Well, I’ve finally completed Diablo III. Kinda funny. My friend and I played the beta of the game almost 4 years ago and wrote about our experiences (in Russian) on AveGamers. Four years… Game managed to change a lot between that beta into the retail version. And three more years later, lots of patches and an expansion changed it even further. Remembering our first impressions from the beta is especially funny, because since then we had several aRPG titles appear reviving the genre, like Torchlight II or the first The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing. Games that took the same ideas of the original 2 Diablo games and went in a very different direction, There’s also Grim Dawn from Titan Quest creators that’s still in development but also looks nice. In addition, by now I’ve come to realize that the mood of the original Diablo is actually better followed up by games like Demon’s Souls and Bloodborne, rather than the modern Diablo-like aRPGs, that are far more about clicking enemies to death, than going for a slow brooding gameplay. But hey, here’s me after spending a week and a half on playing Diablo III and its expansion. And having no regrets. Yet not feeling any different either.
I’ll start with the changes that happened after the original release. Potion bottles are gone, you just have one on a timer. Town portal is now an infinite dedicated button. You only ever use Identify on special rare items that stand in for Unique types from Diablo 2. And even there, you just right click an item and wait a bit, and voila, it’s identified (you can use Cain’s book for that in town as well). All character stats are automatically assigned, you get active skills very quickly, those get their own modifiers that can be unlocked and, most importantly, all skills can be swapped around when outside the battle. You barely ever get white item drops and yellow (rare) ones drop even more commonly than the blue ones. All because that dreadful real money auction house that people hated was shut down and the loot system was rebalanced. All of these changes are hardly “good” or “bad”, they just are.
The gameplay with all of that is also pretty fun. I played as a Monk, which I used during my beta testing all those years ago. And I loved it. Quick combos, jumping from enemy to enemy, seeing how all enemies and parts of the level explode from my hits, mastering a nice energy build-up system that’s unique to the class. And all without needing to use more than just a mouse and a couple of keyboard buttons. It looks amazing, yet… Even though every Act of the game feels very different and there are five of them (with the expansion), you get bored pretty quickly. Especially since on the normal difficulty the game is exceptionally easy, while harder difficulties feel less of a challenge and more of a “well, you have to hit enemies more now”. At least, unlike the original release you can select most difficulties from the start.
Before uninstalling the game I decided to give other classes a go and realized a very simple thing – if you could swap classes at any point (or at least near a teleport), I would’ve not gotten bored. Because every class plays so wildly differently. But that’s not what game wants to be about. Originally, I felt like just the bizarre always-online requirement reminded me of MMOs. But now, I realize that this is a singleplayer MMO. The kind of MMO that WoW turned into – a perfect way to kill time. I always felt weirded out when people discussed “endgame” in singleplayer (or cooperative) games, but for Diablo III? Yeah, that’s part of the game design, clearly. It’s chock-full of stuff to do, just so you never quit playing the game. Congrats, you have unlocked a new thing that gets you to play more and unlock another thing to get yet another thing, yay!
Which isn’t bad, mind you. There are countless people who crave for this thing – perfect killing time pastimes. It’s just that, I don’t like games about that. And I don’t think time appreciates being killed either. The aforementioned Torchlight II or Van Helsing are also quite happy with you playing them for a long time, replaying and killing time. But you can play them once and be fully content with that. Diablo III kinda has that… but that content is more akin to eating seeds or chips. You crave for more, but you’re also full. And maybe it’s time to eat some pasta or rice instead.
The tone of the game, and the script, the dialogues, all of the narration aren’t helping either. There’re lots of these narrative elements in here, far more than the previous games had, yet… It’s all so predictable. Not that Diablo was oh so very original in the first place, in fact Blizzard are well known for “borrowing” ideas from other franchises. But it’s especially dreadful here. Previous games had a very unique defining tone to them, a certain feel. Like “Everything is fucked. But you’re here, so you might as well try to fix anything that can be fixed”. And that’s what you did. Things didn’t get good, but they got better and it was all about the melancholy, the heroism against impossible odds, horror, the apocalypse. In Diablo III you’re the chosen one to fight evil and everyone is 100% sure you will succeed. People die, betrayals happen, but hey, you’re the best, you will save everyone else. Nothing compares to you.
The “story” is more like a collection of ideas and phrases all designed to praise the player every couple of steps they take. Killed 3 enemies? Triple kill, motherfucker! Get bonus experience and huge text praising your amazing skills. Holyfucksocks kill, you’re the greatest! All NPCs are like “Oh my hero, you make me feel so good”, while the demons sing “oh, you defeated us, let us drop some rare loot”. It’s pathetic. As you return to Tristram in the first act, it feels good. Regurgitating old ideas, sure, but good. Second and fifth Act towns are genuinely interesting lore-wise. Third and fourth Acts have amazing things of their own. But the story, the narrative just kills all of the potential all these places have. Because instead of trying to say something interesting, all the game ever wants is sing praises to the player.
But hey, do I regret playing the game? No. It’s not a bad game. Hell, I’d play the next expansion whenever it comes out, though I doubt I’ll do it as soon as it lands. And if you enjoy killing time via clicking enemies to death, Diablo III is one of the best options to do it with. Or, if you’re playing on console and do the couch coop, it should be a fun game to go with beer or tea. But this game is like an ideal commercially produced pop record. It sounds great, it’s memorable, it’s wonderfully produced. But it’s completely empty inside.