Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by arescage

I don't see how D3 moved anything in the genre forward. It took out offline single player, mods, and stats. If a game is to move things forward then it should have something that innovates. FATE added pets that we now see in T2. T2 has that superbar that adds up and applifies certain abilities for each class along with fishing and now pet specific equipment.

 

Even Titan Quest added the character class merging and still some of the best graphics this genre has to this date. PoE has it's own unique skill system using socketted items in it's own original way. I fail to see what D3 has added more than it has discarded from the genre. The only new thing I've seen is the rune system for skills. That's pretty cool, but it would be better if it wasn't the only thing that could be customized. Two people with a Monk have the exact same character minus gear and where they chose to put their skill runes. This concept is primitive compared to every other ARPG out there including D1 and D2.

 

Sorry, but even though D3 is a well made game, it sure isn't moving the genre forward. It's just capitalizing on the name of it's own franchise. D3 is a huge step backwards.

Diablo 3 has a great new crafting system. Diablo 3 has a new skill system which is amazing. Diablo 3 has random events, random dungeons in it. Diablo 3 has an all max level difficulty. They introduced the banner system. They have a very extensive achievement system which I don't think any other action RPG did before it.

I fail to see how Torchlight 1 did anything new for the genre. 

Also Diablo 3 doesn't have to do anything new to be successful because Diablo 2 was damn near perfect. Blizzard CREATED this genre. Diablo 3 got pretty much everything right. It is a true Diablo 2 sequel. The same way SC2 was an amazing sequal to SC1. THose games were very similar too. I've played all the Diablo clones which came after Diablo 2 and none of them came even close to the awesomeness of Diablo. They just were not fun to play. Diablo 3 is fun to play.

Torchlight 1 has an achievement system through steam.

Originally posted by Yuui

Also, correction: 

ActivisionBlizzard DID NOT create the genre. Blizzard North(Condor Entertainment) did. And majority of folks responsible for that are guess where? Runic Games.

Flagship Studios did have 6 people from Blizzard North

but only 3 of them did the transition to Runic Games

Absolutely fantastic design, they did make it harder i dunno how many times right from the beginning one has to watch the damage the enemies are doing to you.

The class designs are fantastic as an avid engineer fan i have to say they did a fantastic job especially with the bots. Those things are awesome. I love the shield abiliities.

The pet running back to town to sell my crap is the best design ever, wish i had that in D3 every time my bags are full.

Originally posted by Nadia

Originally posted by Yuui

Also, correction: 

ActivisionBlizzard DID NOT create the genre. Blizzard North(Condor Entertainment) did. And majority of folks responsible for that are guess where? Runic Games.

Flagship Studios did have 6 people from Blizzard North

but only 3 of them did the transition to Runic Games

 

And that includes all the people that matter - lead designers and main composer. You know, the people with ideas who direct all the cogs in the machine to make those ideas? 

Originally posted by Hayasa

If by evolution you are refering to being less and less interactive and more left button clicker, sure, is an evolution. For me that's the arcaic thing, themeparking is not an evolved form. 

I discovered this game by someone telling me "go play TL2" while giving my opinion about internet dependance on d3. I signed for beta, why not? If that guy hate it may be good. So far I'm enjoying the game so much. TL2 gives me a lot to do while D3 don't give much besides grabing blizzard's hand through their new theme park based on diablo lore. If that's an evolution I'll stick to the other branch of the evolution, the one with TL2 on it. Customization on skills, stats, single player and LAN, different difficulty levels, rich enviroments and dungeons, etc... I rather have fun hacking and slashing that pressing levers to kill monsters conveniently waiting under a big lamp. 

The new blizzard activision's Diablo 3 have and amazing team doing cinematics and an amazing lore left behind by other talented people working now in different games, that's all. The game itself is not what a game named Diablo 3 should be. I am a Diablo fan since '96, but that's is no diablo.

As i said, I'm sticking to TL2

+1

I loved Torchlight and will soon get to love T2.  I only wish I hadn't spent the money on D3 because my partner is not going to be happy to hear I need to spend another 40 bucks for us both to play after having just spent 120 dollars a few days ago.  I don't expect that conversation to go down well.  Maybe I'll wait a few months.

I've been playing T2 open beta and I absolutely love it. I'm not sure how to explain it but Torchlight 2 feels more like a Diablo game than Diablo 3 does. I guess it's probably because both D2 and T2 had some of the same people working on it. The combat has a lot of impact to it. When you shoot that zombie with a rifle, you can almost feel it. And when the mobs explode into little bits and pieces... well it's just so delicious. Dugeons actually have secrets passages and puzzles. Classes are different than the typical warrior, priest, rogue, mage we get in ARPGs. I absolutely love the pet system. Being able to send the pet to sell your junk is a great idea. That ferret is the man!

Never have to deal with always on DRM, player created mod suport, co-op either through online or LAN. You can't beat the price either. $20 on Steam and you get T1 free. Or guaranteed access to the beta of Cryptic's NWN game, if that's your thing. Personally, I avoid Cryptic games like a plague but I can see why some may be interested.

The only down side is that the game is not released yet. It could've held me over until GW2 launches. Too bad. Still a great game though and if you're a fan of ARPGS, you owe it to yourself to buy it. It's $20, no excuses.

Originally posted by Yuui

Originally posted by fivoroth

Diablo 3 has a great new crafting system. Diablo 3 has a new skill system which is amazing. Diablo 3 has random events, random dungeons in it. Diablo 3 has an all max level difficulty. They introduced the banner system. They have a very extensive achievement system which I don't think any other action RPG did before it.

I fail to see how Torchlight 1 did anything new for the genre. 

Also Diablo 3 doesn't have to do anything new to be successful because Diablo 2 was damn near perfect. Blizzard CREATED this genre. Diablo 3 got pretty much everything right. It is a true Diablo 2 sequel. The same way SC2 was an amazing sequal to SC1. THose games were very similar too. I've played all the Diablo clones which came after Diablo 2 and none of them came even close to the awesomeness of Diablo. They just were not fun to play. Diablo 3 is fun to play.

 

Crafting has absolutely zero importance in ARPG games where the main idea is FINDING loot not creating it. If it was MMO, well great for crafting. 99% of arpg fanbase could not care less about crafting.

"New skill system"? Pretty much a copy of how they destroyed World oF Warcraft skill system.

random dungeons? Tl1 had it TL2 has it, hell, even original diablo games had it.

random events? Tl2 has it and half the genre has it too.

Difficulty? considering starter difficulties are a cakewalk and TL2 already has quite a challenging difficulty AND ability to mod it into more difficult, I don't see how that changes anything. 

Achievements? casualization yet again. No one seriously cares about "achievements". Next thing you know you will add a "facebook integration" as a pro for diablo3. 

 

Also, correction: 

ActivisionBlizzard DID NOT create the genre. Blizzard North(Condor Entertainment) did. And majority of folks responsible for that are guess where? Runic Games. 

Other stuff in your post...it seems you are more than likely trying to convince YOURSELF that Diablo 3 was "great". 

Diablo3 is heavily streamlined, heavily casualized "rpg" game with pay2win RMT auction house and invasive DRM. Not to mention the complaints of horrible pacing, linnear mmo-like progression, over-simplification and seriously short game length.

I was talking about what's new. Crafting is new. Doesn't matter if it is very important to action RPGs. Do you think that pets (aka the donkeys that carry and sell your stuff) and stupid fishing matters in action RPGs?

By random dungeons I meant that you can get a wide variety of different dungeons in one area and that some of them you will not see as they do not all spawn in the game. Not just one and the same template randomised which you see in Diablo 2.

Random events - Diablo 3 came out first so they introduced it first? Can you tell me which other action RPGs which are currently on the market have random events? I must've missed them.

Difficulty. I wouldn't say that normal is cake. It's on the same level as Diablo 2.

Do you know how many times I've heard this? STudio X was the original Diablo team. Lalalaala. It's all fancy words. There have been like what 3-5 action RPGS which were made by the "original Blizzard North"? Was Torchlight 1 created by these supposedly "Blizzard North" guys? Cause that game was horrible compared to Diablo and it came out 5-6 years (maybe more not sure) after Diablo 2. And boy was it cartoony. 

Originally posted by jpnz

Yep, TL2 seems like a quality game that I'll buy and sink dozens of hours into. Just like TL1.

Yes, I also play D3 and yes I'll buy PoE too!

 

What? I am a gamer!

Just because I like Pizza doesn't mean I have to hate Steak!

Yeh same here i do prefer d3 but thats my taste , tho i own all the others to and i switch around depending how i feel .

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Yuui

Originally posted by fivoroth

Diablo 3 has a great new crafting system. Diablo 3 has a new skill system which is amazing. Diablo 3 has random events, random dungeons in it. Diablo 3 has an all max level difficulty. They introduced the banner system. They have a very extensive achievement system which I don't think any other action RPG did before it.

I fail to see how Torchlight 1 did anything new for the genre. 

Also Diablo 3 doesn't have to do anything new to be successful because Diablo 2 was damn near perfect. Blizzard CREATED this genre. Diablo 3 got pretty much everything right. It is a true Diablo 2 sequel. The same way SC2 was an amazing sequal to SC1. THose games were very similar too. I've played all the Diablo clones which came after Diablo 2 and none of them came even close to the awesomeness of Diablo. They just were not fun to play. Diablo 3 is fun to play.

 

Crafting has absolutely zero importance in ARPG games where the main idea is FINDING loot not creating it. If it was MMO, well great for crafting. 99% of arpg fanbase could not care less about crafting.

"New skill system"? Pretty much a copy of how they destroyed World oF Warcraft skill system.

random dungeons? Tl1 had it TL2 has it, hell, even original diablo games had it.

random events? Tl2 has it and half the genre has it too.

Difficulty? considering starter difficulties are a cakewalk and TL2 already has quite a challenging difficulty AND ability to mod it into more difficult, I don't see how that changes anything. 

Achievements? casualization yet again. No one seriously cares about "achievements". Next thing you know you will add a "facebook integration" as a pro for diablo3. 

 

Also, correction: 

ActivisionBlizzard DID NOT create the genre. Blizzard North(Condor Entertainment) did. And majority of folks responsible for that are guess where? Runic Games. 

Other stuff in your post...it seems you are more than likely trying to convince YOURSELF that Diablo 3 was "great". 

Diablo3 is heavily streamlined, heavily casualized "rpg" game with pay2win RMT auction house and invasive DRM. Not to mention the complaints of horrible pacing, linnear mmo-like progression, over-simplification and seriously short game length.

I was talking about what's new. Crafting is new. Doesn't matter if it is very important to action RPGs. Do you think that pets (aka the donkeys that carry and sell your stuff) and stupid fishing matters in action RPGs?

By random dungeons I meant that you can get a wide variety of different dungeons in one area and that some of them you will not see as they do not all spawn in the game. Not just one and the same template randomised which you see in Diablo 2.

Random events - Diablo 3 came out first so they introduced it first? Can you tell me which other action RPGs which are currently on the market have random events? I must've missed them.

Difficulty. I wouldn't say that normal is cake. It's on the same level as Diablo 2.

Do you know how many times I've heard this? STudio X was the original Diablo team. Lalalaala. It's all fancy words. There have been like what 3-5 action RPGS which were made by the "original Blizzard North"? Was Torchlight 1 created by these supposedly "Blizzard North" guys? Cause that game was horrible compared to Diablo and it came out 5-6 years (maybe more not sure) after Diablo 2. And boy was it cartoony. 

 

 

There is a lot more to the pet system in T2 and pets are a lot more than just pack mules but nice try though.

As far as your little anti Torchlight rant, that game has ratings almost as high at Diablo II. Metacritic has it at 8.3 critic and 8.4 user rating, compared to Diablo II's 8.8 critic and 8.5 user rating. You may not like the game but it's far from horrible. It's a solid ARPG, one of the best actually and it is true, some of the people who were responsible for Diablo II are responsible for Torchlight 1 and 2.

Personally, I can't wait for T2. I'm really looking forward to playing a single player game and not having to worry about lag or the servers being down.

Originally posted by heartless

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Yuui

Originally posted by fivoroth

Diablo 3 has a great new crafting system. Diablo 3 has a new skill system which is amazing. Diablo 3 has random events, random dungeons in it. Diablo 3 has an all max level difficulty. They introduced the banner system. They have a very extensive achievement system which I don't think any other action RPG did before it.

I fail to see how Torchlight 1 did anything new for the genre. 

Also Diablo 3 doesn't have to do anything new to be successful because Diablo 2 was damn near perfect. Blizzard CREATED this genre. Diablo 3 got pretty much everything right. It is a true Diablo 2 sequel. The same way SC2 was an amazing sequal to SC1. THose games were very similar too. I've played all the Diablo clones which came after Diablo 2 and none of them came even close to the awesomeness of Diablo. They just were not fun to play. Diablo 3 is fun to play.

 

Crafting has absolutely zero importance in ARPG games where the main idea is FINDING loot not creating it. If it was MMO, well great for crafting. 99% of arpg fanbase could not care less about crafting.

"New skill system"? Pretty much a copy of how they destroyed World oF Warcraft skill system.

random dungeons? Tl1 had it TL2 has it, hell, even original diablo games had it.

random events? Tl2 has it and half the genre has it too.

Difficulty? considering starter difficulties are a cakewalk and TL2 already has quite a challenging difficulty AND ability to mod it into more difficult, I don't see how that changes anything. 

Achievements? casualization yet again. No one seriously cares about "achievements". Next thing you know you will add a "facebook integration" as a pro for diablo3. 

 

Also, correction: 

ActivisionBlizzard DID NOT create the genre. Blizzard North(Condor Entertainment) did. And majority of folks responsible for that are guess where? Runic Games. 

Other stuff in your post...it seems you are more than likely trying to convince YOURSELF that Diablo 3 was "great". 

Diablo3 is heavily streamlined, heavily casualized "rpg" game with pay2win RMT auction house and invasive DRM. Not to mention the complaints of horrible pacing, linnear mmo-like progression, over-simplification and seriously short game length.

I was talking about what's new. Crafting is new. Doesn't matter if it is very important to action RPGs. Do you think that pets (aka the donkeys that carry and sell your stuff) and stupid fishing matters in action RPGs?

By random dungeons I meant that you can get a wide variety of different dungeons in one area and that some of them you will not see as they do not all spawn in the game. Not just one and the same template randomised which you see in Diablo 2.

Random events - Diablo 3 came out first so they introduced it first? Can you tell me which other action RPGs which are currently on the market have random events? I must've missed them.

Difficulty. I wouldn't say that normal is cake. It's on the same level as Diablo 2.

Do you know how many times I've heard this? STudio X was the original Diablo team. Lalalaala. It's all fancy words. There have been like what 3-5 action RPGS which were made by the "original Blizzard North"? Was Torchlight 1 created by these supposedly "Blizzard North" guys? Cause that game was horrible compared to Diablo and it came out 5-6 years (maybe more not sure) after Diablo 2. And boy was it cartoony. 

 

 

There is a lot more to the pet system in T2 and pets are a lot more than just pack mules but nice try though.

As far as your little anti Torchlight rant, that game has ratings almost as high at Diablo II. Metacritic has it at 8.3 critic and 8.4 user rating, compared to Diablo II's 8.8 critic and 8.5 user rating. You may not like the game but it's far from horrible. It's a solid ARPG, one of the best actually and it is true, some of the people who were responsible for Diablo II are responsible for Torchlight 1 and 2.

Personally, I can't wait for T2. I'm really looking forward to playing a single player game and not having to worry about lag or the servers being down.

are you seriously quoting metacritic as proof of a games quality? really?

mouse wheel zoom ftw

Originally posted by Asamof

Originally posted by heartless

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Yuui

Originally posted by fivoroth

Diablo 3 has a great new crafting system. Diablo 3 has a new skill system which is amazing. Diablo 3 has random events, random dungeons in it. Diablo 3 has an all max level difficulty. They introduced the banner system. They have a very extensive achievement system which I don't think any other action RPG did before it.

I fail to see how Torchlight 1 did anything new for the genre. 

Also Diablo 3 doesn't have to do anything new to be successful because Diablo 2 was damn near perfect. Blizzard CREATED this genre. Diablo 3 got pretty much everything right. It is a true Diablo 2 sequel. The same way SC2 was an amazing sequal to SC1. THose games were very similar too. I've played all the Diablo clones which came after Diablo 2 and none of them came even close to the awesomeness of Diablo. They just were not fun to play. Diablo 3 is fun to play.

 

Crafting has absolutely zero importance in ARPG games where the main idea is FINDING loot not creating it. If it was MMO, well great for crafting. 99% of arpg fanbase could not care less about crafting.

"New skill system"? Pretty much a copy of how they destroyed World oF Warcraft skill system.

random dungeons? Tl1 had it TL2 has it, hell, even original diablo games had it.

random events? Tl2 has it and half the genre has it too.

Difficulty? considering starter difficulties are a cakewalk and TL2 already has quite a challenging difficulty AND ability to mod it into more difficult, I don't see how that changes anything. 

Achievements? casualization yet again. No one seriously cares about "achievements". Next thing you know you will add a "facebook integration" as a pro for diablo3. 

 

Also, correction: 

ActivisionBlizzard DID NOT create the genre. Blizzard North(Condor Entertainment) did. And majority of folks responsible for that are guess where? Runic Games. 

Other stuff in your post...it seems you are more than likely trying to convince YOURSELF that Diablo 3 was "great". 

Diablo3 is heavily streamlined, heavily casualized "rpg" game with pay2win RMT auction house and invasive DRM. Not to mention the complaints of horrible pacing, linnear mmo-like progression, over-simplification and seriously short game length.

I was talking about what's new. Crafting is new. Doesn't matter if it is very important to action RPGs. Do you think that pets (aka the donkeys that carry and sell your stuff) and stupid fishing matters in action RPGs?

By random dungeons I meant that you can get a wide variety of different dungeons in one area and that some of them you will not see as they do not all spawn in the game. Not just one and the same template randomised which you see in Diablo 2.

Random events - Diablo 3 came out first so they introduced it first? Can you tell me which other action RPGs which are currently on the market have random events? I must've missed them.

Difficulty. I wouldn't say that normal is cake. It's on the same level as Diablo 2.

Do you know how many times I've heard this? STudio X was the original Diablo team. Lalalaala. It's all fancy words. There have been like what 3-5 action RPGS which were made by the "original Blizzard North"? Was Torchlight 1 created by these supposedly "Blizzard North" guys? Cause that game was horrible compared to Diablo and it came out 5-6 years (maybe more not sure) after Diablo 2. And boy was it cartoony. 

 

 

There is a lot more to the pet system in T2 and pets are a lot more than just pack mules but nice try though.

As far as your little anti Torchlight rant, that game has ratings almost as high at Diablo II. Metacritic has it at 8.3 critic and 8.4 user rating, compared to Diablo II's 8.8 critic and 8.5 user rating. You may not like the game but it's far from horrible. It's a solid ARPG, one of the best actually and it is true, some of the people who were responsible for Diablo II are responsible for Torchlight 1 and 2.

Personally, I can't wait for T2. I'm really looking forward to playing a single player game and not having to worry about lag or the servers being down.

are you seriously quoting metacritic as proof of a games quality? really?

 

What's so wrong about that? 

Metacritic is good indication of the user opinion in relation to (possibly paid) reviews.

Dragon age origins(an absolute masterpiece) holds both high critics rating and user rating.

Dragon age II(an absolute flop) holds huge critic rating and absolutely low user rating.

Mass Effect 3 holds huge critic rating and absolutely low user rating. 

Diablocraft 3 holds huge paid critic rating and absolutely low user rating.

Torchlight holds a huge critic rating abd huge user rating.

Its very efficient way at judging things :)

This BETA is well done.  GJ RUNIC! 

Originally posted by Yuui

Originally posted by Asamof

Originally posted by heartless

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Yuui

Originally posted by fivoroth

Diablo 3 has a great new crafting system. Diablo 3 has a new skill system which is amazing. Diablo 3 has random events, random dungeons in it. Diablo 3 has an all max level difficulty. They introduced the banner system. They have a very extensive achievement system which I don't think any other action RPG did before it.

I fail to see how Torchlight 1 did anything new for the genre. 

Also Diablo 3 doesn't have to do anything new to be successful because Diablo 2 was damn near perfect. Blizzard CREATED this genre. Diablo 3 got pretty much everything right. It is a true Diablo 2 sequel. The same way SC2 was an amazing sequal to SC1. THose games were very similar too. I've played all the Diablo clones which came after Diablo 2 and none of them came even close to the awesomeness of Diablo. They just were not fun to play. Diablo 3 is fun to play.

 

Crafting has absolutely zero importance in ARPG games where the main idea is FINDING loot not creating it. If it was MMO, well great for crafting. 99% of arpg fanbase could not care less about crafting.

"New skill system"? Pretty much a copy of how they destroyed World oF Warcraft skill system.

random dungeons? Tl1 had it TL2 has it, hell, even original diablo games had it.

random events? Tl2 has it and half the genre has it too.

Difficulty? considering starter difficulties are a cakewalk and TL2 already has quite a challenging difficulty AND ability to mod it into more difficult, I don't see how that changes anything. 

Achievements? casualization yet again. No one seriously cares about "achievements". Next thing you know you will add a "facebook integration" as a pro for diablo3. 

 

Also, correction: 

ActivisionBlizzard DID NOT create the genre. Blizzard North(Condor Entertainment) did. And majority of folks responsible for that are guess where? Runic Games. 

Other stuff in your post...it seems you are more than likely trying to convince YOURSELF that Diablo 3 was "great". 

Diablo3 is heavily streamlined, heavily casualized "rpg" game with pay2win RMT auction house and invasive DRM. Not to mention the complaints of horrible pacing, linnear mmo-like progression, over-simplification and seriously short game length.

I was talking about what's new. Crafting is new. Doesn't matter if it is very important to action RPGs. Do you think that pets (aka the donkeys that carry and sell your stuff) and stupid fishing matters in action RPGs?

By random dungeons I meant that you can get a wide variety of different dungeons in one area and that some of them you will not see as they do not all spawn in the game. Not just one and the same template randomised which you see in Diablo 2.

Random events - Diablo 3 came out first so they introduced it first? Can you tell me which other action RPGs which are currently on the market have random events? I must've missed them.

Difficulty. I wouldn't say that normal is cake. It's on the same level as Diablo 2.

Do you know how many times I've heard this? STudio X was the original Diablo team. Lalalaala. It's all fancy words. There have been like what 3-5 action RPGS which were made by the "original Blizzard North"? Was Torchlight 1 created by these supposedly "Blizzard North" guys? Cause that game was horrible compared to Diablo and it came out 5-6 years (maybe more not sure) after Diablo 2. And boy was it cartoony. 

 

 

There is a lot more to the pet system in T2 and pets are a lot more than just pack mules but nice try though.

As far as your little anti Torchlight rant, that game has ratings almost as high at Diablo II. Metacritic has it at 8.3 critic and 8.4 user rating, compared to Diablo II's 8.8 critic and 8.5 user rating. You may not like the game but it's far from horrible. It's a solid ARPG, one of the best actually and it is true, some of the people who were responsible for Diablo II are responsible for Torchlight 1 and 2.

Personally, I can't wait for T2. I'm really looking forward to playing a single player game and not having to worry about lag or the servers being down.

are you seriously quoting metacritic as proof of a games quality? really?

 

What's so wrong about that? 

 

Metacritic is good indication of the user opinion in relation to (possibly paid) reviews.

Dragon age origins(an absolute masterpiece) holds both high critics rating and user rating.

Dragon age II(an absolute flop) holds huge critic rating and absolutely low user rating.

Mass Effect 3 holds huge critic rating and absolutely low user rating. 

Diablocraft 3 holds huge paid critic rating and absolutely low user rating.

Torchlight holds a huge critic rating abd huge user rating.

 

Its very efficient way at judging things :)

Yup. The small disparity between professional critic and user scores is a good indication of the quality of the game. Large disparity can be attributed to trolling or paid reviews.

Games like Diablo, Diablo II and Torchlight have very small disparity between the critic and user scores, thus indicating that the scores are spot on.

Originally posted by fivoroth

Originally posted by Yizle

Originally posted by Asamof

I've been playing the TL2 beta, and I'm enjoying a lot of things about it

the class mechanics are interesting and the exploration is fun

honestly though, the game already feels archaic compared to D3

the game will definitely fill that niche of people who want the oldschool/outdated style of dungeon crawling, but D3 is the natural evolution of the genre

I lol'd so hard at this fanboy BS. Then I started feeling sorry for you and anyone else who belived this load.

D3 is crap. Complete crap. If you like old graphics D3 is your game. If you like no skill required and basically autoleveling D3 is for you.

Post your hell or inferno character and then we can talk. I am sure you have 0 experience of Diablo 3.

@OP, I really liked the review. I've already bought the game on steam because 15 pounds is nothing.

Probably extremely similar to someone else's hell or inferno character.  In fact, they have the same damn skills no matter what.

Some of us like customization.  What I don't like is people claiming D3 is moving the genre forward with little more than opinion rather than factual evidence.  The only thing D3 is moving us towards is less customization and no ownership of our games.

Originally posted by jessie360

Probably extremely similar to someone else's hell or inferno character.  In fact, they have the same damn skills no matter what.

Some of us like customization.  What I don't like is people claiming D3 is moving the genre forward with little more than opinion rather than factual evidence.  The only thing D3 is moving us towards is less customization and no ownership of our games.

Yeah, except D3 gives you MORE customization, not less, then the previous Diablo games.  This kind of misinformation really needs to be stopped from being spread. 

I played late into the night last night nearly finishing up the story on my Ember Mage.  I found some beautiful AoE and utility skills that let me play in a totally different manner.  Next go around I'll try a more focused build.  This time I was just noodling around and exploring.

There are some rough edges that can be polished, but most are just nit-picky.  For example, when I switch my USB sound from speakers to headset (or vice versa) the game needs to be restarted in order to pick that up.  There are also some small mechanics issues I hope will get smoothed out, but nothing major.  Gameplay is very smooth and responsive.  Things just work, and the UI is pretty nice.

This is definitely a winner in my book.  It is something I can play with my son at the house and with my relatives and friends over the internet.  It's also being sold at a very reasonable price.

I'm very curious how PoE will end up.  It might be the grittier version of hack-n-slash that I'm looking for.  I'll be checking them out once my workload slows down some.