said.
Diablo 3 didn’t fell because of its graphics only. There were multiple factors. Mostly the same as Diablo 4. Poorly released, poorly balanced, weak itemization system, weak skill system, a storyline that is still one of the worst till this day. From Diablo 1 to 4. 3 is one of the worst in any key moment, since the start until now. Took them near 25 seasons to make the game decent.
First of all, I said after TL2 and don’t try to act like people that haven’t played RoS, which literally toned down the colors, don’t still complain about the D3 colors.
Marvel Heroes didn’t have a big fan base. I was there from beta to its last day. If you played it enough, you would see the same players over and over. It was held up by whales, and before Disney pulled the license they did the “Big patch” that dumbed the whole game down and made it a joke.
Lastly, D3 post RoS is the best Diablo.
Yep, I agree. They barely salvaged D3. It became a decent game towards the end after many seasons and ROS expansion. It still doesnt have the diablo 2 spark, the feeling of finding a high rune + its itemization. D3 still feels off for me. D4 couldve captured the D2 spark.
Im no game developer, but i felt like if they added a high rune + a better trade system, d4 couldve captured some of the magic
I don’t think colors were ever a problem for D3. They just didn’t to the lightning correctly, that hurt the visuals of the game, which made it cartoonish instead of the grim Diablo we know. The excuse was "We just cant’'. Meanwhile D2R somehow did it magically, lol.
No, people used the terms “color palette” and complain about it to this day. It was a major complaint. Even when they darkened it with RoS, it still is a bit cartoonish.
I don’t like D2 or D2R, so for me, it didn’t do anything magical. The one props I’ll give to D2R is that is Blizzard Albany (my neck of the woods), and that’s not a lot of devs working on it.
Just curious, what dont you like about D2 and D2R? I’ve sunk maybe thousands of hours with d2 + d2r combined
They’re my favorite games of all time, and I guess theres no huge build diversity since theres a cookie cutter build for all class. Thats my only complaint if i had to reach
Probably, but atmosphere in these games is as important factor as gameplay, as itemization, as skill system, as progression being vertical or horizontal.
What Diablo 3 lacked from those is everything apart from vertical progression.
All the depth from previous Diablo’s was scrapped, in favor of numbers. That’s what RoS did. The vanilla Diablo 3 was even better than the obscene numbers that make no sense like a Korean mobile game. They made a game with a Main stat, Defense, Life and Resist.
The itemization was as simple as collect this set after 1 hour of gameplay and you can end the season 
The only good thing from Diablo 3 was the fluidity of combat.
The combat mostly. It’s very stiff. Also don’t care for inventory tetris or losing all your stuff when you die and doing a walk of shame that mostly is nothing but a time waster. Also don’t care for losing XP toward the end.
Story and CGI, music…that’s what I liked about D2. Everything else…meh.
Agree to disagree. While combat is what keeps me going back to the game, RoS story, music, atmosphere, etc was outstanding. I hated vanilla D3. I spent most of my time breaking vases and doing chest runs to sell junk on the RMAH (paid for a WoW expansion and Ros with the profits). I’ve put more time into D3 than any game I’ve ever played, except Marvel Heroes. Huge Silver Surfer fan. I was accepted into the private test of him, and had a Surfer cosmic that I raided on. Damn, I miss that game…
As far as D3 numbers…yeah, it got out of control. Last season I was DH just strafing with bola doing billions in instant, one shot group kills.
Probably. Vanilla was very barebones. But there was challenge, even if that was due to imbalance. When RoS dropped, farming became way too casual. Drops became way too common. Ugh, for better or worse the game got very very easy.
To be fair, drops were lower in vanilla to compensate for the fact gear could be bought with real money or gold. I’m a self found player only, no trades or buying. Vanilla definitely was challenging, but kind of in a cheap way. I would get bombed from elites from off my screen or sniped by insects, also from off screen. I was never able to clear Diablo in Hell before the nerf though. I’ll admit that. That’s why I was farming vases lol
It’s not a matter of hiring them back, they wouldn’t come back. You could sell off all of Bobby’s yachts and it still wouldn’t be enough money.
Blizzard North was long gone before D3 even came out. August 1, 2005 Blizzard North officially dispersed. Please tell me you haven’t been chasing this pipe dream for nearly 20 years.
We cleared inferno shortly after getting some gear 60+ level gear (dropping only in inferno). It wasn’t that bad. The bad part comes when you have to farm. Or lets say get the so wanted 100 paragons. Got them with 4 other friends but Alkeizer runs were just ugh. Trading was a part of the game. Drops were not a problem in Vanilla D3 despite the constant crying from the fanbase.
The thing is gaming was changing far before Diablo 3, when Diablo 3 dropped people already wanted things that are easier. The standards dropped to the point that, if a player has 3 stats. Attack/Defense/Life, that’s complicated and has to be even more simplified.
Developers did as much as they could to sell this game. Not to cater hardcore Diablo players or anything. That was the point where the link broke.
And Diablo 4 does the same, trust me, the affixes that people cry about now (too complicated, too many of them) will be simplified. It always happens in modern gaming to cater the masses.
Nah, havent been chasing this pipe dream. I was just watching some of david breviks design philsophies recently on youtube. Was curious about the history of blizzard north, also checked out some of exile cons panel with the blizzard north team.
It got me wondering, what couldve been
Although it’s not a Diablo game, Stormgate is looking pretty good. Made by some of the developers of Warcraft 3 and StarCraft 2. It’s an RTS but it shows promise. I’ve been watching the development ever since it was announced. Now I’m still skeptical, like I am with all games that haven’t been released but I am looking forward to it.
It’s nice to dream about what D4 could’ve been, but after hearing about the poor work environments, the horrible turn around rate from working at blizzard, the amount of fresh developers who never even worked on a video game, etc. I think it’s time to cut our losses and just let Blizzard go.