@cpfast Well I'm upto Act II on Nightmare difficulty which is the one after you beat normal. And so far I've only seen Legendary items on other players, none have dropped for me.. so yeah.. very rare in deed.
I think, as you mention, the loot rareness has been tweaked in favour of the real money auction house. But that said it's up to each person whether or not they are THAT desperate for certain items. I think it's important for everyone to remember, as much as rare loot is great, don't forget it's just a game and play to pass time in an enjoyable manner. Though I remember D2 as being very scarce with good drops too. In D3 you just get a LOT more frequent items dropping.
You start off in normal mode which is easy at times and can be hard and annoying at times too. Annoying because the game uses some stupid checkpoint system. So say you fight a boss (which some have multiple stages to the battle) and you die right before killing them, if you're solo-ing, you have to start over from the last checkpoint before the battle even began. . only this time your items have taken a 10% hit to their durability.
The game plays different to D2, but is very similar as well. Has its ups and downs like any game (maybe more negatives than D2). But, what the new team behind the Diablo series managed to pull off is a rather addictive ARPG game. Not worth the 90% that most sell out reviewers are giving, but played for what it is, it's a pretty decent game.
Its no substitute for Torchlight 2, nor D2, as neither are for D3. They're all good games that should fit right at home in the collection of any ARPG fan. People just have too much expectations of a game to be a certain way these days... I know.. I was criticising it a few days ago. It is what it is, you either enjoy it or you don't. No review will give you certainty that you will enjoy a game. Grab a trial key off someone and give it ago.
@chikahiro94 That would be the best way of them to go about it. We'll have to wait and see though.
The thought of EA get itself involved with the indie community makes me sick to my stomach though. Fingers crossed they don't f@#$ up another good thing we've got going on.
Bah.. A bad person helping an old lady across the street is still a bad person. And in business where there's a condition (such as a 90 day grace period), you know there are ulterior motives.
I don't like the way EA does business, and playing Mr Nice guy is not helping them.
Please EA, leave kickstarters alone, they dont need you. I think the last thing the gaming community would like to see is "EA, proud supporters of kickstarted games.' Though it would make for a good laugh.
@chikahiro94 But what about those who have already funded the project and will be receiving a digital copy? Will their digital copy be locked into origin? That's my concern.
@Radoria Diablo 2 was just a very polished and groundbreaking game. It offered great visuals, gameplay, music, atmosphere, re-playability, addictive looting, character creation, fun single player, even better multiplayer, and on and on. It had it all.. and everything it did it did extremely well. It was done so well, in fact, that it was hard to fault. It ticked all the boxes. It was the quintessential game back in the day for most gamers willing to give it a go.
It's always hard to top something made so well - the same reason why many movie sequels bomb. Quality can't be forced, it just happens. When everything goes together perfectly, all the positives are in place, it's hard to fault for dislikes, you've got a hit on your hands. Blizz are usually good at ironing out the negatives and upping the positives. Unfortunately, when the negatives are actual aspects of the game, gamers know it's not as simple as patching things in or out of it. Things such as always online DRM, RMAH, Character progression changes which forcefully shift the focus out of balance on to loot (suspiciously in line with the addition of the RMAH? hmm? Did I mention suspicious?... in a time when casual and free to play games seem to be pretty good short term revenue raises?). Not to mention the half-assed rationalizations for all of it which the fans seem to chew up without obviously giving it much thought.
I'm sure there are many positives and, if you are able to overlook the negatives, will enjoy the game immensely. It's kinda like having a fat girlfriend with a really weird laugh, but she's a great cook, will do anything for you, and so on and so forth. Do you put up with the quirks or not?
Diablo 2 was, and still is, pure Quality in computer game form. It ticked all the right boxes and was hard to fault. For many, it was perfect. No extra pounds or weird laugh. But at the end of the day, each person has their own unique tastes.
@ocsgabe Well a quick visit to Akara and your stats can be reset. There's a little more thought that goes into the character creation in Diablo 2. Each character in essence becomes three different characters (at least), each offering the game play-through a different and unique experience. Want a more challenging experience? Try mixing skill trees and becoming a jack of all trades, master of none.
I can understand your perspective as I'm aware of the cookie cutter builds that developed as a result of people trying to perfect each class to do most damage. To perfect something is one thing, to play to have fun and enjoy a game is another. And whilst I have no doubt that Diablo 3 will prove to be an enjoyable game, I fail to see that the game will offer as much re-playability as D2 did with its now "die-cast" characters.
I'd just like to add that in D2 I immensely enjoyed starting the game over and over playing and experimenting with the different class builds to see what interesting combinations I could come up with. Playing the beta of D3 left me with zero interest in starting the act over again. If I had to it would have felt like a chore. But that was just my experience. I hope the skills/rune system proves to be less rigid than the beta makes it out to be. I also hope all who get it thoroughly enjoy it!
@maxguevera Might I suggest getting Diablo 2 with the LOD expansion first and playing that before Diablo 3. Though it may seem a little dated (not bad to feel only a little dated for a 12 year old game!) it is a fantastic experience!
Many who played the Diablo 3 beta think it doesn't hold up to Diablo 2. That comes down to personal preference. Though it would probably be harder to enjoy Diablo 2 after experiencing Diablo 3, whether you enjoy part 3 or not.
Perfect execution has nothing to do with innovation. You can have innovation without perfect execution, and perfect execution without innovation. Wilson speaks from his ass like Steve Jobs did more than half of the time.
The only innovation in D3 is blurring the line between a computer game and eCommerce. The level up system has been simplified so there's less focus on character progression and greater dependency on acquiring newer and better items. But where will you get them? Sure, you could get together with some friends and do some boss runs. But oh look, there's a convenient little auction house that's open 24 hours a day and always happy to do business.
The game's designed to put reliance on items for character uniqueness and power, make the good items scarce, and almost force players to purchase from the auction house. It's just like leading live stock to the slaughter house. I guess that's what Jay Wilson meant by, "Innovation comes from perfect execution."
@2bitSmOkEy See the interesting thing about d2 for me is I can play the start over and over and never lose interest. The whole atmosphere generated by the graphics, music playing in the background and sound effects is incredible. Act 1 is my favorite act in the entire game. Not to mention each character being leveled up in a unique way altering the experience just enough each time. Though as a fan of the Diablo 'universe' I hope you're right!
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