Diablo 3 - Gamepad Edition

[RenegadeRocks]

But I am never out of it. I am always shooting powers and thats how the game is designed. Weird mechanic ! Why have weapons at all then? I am never using it at all !!! Just to add stat numbers to powers?

Now I can see why it was a divisive game. Is fun to play,no doubt, but its mechanics are strange and limiting. We can say its the COD of Dungeon Crawlers, linear, limiting and choice less. RPGs are all about choice, this is not. Its still fun and I will recommend this for ur first Dungeon Crawler but not if you are really into Dungeon Crawlers.

What they have achieved well is downsizing a dungeon crawler so that even newcomers can enjoy it wothout getting intimidated with menus and choices while still keeping experienced players engaged. For that, well done ! Cos I can see my wife and nephew easily warming upto this but getting totally overwhelmed by the menus and inventories and powers' choices of Torchlight 2. Good game in that regard.

For people who like the genre, Compared to this Torchlight2 is an open field of fresh air. Weapons are ur primary damage and powers, multitude of them to choose from, are your secondary damage, to be whipped out when things are getting overwhelming. You have a plethora of choices for weapons, powers, passive abilities, etc. to choose from and theres lotsa lotsa loot and all is meaningful hardly ever does TL2 drop loot that u won't pickup. Whereas, for the first time , I am finding myself leaving loot on ground in D3 ! Its shocking for the hoarder I am in games ! Also, killed one of those special enemies that are supposed to have a chance of dropping Legendary loot and all he dropped was of lower stats than everyhting I had !

I am sure I will enjoy this a lot with my family, thanx to the simplicity, but my next Dungwon Crawler will be from Runic games, not Blizzard.

 

[AlNom]

But I am never out of it. I am always shooting powers and thats how the game is designed. Weird mechanic ! Why have weapons at all then? I am never using it at all !!! Just to add stat numbers to powers?

Didn't you ever want a sorceress wielding a giant sword? Anyways, mana will be a problem on higher difficulties or later on, not so much early in the game.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

Didn't you ever want a sorceress wielding a giant sword? Anyways, mana will be a problem on higher difficulties or later on, not so much early in the game.

I hope the weapons hold up when that happens. The Demon Hunter has a rhythm to his powers and I have settled in well, for now. My character is unstoppable right now, which feels good !

EDIT: BTW, if someone wants to co op here, lets do it !

 

[Billy Idol]

Great game so far. I can see why people are complaining. Character development seems to be quite limited.

Still, I like it so far and just hit lvl 14 with my Wizard:

Arkane Blades are cool

 

[RenegadeRocks]

I am level 15 with the Demon Hunter and he is practically unstopable ! Demon Hunters have two reasources and I time it such that I am never out of both= constant stream of damaging awesomness !

 

[deathindustrial]

Watching Twitch streams of PS3 gameplay this evening, I am surprised by how often and jarring the load screens are. The really should have tried to come up with a loading screen that blended into the action better (even a simple fade out would have been exponentially less annoying).

Was the PC version the same way?

Cheers

 

[RenegadeRocks]

Act II : Now the real game starts ! Getting difficult now and Very fun

 

[Billy Idol]

Lvl 16...and found my freakin first legendary drop! Some mid boss battles are quite tough...my Wizard is already a glascanon (there is even a perk named like this )

It was just a random dude who gave it to me...how kind!

 

[RenegadeRocks]

What is a legendary ? And how do u know , what colour is it ?

Edit: just checked , i have the trophy for equiping a Lefendary, so I must have something too.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Played 3 player last night projected on a wall. Fun game, although definitely odd as other have said. The fact you don't use your weapon, and it's used for defining skill power, is pretty ludicrous from a world mechanics POV. To see a mage waving a crossbow around in order to cast magic missile spells kinda breaks the illusion of another world! And the stats are auto-levelled, so there's not really a character development progression. AFAICS (we got to level 8) there's no managing the skill smuch either. You get access to all skills and just choose a rune to vary them, and can only have 6 active skills equipped.

The production values are very good though. The 60fps and smooth update makes it feel good an consoley. Most similar games this gen have been low budget and struggled. The closest high quality game I played was Dungeon Siege 3, but this has move production value and interest IMO. The skills early on are interesting. I picked a witch doctor and the skill of spiders-in-a-jar is certainly original, although I didn't use it because it's an aggravating sound. But as one chooses either blow pipe or spiders, or whatever the other skills are, it seems there's a lot of redundancy. You basically find a skill you like and stick with it. I guess a lot depends on what the runes do.

The interface is pretty awkward. Lots of wrong buttons when trying to navigate; not very intuitive. And having to handle inventory one player at a time is awkward. Also having the X button for everything is a questionable choice - enter a dungeon, start shooting and find yourself exiting because the attack button is also the use door button is also the pick-up button!

Have had one bug where player 3's green ring, and then P3 label, just disappear until the next area loads.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

What is a legendary ? And how do u know , what colour is it ?

Edit: just checked , i have the trophy for equiping a Lefendary, so I must have something too.

Aren't they the yellow items? Lots available in the shops. We also had several in the stash to equip. We could all equip the preorder bonus items, but buying items from the shop, although blue items could be bought by more than one player, it seems yellow items are once offs and you have to ensure the party agrees about who gets what (or have a rule where whoever gets to the merchant first gets first dibs ).

 

[Billy Idol]

What is a legendary ? And how do u know , what colour is it ?

Edit: just checked , i have the trophy for equiping a Lefendary, so I must have something too.

You get one at the start when you preorder.

When you find one...you will know
Color is about golden and you have first to identify it to use it...legendary are really really strong but super rare weapons. The highest weapon class iirc.

 

[Billy Idol]

Aren't they the yellow items? Lots available in the shops. We also had several in the stash to equip. We could all equip the preorder bonus items, but buying items from the shop, although blue items could be bought by more than one player, it seems yellow items are once offs and you have to ensure the party agrees about who gets what (or have a rule where whoever gets to the merchant first gets first dibs ).

No, yellow items are "rare" items, quite good, but no legendary.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

Aren't they the yellow items? Lots available in the shops. We also had several in the stash to equip. We could all equip the preorder bonus items, but buying items from the shop, although blue items could be bought by more than one player, it seems yellow items are once offs and you have to ensure the party agrees about who gets what (or have a rule where whoever gets to the merchant first gets first dibs ).

Legendaries are Orange according to my Trophy list. What are the colour codes in D3? I mean white<?<blue<purple<yellow<Orange?

And yes, preorder bonuses seems to be for all, my wife , when she joined in today ,also got them from the stash. We hd totally forgotten about them yesterday , equipped them today.

Btw, the game becomes very beautful in Act 2, but it does have tearing, which I hate in any game. I can take framerate drops, but tearing irritates me. Also, reading the gaf thread and listening to some other ppl's thoughts, I think my Demon Hunter is definitely more powerful for the game. Act 2 requires u to constantly watch ur health bar, before that I was just mowing through the crowd not worrying at all.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

You get one at the start when you preorder.

When you find one...you will know
Color is about golden and you have first to identify it to use it...legendary are really really strong but super rare weapons. The highest weapon class iirc.

What??? I did not identify anything till now ! Didn't even know this game has an identify mechanic.

Edit: ok, so the preorder one doesn't have to be identified.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

@Billy: so, what does u r legendary do?

Also, what time do u sually play? We are at similar levels, we could co op. co op is fantastic and very tough too.

 

[Billy Idol]

@Billy: so, what does u r legendary do?

Also, what time do u sually play? We are at similar levels, we could co op. co op is fantastic and very tough too.

Can't remember at the moment...but it is quite a bit stronger than my former weapon (has a lot of stats to it).

Coop would be great! What are your plans: I will most likely play through the game with my character multiple times to level him up in the next difficulty.

If you are interested, we could team up for the second run through

I noticed that we are online often at the same time, so this should not be such a big problem...I am Europe time and typically at the evening...if I am addicted even in the morning before work

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Noticed a couple of points playing a little solo. Firstly, DOT doesn't appear to show as damage number. The witch doctor's grasping hands skill damages all enemies in its radius, but you'll only notice that if have enemy health bars visible (they are shown at the top of the screen in solo play but not in coop - you can enable them over the monsters). Damage is also a floating-point value, so attacks can do less than 1 damage, but this damage is rounded to 0 and not shown. My zombie dog and spider damage wasn't showing as damage numbers until I got a decent weapon.

That comes to my other observation about a certain broken aspect to this game. Damage is all tied to weapon, which means you have to have a decent weapon. I progressed to level 5 without finding any new weapons, meaning I was doing 2-3 damage clearing out the cathedral. It was a slow and difficult process! Didn't get any weapons drops, not even from the weapon racks, couldn't afford either weapon from the shop either. As the game progresses this probably becomes a non issue as you'll have money and options, but it definitely colours the start of the game.

Also, solo is way, way harder than coop (hard mode in both plays)! And it warrants using more skills. eg. I could chuck spiders over a banister to hit zombies below me, then switch to blowpipe when critters get close.

 

[RenegadeRocks]

Can't remember at the moment...but it is quite a bit stronger than my former weapon (has a lot of stats to it).

Coop would be great! What are your plans: I will most likely play through the game with my character multiple times to level him up in the next difficulty.

If you are interested, we could team up for the second run through

I noticed that we are online often at the same time, so this should not be such a big problem...I am Europe time and typically at the evening...if I am addicted even in the morning before work

As you say , I am fine with co op on first playthrough too.

Btw, got two legendaries, one was a pair of pants with lots of buffs and another was an amulet, which replaced my Drake's amulet from the pre order. Still haven't got any weapon Legendary. I have encountered that Treasure Goblin thrice now, but never got anyhting worthwhile from him.

Also, after a brief period of some challenge at the beginning of act 2, my Demon Hunter again seems to be unstoppable. Magdha's fight was over in about 40-50 secs ! My demon Hunter finished her in under a minute ! And she is supposed to be a boss ! I don't think its supposed to be that easy in a game. Feels OP, but I am having my fun !

No choice for unlocks means about 3-4 level ups went without any change in the moves I was using as th enew ones were ot my style or the runes were for the ones I don't use. Finally, now I got that 'whirlwind' ability, thats superb ! The DH just cruises theough the enemies while shooting in all directions ! Ha ! I use it just to have fun with the enemies.

 

[blakjedi]

im using a monk. So far its good not really great yet... PS3 has some tearing... I dont quite understand all of the level ups for weaponry but im getting there Level 14 still in act 1.