Better said they are still in business because they make convenient games. My point is that there is a certain amount of difference there.
And to reply to Mucky, if you count 'convenient' as great.. well then yea, sure.
On sidenote, good for blizz. But most of the old timers won't be coming back, and I think blizz doesn't really expect them to. So that's why I find those 'principles'a bit bold, to stay at that.
edit: its like reading the text for a washing detergent commercial.
I'm a d2 vet, and over 10 years I've grown tired of overly complicated games. If d2 came out today, I'd probably not even play it more than a few hours. I now want games that don't screw around with tedious upkeep/overly complicated systems. I want to enter the game, and have it be very simple to play and upgrade the character. Throw a bunch of help files, stat explanations, bugs, mysterious mechanics that require knowledge of various formulas... I can't be arsed with that. I don't play games that make it feel like I'm working a second job.|||Quote:
I'll pretend I haven't noticed the obvious insults you threw at me.
I could count the times during d3 development (and during other recent blizzard games btw) where gameplay, artistic visual design, ratings, etc. were all traded off for a larger and better paying audience.
You gonna try and tell me that is not so? Go ahead. Just don't shoot garbage flying at me, I don't like it.
Telll us exactly where these trade off's have been made. Don't be vague about it and don't deflect.|||Quote:
Telll us exactly where these trade off's have been made. Don't be vague about it and don't deflect.
ael wont because he's a troll.|||Value #8 (should really be #1 imo): "Learn & grow: The games industry is ever-changing. Technology improves, techniques change, and design philosophies become outdated." It's true that if they left, Blizz wouldn't miss the 'old-timers'. Their numbers pale in comparison to casuals, while in the past there were next to no casuals and they were the majority. That was then, this is now. As the saying goes, deal with it.
ael is right that the list on that page is naught but marketing talk, towards employees as well as potential customers. The aims are different - you market the job to motivate people and the products in order to sell them - but it's marketing through and through. There are no higher ideals than making money in the corporate world. Seemingly, there are 'core values', but as soon as those so-called principles start conflicting with the profit motive, it's time to re-mold them or cast them out in favor of new ones. If you don't do that you eventually risk running the company to the ground. It helps if your principles are vague platitudes like Blizz's, so you can twist words around and make them describe almost anything. You can even go with outright truisms if you like. I mean, who the hell doesn't think globally in this day and age?
Imo, the reason Blizz are taking so long with release is that they want to hone the game to perfection, gameplay-wise, so that there are no real alternatives to it. With all the grinding that these games basically consist of, after the initial play-through, you want it to go as smooth as possible. This is why games like Path of Exile or Torchlight (granted I haven't tried either) can only compete when it comes to design decisions. They can't afford to keep developing games for years and years, unlike Blizz, and so there will necessarily be some rough edges.
Ofc Blizz could make D3 a haphazard cash-cow and still make a lot of dough, but you've got to think long-term too. They want it to be good enough to condition you to buying D4 10 years down the road... And the two or three expansions before that.
|||Quote:Better said they are still in business because they make convenient games. My point is that there is a certain amount of difference there.
How you recognize if game is good or convenient?
I am also Diablo veteran.. or even warcraft veteran..hell, I played golden axe, Dune 2 when these games were new.. Yet I still see Blizzard games like one of the best game on the market...for over decade now.. .And can't wait for Diablo.
Most my friends are even older than me.. and played Diablo more extensively than me and they still like how Diablo 3 is shaping .I don't think you can just generalize games and even future playerbase..you don't like it? Okey..it's fine..that's how it works..but just don't make generalizations.|||Quote:
The only people who spout that nonsense are the ones who feel the need to get personally offended whenever Blizzard does something as a company they don't personally approve of with their games.
Thankfully,the butthurt whinings of a few sperglords (who'll be buying their product...anyways) has no actual impact on the quality, or success, of their games.
Maybe I am just getting cynical as the years waiting for this game go by... but I tend to agree with this, short of a few name callings here and there.
For as big as blizz is, they do a pretty good job keeping with those 8 values. At any point you try to rub those in their face, it's probably because you are mad they pulled something from the game that you liked. Honestly, from what I have played ... rule #1 "Gameplay first" -- the game is really fun.
There is a reason they are making games for a global market and you aren't. If you disagree with that, then really the best option is to get into the art and business of game design for yourself, show me up, show blizz up, and make a trillion dollars.|||Quote:
And to reply to Mucky, if you count 'convenient' as great.. well then yea, sure.
Why would anyone want a game to inconvenience them? I think you're confusing accessibility with challenge. We know that D3 will be broadly accessible – and why would anyone but an elitist want it to be otherwise? Whether it'll be challenging is still yet to be seen but Blizzard usually stick to their “easy to learn, difficult to master” ethos doggedly.|||Quote:
Why would anyone want a game to inconvenience them? I think you're confusing accessibility with challenge. We know that D3 will be broadly accessible � and why would anyone but an elitist want it to be otherwise? Whether it'll be challenging is still yet to be seen but Blizzard usually stick to their �easy to learn, difficult to master� ethos doggedly.
The thing that i dont get though is that people talk like diablo 2 was somehow a challenge when really if you played a cookiecutter build it was easy. Once you got some decent gear you could roll over everything even on players 8. Hardcore was hard but only because death was hard to avoid with some monsters. Besides that D2 was a easy game. I hate the argument that its somehow streamlined or made easy when diablo 1 was the last game that had a challenge anyways.|||Quote:
What exactly are people complaining about here? Where have gameplay, artistic visual design, ratings (what does that even mean?) been traded off?
Quote:
Telll us exactly where these trade off's have been made. Don't be vague about it and don't deflect.
For one thing, there used to be options besides item grind. Now, it's almost 100% item grind, which removes a ton of variety. It's pretty bad if you're not a fan of item grinding. And don't tell me past Diablo games were "all about item grinding" because they weren't. Maybe a large part of it was about the items, but there were other options for those who wanted them: level grind, ladder, incentive to reroll, skill points, stat points, offline play, LAN, all of it gone now despite some of these systems upheld by Blizzard in the past three years. Now, there are less options. And you can probably guess why these options were taken away and replaced with pure item grinding (because Blizzard makes more money that way). And please don't go through the list of options removed and find excuses why they should be removed because there are too many of them for this thread. It's really about the principle of forcing everyone into item grind.
Edit: I suppose someone will say "no one is forcing you to play the game." Sure, no one is forcing me, but it still sucks to have options removed. So let me rephrase: If you want to play your favorite game, you are forced into item grinding and virtually nothing else.|||I can't for a second believe that any real game designers are behind most of the D3 changes. They almost have to be driven by management pressure to streamline.
It's possible JW is really that limited (or to be fair, in tune with the current game development mind rot) I guess. He's got to be talented or he wouldn't be there. I just don't agree with him, which I'm sure is zero skin off his nose.
No comments:
Post a Comment