By now, a week after release, many of you have probably plunked down your cash for Blizzard's epic action RPG and hungrily devoured its story campaign at least once. But some of you haven't -- maybe you've been on the fence or are waiting for a long summer break -- and that's who this review is primarily aimed at.
Evil Rises... Again
You feel like a kickass action star while leveling up your character with better weapons, armor, magical items, and skills, and spells.
So, first thing's first: Diablo 3 is an awesomely entertaining, intensely engaging experience that you'll probably want to play and replay, alone or with up to three other players in co-op. It deftly picks up on the Diablo storyline 20 years after the end of Diablo 2, when you, the Nephalem, are summoned to the town of Tristram to investigate a fallen star that has had the unfortunate side effect of raising armies of the dead to attack the living. Each of the five playable character classes -- Barbarian, Demon Hunter, Monk, Witch Doctor, and Wizard -- offers its own unique play style, personal history, and personal interactions that encourage replays and make you feel like a kickass action star while leveling up your character with better weapons, armor, magical items, and skills, and spells. Trust me: knocking back undead skeletons into walls with the slam of a Barbarian club never gets old.The Barbarian's Power Slam feels ridiculously powerful right from the start.
The Prime Evils of Hell are back? What a surprise!
Like its predecessors, Diablo 3 has one of those grand but uncomplicated four-act storylines (The Prime Evils of Hell are back? What a surprise!) that's also easy to ignore as you frantically click your mouse to kill monsters and grab loot. It's not that you'll necessarily want to ignore it -- there are a couple not-too-surprising reveals and betrayals -- but, frankly, the story isn't as compelling as the action. Lorehounds can get a deeper dive into the backstory by chatting with major characters and hunting for diaries and logs scattered around the dungeons, towns, and vast expanses that you visit, but don't expect more of a reward than some bonus experience points and knowledge. Even the three Followers you meet -- a Templar, Scoundrel, and Enchantress who can fight alongside you (one at a time) -- have their own story arcs. Exploring their plot baggage is completely optional, which is fine, however it's disappointing that there's no tangible benefit for doing so, such as opening up new quests or unlocking unique pieces of loot. Carrot, Meet Stick
Loot, of course, is the bait that drives you to kill just one more demon… which quickly turns into killing a thousand more demons at 4am. Managing inventory has been thankfully streamlined since Diablo 2. Gone are the days of playing "inventory Tetris" trying to make everything fit, and teleporting back to town to sell items is a quick and easy process. That said, the new loot system teeters on the dull side. For example, why did the designers even bother to include unidentified magic items when every character can freely identify them just by clicking the right mouse button? (In previous Diablos you need a Scroll of Identify or paid Deckard Cain to do it, and you can't use an item until you do.)
This demon sure talks a lot of smack for a guy who looks like a pudgy owl.
The fun of crafting new items by experimenting with recipes and Diablo 2's Horadric Cube has been replaced by an in-town Blacksmith and Jeweler.
Likewise, merchants are mostly useless except for selling items or buying health potions; their paltry selection of wares can easily be outclassed by arms and armor picked up in the field. (And don't expect to get rich off selling non-magic loot; the average sell price is a whopping 3-5 gold pieces for each regular item.) Even the fun of crafting new items by experimenting with recipes and Diablo 2's Horadric Cube has been replaced by an in-town Blacksmith and Jeweler who make it all for you from preset recipes and randomized magic stats. Blizzard has simplified the process to the point that the mystery and joy of discovering a unique, special piece of kit perfect for your class has all but been removed.Hell on Parade
The rank-and-file monsters you face will be mostly familiar to Diablo veterans, ranging from zombies, spiders, and skeletons to minor demons and flying succubi. One of the most loathsome foes may be the corpulent Grotesque (and its variants) -- a fat, undead corpse that unleashes an explosion of attacking worms from its belly when defeated.
The strength of bosses, especially in later stages, could use some balancing, though. Just by doing some extra exploring to level up my character, spending some gold at the Blacksmith's to craft more potent magical armor and weapons, and augmenting my Follower with upgraded armaments and magical bonuses to complement my character's strengths, my Wizard was so obscenely powerful that I was able to slice through a Lesser Evil in all of five seconds. That feeling lasted up until my final encounter with Diablo, whose initial ass-kicking took me by surprise because his lieutenants had been such pushovers. Overall, Normal level was a little too easy -- and for some bizarre reason you're not allowed to dial it up.
On Normal difficulty, even the bosses are pushovers for a leveled character.
You'll have more to look forward to, even when replaying the same story for the second, third, or fourth time.
Only once you've played through the Normal setting can you replay the campaign with the same character at successively more difficult levels -- Nightmare, Hell, and Inferno -- that are not only tougher to beat, but give rarer loot drops and add a little more complexity to crafting. (For example, you have to find recipe pages to unlock a new rank in your crafting skill.) Though it's a plus that you'll have more to look forward to, even when replaying the same story for the second, third, or fourth time, I would've liked to see more of that special attention right from the start. The impression is that Blizzard would like to prompt players into visiting Diablo 3's gold-based auction house (or the soon-to-be-launched real-money auction house) to trade with other players for the really phat loot. At least the 10-item limit in the Auction House keeps it from being crowded with junk, though that same limitation probably isn't making power-sellers very happy.The Online Conundrum
Diablo 3 itself may be polished to a shine, but the same cannot be said of the infrastructure that supports it. As you may have heard (or suffered through yourself), the launch was spectacularly wretched, complete with errors and downed servers that kept players who had eagerly been awaiting the midnight green light twiddling their index fingers for most of the next day. Those used to the tumultuous launches of MMOs like World of Warcraft or the travails of Battle.net were annoyed, but ultimately shrugged their shoulders and said "Well, that's just Blizzard!"
I said DANCE, damn you!
Offline mode is not an option, even if you are playing solo.
But the point is this: Diablo 3 is not an MMO. You can play the entire thing solo without encountering another player, just like you did in Diablo or Diablo 2, or choose to play in co-op. Here's the rub: In order to help combat cheating, pirating, hacks, and create a secure economic ecosystem for the impending real-money auction house, Blizzard requires a persistent online connection to play Diablo 3. Not just for authentication of your account, but for the entire time you play, even if you are playing solo. Offline mode is not an option.But Why?
In effect, Blizzard has forced the limitations of an MMO onto anyone playing Diablo 3 only in single-player. This means that when servers go down for maintenance (as they did numerous times during launch), you'll be kicked out of your game, even when playing alone. And while my experience was mostly smooth, reports of server-related lag making Diablo 3 nearly unplayable have been widespread. The question is, why is there server lag in a non-MMO in the first place?
Yellow means he's tough, but also full of good loot.
There's a reasonable expectation that you'll be able to opt in or out of the online world.
Some may argue that Diablo 3 is intended to be an online multiplayer experience. In fact, the option "Allow Quick Join" is checked on by default, leaving the door open for your friends to join you at will. (Imagine my surprise when a friend abruptly joined during a big boss battle, replacing my Enchantress follower. It was NOT a happy surprise.) The problem is that, since Diablo 3 isn't marketed as an online-only game, there's a reasonable expectation that you'll be able to opt in or out of the online world, just like you did in the first two. It should also be noted that one of Diablo 2's major multiplayer features, PvP mode, hasn't even been implemented yet in Diablo 3. Blizzard has promised that it'll be added in a future patch.As long as you are aware of and accept Diablo 3's online limitations, I wholeheartedly recommend it. A week after launch, the servers are up and running smoothly, though "scheduled maintenance" still brings them down from time to time, usually in the wee hours of the morning. But solo players who would rather live their gaming lives offline -- or have less than perfect faith in the stability of their internet connections -- should probably hold out for the offline-friendly Torchlight 2 instead.
Want to see how we arrived at this conclusion? Read on to the next page to read our thoughts from this week.