Diablo III is a game that many people have been waiting for since the announcement a long time ago, but without a release date for the longest time. Now that it's finally released, was it worth the wait? Or does it not meet people's expectations after the popularity of Diablo II?
Diablo III is an Arcade-y Action RPG, where you pick a class from the five available, and adventure from a bird's eye view as you guide your character through quests, hoards of enemies, and bosses to your ultimate goal; sweet loot.
The story in Diablo III is... there. Despite the game having separate cut scenes for each character class and gender, the game's main story mostly revolves around Leah, a young girl who was raised by Deckard Cain, her uncle, who has been studying the lords of evil and the destruction they would bring upon the world, and Tyrael who you'll learn more about as you progress. Each character class has their own reasons for fighting, but aside from their back story, they all follow the same paths in saving mankind.
However, the back story does add some depth to the character developments, especially for your mercenary NPCs that will accompany you throughout your journey. There are three of them; the Templar, Scoundrel, and Enchantress. Each of them will join after a certain part of their story, and during their travels with you, they will converse with your character to talk about their history some, with additional conversations you can hear in town outposts as well. At times, these personal back stories of these NPCs are more interesting than the main story.
As for the gameplay, the play style may have changed slightly, but the biggest changes have been made in the way how stats and builds are handled. By that, I mean, the game handles stat gains completely, and you don't put skill points into skills either. Instead, the only way to raise a certain stat is through equipments that give bonus stats, and skills can be freely changed, so you can try many different skill builds as you see fit. In a sense that is good, in that you can't mess up your character build, wasting their potential. However, it does leave little for character personalization and customization as all characters of the same class could potentially all have the same skill build without any extra effort of leveling with only certain skills. This can be debated on whether if this change was for better or worse. I personally think this change allows more casual players to enjoy the harder difficulties without too much trouble, as well as be able to test out all the available skills instead of focusing on a select few.
As for the combat mechanic, it is fairly simplified as well. Your primary attack is done by holding down the left click on an enemy on screen. Secondary attack is done via right click, and there are up to 4 other skills you can set on your keyboard's 1~4 keys. The usual RPG rules apply in that some skills may require resources to activate the skill, like MP. Barbarians gain Fury through being in combat, namely through attacking and getting hit, but degenerate Fury while outside of combat. Monks gain Spirit through attacking as well, which they use for some of their skills. The Witch Doctor has Mana in which they use to summon creatures and spells, while the Wizard uses Arcane Power. Both of these regenerate over time. Finally the Demon Hunter has two separate resources; Hatred which is gained through attacking, and Discipline, both of which regenerates over time. Aside from requiring resources, skills will also have cooldowns, depending on how effective they are, so not all spells can be spammed despite having enough resources. Basic Action RPG rules. Each of these five classes play fairly differently, and excel in many different ways. The Barbarian and Monk are melee classes, while the other three are ranged.
Often times, you will find most monsters to be clustered together in an area, so when you engage into combat, you will be out-numbered. Depending on the difficulty you are playing on, that could be either good or bad. If you are playing on Normal or Nightmare, the monsters will usually not pose too much of a threat if you are properly leveled. In fact, the game will reward you for making many kills in a short time with bonus EXP, and additional bonus EXP if you kill 6 or more enemies in a single move. Even if you do take damage, monsters will frequently drop health globes when they die (aside from potion items), which can instantly heal some of your HP. Another addition to the Diablo series, but a welcoming addition that helps make Life Regeneration equipments less of a requirement, and keeps players ready for more action than worry about health management. However, these health globes alone will not help in the later difficulties of Hell and Inferno, where all enemies are much tougher.
In order to survive in these harder difficulties, you really need some good equipments and a solid skill build to come out ahead. Otherwise, dying too frequently will start to cost you a lot for equipment repairs as your equipments lose 10% durability for the death penalty. Finding good equipments will require a lot of farming by killing Elite monsters and Bosses, which can be quite troublesome if you are not strong enough. Thankfully, the Auction House is available for both Gold, as well as US Dollars, to buy equipments from other players, which can help you find and get some great equipments with less time spent on farming.
For those of you that are looking to make money on the Auction House, be wary, as many people have found many powerful equipments that are currently being sold in the Auction House. If the item you are trying to sell is not as good as many others in the Auction House, it may not even sell at all. You will have to know what bonuses are more valuable, and at what level requirements they are for. The highest selling equipments tend to be those found in the higher difficulties, for the maxed, level 60 characters, and even then, if they lack good Life Regeneration, Resist All Elements, and other bonuses that would increase the characters' DPS, there will be less buyers interested, thus having to compensate with much lower prices. So far, I have only been able to sell three equipments at $2.00 and below. Selling items for Gold will have more buyers naturally.
The graphics for Diablo III is rather unimpressive. Sharing the similar bird's eye view, and not-too-detailed 3D models, it does little to please the eyes. However, nothing sticks out as horrible-looking, so there's nothing wrong with it either. The environments tend to have some interesting backgrounds at times, and the floors don't necessarily have repeating texture patterns that you notice in a single glance either. However, the game does have a nice, working physics engine that seems to animate smoothly when objects are in motion, like when corpses and debris fly when your fierce blows cause explosions.
The sounds department isn't as lacking, although the music tends to be subtle, at least at its default volume setting. The sound tracks add a great amount of depth to the environment and mood. The voice acting however, is very well done. All dialogues and character interactions are voice acted, and they all sound great as well. If they ever do get annoying, you can speed up the dialogue with the space bar, or skip cut scenes with the escape key.
Naturally, Diablo III is one of those "addicting" games where it has a great amount of replay value. With the game having 4 difficulty levels, 5 different classes, the need to grind/farm for better equipments to get stronger, and the satisfaction of slaying hundreds and thousands of undead and demon hoards, it will keep those that get into it well occupied for a long time, and as of this review, PVP hasn't been released yet either.
Overall, Diablo III is a fine sequel to Diablo II, but not much can be said about it, as the only special thing about the game is how the equipment mechanics work. It feels like there are many competition out there for grindy MMORPGs, and Diablo III does little to be on the top of the already-large list. However, in the end, Diablo III is still a big and popular game that is still growing. I question the full price of $59.99, but perhaps when the price drops or find it on a sale, it could be worth checking out if the arcade-y action RPG gameplay appeals to you. Otherwise, you're not missing out on too much by not playing Diablo III.
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