Diablo 3 Review - The Verdict Is In!

As I headed into Act III, some of the issues that bothered me earlier in Diablo 3, such as the relatively weak loot and crafting system, began to right itself. Sure enough, a gem crafting station set up shop, and now I can make better quality gems from the chipped and flawed ones I've been picking up. Slotted weapons, armor, rings, and amulets are working their way into loot drops as well.


The loot system is getting better, but still not as good as it should be (or was, in Diablo II), in that I'd like to have more control, and be able to find more recipes for crafting than the ones currently available. Or is this design all part of Blizzard's plan to prod us towards the gold and real-money auction house in time?

ACT III Unleashed

As far as gameplay goes, though, Act III is off the hook! For anybody who thought Act I and perhaps even Act II were too slow-moving, Act III makes up for it and then some right from the start, with an all-out attack on a castle keep by demonic forces. I frantically ran around the ramparts of the keep lighting signal fires and installing turrets as quest objectives. Meanwhile hordes of beasts and brutes ambushed me, winged creatures swooped in to attack and carry off archers protecting the keep, and most challenging of all, gigantic demons scaled the walls to spit out minor demons as they clung to the side.


If you're playing as a Wizard (like myself), Chained Lightning remains one of the most effective means of killing multiple baddies at one time. Especially if you've bumped up your Intelligence and Attack Points to feel like an unstoppable killing machine. It's also fun to see which powers (mostly based on fire, ice, or electricity) are most effective against which enemies. My companion character -- the Enchantress, who I chose for her backstory -- feels like she's pulling her weight more now that I've equipped her with more powerful weapons and equipment. Maybe it's because she's started to kill creatures on her own, and her ability to charm a monster into fighting on my side has been useful.

All in all, things are definitely improving. Not to mention that the servers are up -- huzzah!


05/17/12 - Mike Nelson, Barbarian

I know I said yesterday that I had planned on finishing up Act 1 last night, but gosh darn it, I'm just having too much fun killing things and grinding up to my next level to unlock more attack powers. That and I still have issues staying connected to Diablo 3 (more on that in a second). When I can play I'm having a blast exploring the wealth of small side dungeons scattered around the starting area, and trying to see what kind of ultra cool loot I can find.


I've also started to experiment some more with my Barbarian's attacks. Now that I've reached level 14 I think I'm finally ready to move on from Bash. Right now I've got Frenzy set as my primary, which is a powerful attack that increases in speed the longer I'm attacking for, and I just unlocked Throw which allows me to, well, throw my weapon to deal some slow damage on my enemies. But while all of this fighting has definitely filled up my inventory space thanks to all of the loot, it hasn't helped my pocket books all that much.

Loot for You, Not for Me

The majority of the loot so far while battling in the dungeons and open world in Diablo 3, while plentiful, tends to not benefit my character that often -- unless I just finished fighting a minor or major boss. I've picked up a lot of crossbows, wizard hats, and even some spiked knuckles (that in retrospect I guess I should have hung onto for Dan's Monk). The upside is I can collect as much as I want without having to play "inventory Tetris" before I run out of room, but the downside is that the profit return for selling these items in town doesn't tend to be that high for regular items.


I really should know better by now, but it's a hard habit to break from Diablo 2. I think I used a Scroll of Town Portal every 15 minutes or so during my D2 days, and I'd get a pretty good profit return selling off the weapons and armor that was no good to me. Not so much here, but at least Town Portal is now a learned spell and doesn't take up inventory space. But I need to start looking at alternatives, like the Auction House, if I want to start making money instead of selling off these random loot drops to the local town, or collecting small coin drops from defeated enemies.

Still Feeling Disconnected

Yes, I'm still running into connection issues three days after retail release. I think one of the most frustrating parts of this always online requirement is just how sparingly Diablo 3 saves my progress. Like earlier tonight, my inventory was full (I told you I have a problem) and took a short trip back to New Tristram to unload some of my worthless loot. While doing nothing more than managing what I was going to sell, I lost my connection, and was booted back to the start screen. I was able to log right back in a few seconds later, but that Town Portal I just used to get back to town? Yeah, that's gone. And all of the progress I made in the Southern Highlands, that's gone too.


I really shouldn't have to put up with this anymore, none of us should, but if I want to continue playing Diablo 3 what other choice do I have? I want to enjoy playing your game, Blizzard. I really do. So, could you just let me stay connected long enough, or at least issue a patch that saves my progress on a more frequent basis? I'm really getting tired of backtracking, but at least it's starting to help me kick my Diablo 2 loot habits, so that's a plus I guess.



Despite Diablo 3's launch day snafus, I finally had my first all-nighter battling the Lord of Terror. When it works, it performs flawlessly -- Blizzard may take its sweet development time turning out a new product, but at least it's highly polished when it arrives. (Diablo 3 itself, at least, not the online infrastructure supporting it.) After settling down to plow through Act I and half-way into Act II, here are a few more impressions.

A Living World

If you're in a race with your friends to finish Diablo 3 as soon as possible, then you may be missing a lot of the details. I'm not just talking about the visuals (which, for a game viewed from an overhead isometric perspective, are pretty intricate), but in the little surprises littered around the environments. Like, for example, the preset boobytraps that can be triggered on enemies (such as crashing chandeliers and piles of precariously stacked logs), precipices that crumble away when you get too close, collapsing walls and columns, secondary quests, and bits of lore uncovered by going off the beaten path. If you're a lore-hound, there's plenty to appreciate here.


Loot Ain't Phat Enough

Maybe it's just because I'm still in the first half, but the loot and inventory system doesn't match up to Diablo 2 (or its expansion, Lord of Destruction). For many of us, tinkering with our loadout -- enhancing weapons and armor with gems and runes and experimenting with the Horadric Cube to create new items -- made every big loot drop feel like Christmas morning. At this stage, weapon and armor creation is performed only at the town forge where you can break down unneeded magical loot to create new preset magical items that you might actually use. But, at least at the beginning, it's too limited and -- dare I say -- a bit boring. I've started finding gems to put into slotted weapons, though, so my loot-tinkering itch may soon be scratched.


Severs Down

Not to beat a dead horse into bloody horsey-tasting paste, but a prime example of why my single-player game shouldn't require a connection to an online persistent server struck me like a mace to the back of my skull. While inside a timed dungeon (I had to make my way to the central treasure room in under three minutes), the servers went down for maintenance. When I returned later, the side-quest wasn't available; I could still enter the dungeon and loot, but there was no timer, so I don't know if I missed out on an ever bigger payday. Again, this isn't a MMO -- I wasn't questing with friends, just my NPC buddies. Blizzard, why are you making it so hard for me to love your game???




05/16/12 - Mike Nelson, Barbarian

Yesterday sucked. I don't think there's any getting around how much Blizzard screwed up a launch day that everyone managed to show up to except for them. Today was a much different picture but it's still far from perfect -- I still ran into a handful of log in and disconnection issues which has made it awfully hard to make much in the way of progress (I just took care of the Skeleton King).


So is it everything I ever hoped it would be? That's hard to judge this early on because I played much of this opening area during my time with the Diablo 3 beta. Yes, the combat is great. Yes, I'm still having a lot of fun. No I don't mind that the opening levels are a little slow to start. The biggest difference I've noticed thus far when compared to the beta is that I have some more unique loot drops and attacks that were previously unlocked, but playing as Barbarian I'm still sticking with Bash and Hammer of the Ancients as my go-tos and haven't felt like branching out just yet. After I unlock more runes I'll start to experiment with the customizable system some more.

I also haven't had a chance to try multiplayer yet. I keep hearing horror stories about my friends getting in parties with people who are skipping cutscenes so the group can keep moving onto the next area. Because I'm such a lore hound, and don't want miss out on any of the story, I'm going to wait until I have a friend or two to play with. Then we'll be in agreement that we'd prefer to stay awhile and listen instead of rushing off to the next dungeon.


Tonight I plan to complete the remainder of Act 1 as long as I can stay connected and don't lose any unsaved progress. I also want to dabble in the Auction House, see if I can find some better armor for my Barbarian. Perhaps tomorrow I'll be able to weigh in some more about my thoughts beyond the introductory chapters of Diablo 3.



Day One

Midnight. Diablo 3 is downloaded, installed, and awaiting the witching hour when the servers unlock so I can begin my descent into Hell. The time comes. I enter my Battle.net login info, click "Play," and... get a message that "The servers are busy at this time. Please try again later. (Error 37)" Oh, goody.


My fears about the consequence of depending on online servers to allow access to what, for many people, will be a single-player experience have just been realized. While it's pretty common for servers to be slammed at launch for massively multiplayer games, Diablo 3 isn't just any other game (or an MMO). It's a game PC gamers have been waiting a decade to play. To be so close, and yet so far, is just plain cruel. And for those on the East Coast who had to wait until 3am, only to be locked out, it's even crueler.

Into the Breach

Finally, at 1:20am, success! I quickly agree to the three Terms of Service, my account is authenticated, and then... the request times out. I barely manage to stifle a loud curse.

The login dance continues for 15 more minutes until, miraculously, I'm ushered into the character select screen. From there I select to play as the Wizard from the choices of Witch Doctor, Barbarian, Monk, and Demon Hunter. An instant plus is that, unlike previous Diablo games, you can select your gender instead of having it associated with the character class.


Entering the world of Diablo 3 is like revisiting an old friend, though one who's undergone the knife with considerable cosmetic surgery. The gameplay is thankfully just like you remember it: click frantically with your mouse to move and attack. The visuals are noticeably improved with 3D graphics, enhanced lighting effects, and smoother animations, but it still has that unquestionable Diablo "look." And for those who played the first two games, you run into an old friend early in Diablo 3 -- Deckard Cain, the elderly storyteller who always urged you to "stay awhile, and listen," is still sucking air. (Voice actor Michael Gough continues to deliver an excellent performance.)

Once rescued from the Undead that have infested the town of New Tristram, Cain imparts how the world of Sanctuary is facing the End Times due to the machinations of Diablo's minions. My Wizard's response is to lob fireballs and cold blasts at the Undead until they're dead-dead. Combat is still very basic right now, but oh-so addictive.


The next morning, I awaken refreshed and renewed. Oops, more server issues. Blizzard is performing maintenance and hopes to get them all back up "soon." My new nemesis is "Error 317002."

And the quest continues...


Spy Guy says: It's ridiculous that a company with Blizzard's reputation, not to mention its "when it's done" philosophy, would release Diablo 3 in this state. The team behind D3 is probably way more frustrated about this than we could possibly imagine, but they took our money, and it should be working better than this on day one.