Blizzard going back to the drawing board for dungeon-crawler's Team Deathmatch mode; dueling option coming with next patch.
Gamers holding out for a Diablo III player-versus-player mode may want to get comfortable. Blizzard Entertainment announced through a new blog post that the dungeon-crawler's Team Deathmatch mode "isn't where we want it to be," noting it "falls short" of company expectations.
"In continuing to develop this mode, playtest it, and put it in front of other developers within the company, we've found that it falls short of our expectations for a high-quality Blizzard experience," Diablo III game director Jay Wilson said.
Wilson further explained that the shortcomings are the result of a "few issues," the first of which is depth. The designer said the PVP experience in place "gets old" quickly, and though some playtesters enjoyed their time with it, overall this was not the case.
"Simply fighting each other with no other objectives or choices to make gets old relatively quickly," Wilson said. "We've brought a lot of people in to try out Team Deathmatch and, while some found it entertaining, most of our testers didn't feel like it was something they'd want to do beyond a few hours. Without more varied objectives, or very lucrative rewards, few saw our current iteration as something they'd want spend a lot of time in."
A second issue with Diablo III's Team Deathmatch mode is that of class balance.
"Like Diablo II, Diablo III was designed to be a PvE-first kind of game, where we never compromised on player abilities in the name of future PvP balance. We want to be able to carry over as many of the crazy runes, items, and skills as possible, with their crazy effects, and alter them as little as possible," Wilson said. "In a casual PvP mode, something equivalent to a WoW Battleground, this would be fine, but Team Deathmatch felt very hardcore, and it put a laser focus on class balance in a way that we didn’t think would be good for the game as a whole."
Though Blizzard is no longer pursuing a Team Deathmatch mode for Diablo III, Wilson said time spent developing it has not gone to waste, as it has provided unspecified benefits in the areas of controls and combat model tuning. However, "at this point, we don't believe it's the experience we feel it needs to be in order to ship, so we will be shelving it for now and exploring other options."
Wilson also explained in the blog post that Diablo III will soon support dueling options for players. This will be added to the game through patch 1.0.7, which is expected to arrive sometime in 2013.
However, a full replacement for Team Deathmatch is further away, as Blizzard is now exploring "new modes that play up to the strengths of the character classes, focus on objectives beyond just defeating other players, and possibly even integrate PvE elements and rewards." Whatever this turns out to be, it will be offered a free download, Blizzard said.
Eddie Makuch (Mack-ooh) is a News Editor at GameSpot. He works out of the company's Boston office in Somerville, Mass., and loves extra chunky peanut butter.
I have no reason to max out my character in diablo 3. I have beaten the game once and that is it. I might go back to it later. I wanted to be excited about the pvp in Diablo 3, but I do not know when I will be excited for it. I had fun with Diablo 3, but I am having much more fun with Torchlight 2.
the damage of the hackers, botters and exploiters are done.game has been f*cked since release.
3 Like It's amazing Blizzard is (almost) able to keep up with small indie studios like Grinding Gear Games (PoE). Why, with a few billion $$$ and another 15 years, who knows how far Blizzard can go!
Keep reaching for those stars Jay, don't let everyone else's opinion in gaming deter you from your goal of mediocrity...when your ready.
I really couldn't care less.
I've never really understood the people who play Diablo for the PvP. PvE was always the main focus of the game design for every entry in the series. I simply never felt any inclination to duel in either of the previous games, and I still have no interest now. Why don't the people who seem to want this so badly just go and play a game that was designed for PvP from the ground up?
While I liked some aspects of D3, D2 is by far my favourite of the franchise. My biggest issue with D3 wasn't PvP not being there, it was that the campaign was or at least felt incredibly short. The story was less interesting as a whole although I liked the later levels a lot (character interactions were great however).
I stopped playing this game after my first run, couldn't bear to go another round. The game looks great, but I have to be honest I miss the Necromancer class from D2, I really liked walking with an army plus his armour looked very cool (Witch Doctor IS NOT the Necro equivalent), so it doesn't matter what they do - it will never be a D2 so I managed to keep expectations very low and safe myself the disappointment since they announced the classes.
One thing I liked a lot was the blacksmith and jewel crafting levelling system carrying over to new game the way they justify the grind. If they could expand this feature to a player's fortress that be very cool, you know like start with a clear patch of land and do some missions increasing the options and power of your keep, getting to customize the looks of it and even the type of armour your guards use would be awesome. Imagine the end result with several rooms and such to show of to your friends, maybe even a Demon Trophy room (heck maybe make it guild fortress so you can power the community). I don't know. It is something that came to mind that would have me return to D3.
5 Like When Jay "fuck that loser" Wilson says it falls short of his expectations, then what he probably means is that it's not accessible enough yet and players with free (not paid auction house equipment) can still win by skill, which is obviously not in his interest because skill means fun and auction house means money. (aka "the pay to win aspect is not quite where we want it to be yet")
Then again I'm amazed they found people (no bots but real people) that still play this game to test it for them, besides the development team itself.
Probably the same casual gamer crowd that was invited the first time and thought D3 was too "complex" by allowing distribution of skillpoints and having more than 5 "skills" usable at a time, was probably whining that the UI doesn't look console-ish enough and the story would make too much sense and needs dumbing down to "braindead level" too.
No amount of patching will ever return this to a playable, interesting state.
Make it free to play to perhaps regain some players' interests, because that's what it screams anyways with the auction house at its core or shut it down and let it rest in peace.
1 Like >.> <.< Er.. that's not implemented yet? Isn't this like them announcing a multiplayer map for Warcraft 3?
I've logged in over 100 hrs into the game. I know I got my money's worth, but I felt that I could have gotten more enjoyment. After reaching 60, the extra 100 Paragon levels were just wasted time. No real need to level up further because you can supplement the stats with better gear. What they should have done was provide more spells up till Lev 100 or something.
I stopped playing this game months ago. I put 300 hours into it, which means that I technically got my money's worth--but I don't feel that time went anywhere. It was just wasted effort. I almost wish I had read a book instead.
2 Like People don't realize it but the real reason it failed was the lack of any real choice. Yes you can change your build but there no choice with any sense of investment to it; each character feels "unlocked" rather than "built".
1 Like Time spent playing Diablo 3: ~200 hours. Time spent playing Diablo 2 LOD: 2,000+.
It took me a while to realize what the difference was and I can honestly say it was drive, community, optimization, and 100 different options for getting rich. Diablo hasn't married the myriad ways that people played D2 in the ways that it would work for D3. It's not for lack of trying, but the game doesn't have that "it" factor like it's older brother did. Offer the runewords again, get pvp going RIGHT NOW, and move the game towards the evolution from the older game, not vice versa. Pvp was a constantly evolving battlefield in D2 that offered most classes at least 1 or 2 skill loadouts that could devastate each other. With the ability to modify Diablo 3 at will, why not just start it and then patch it as it goes? Flaws and balancing are going to be there today just as much as they are going to be there whenever Jay feels they are done; just let it happen and correct it as it comes.
2 Like @starfox15 and while in torchlight 2 I found at least 6 different ways to play has an Outlander
and all that pvp would probably turned into in D3 is pay to win
2 Like Looks like the addition of more grinding has been stalled. Who's still playing Diablo III? Good luck to you.
2 Like @GreySeven In order for a grind game to be successful. The grind to reward ratio should be proportional. When you grind for 5 hours straight without getting meaningful drops so you would be forced to use the RMAH, then the design of the game is fundamentally WRONG!!! It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this out. I wonder why Blizzard doesn't get it.
1 Like @Yagami-san I agree with that. Accountants, slot machines, and mathematicians don't know much more than dollar signs, random number generation, and payout.
1 Like I bet it stalled coz the RMAH was killing interest for all but the super-rich or super-spoilt amongst the tester base.
2 Like The biggest letdown in PC history the last 10 years at least...
Jay Wilson FAILED so hard , NOONE , and i mean it , NOONE could predict such fail 1 day before release. And whoever says could is a bad liar.
I have had the game since launch and have to say whilst enjoyable is too shallow. It kept my interest for about 80 hours or so, but after that its has lost its allure.
For the amount of time this game was in development I expected a lot more in terms of content, variety and length of the game.
I am not saying that it is a bad game but its just too short and shallow
4 Like to quote fatboy wilson "if pvp isn't released in 2012, D3 is a failure"
Could have told you that from day 1. No offline mode, RMAH and now no PVP. Could happen this year, but who cares. Fail game is fail. I blame both activision for being the corporate master of blizzard and I blame blizzard for whoring themselves out. Not that they feel bad about themselves for anything, whores get paid either way.
when i wrote after a month, i meant having it installed a month. didnt play that much after the first two weeks.
4 Like does anybody care anymore? i stopped playing like a month after it came out. uninstalled and never ever have the slightest thought of touching it again.
2 Like First game is way to short.. Second the game doesnt feel like diablo to me..Third the items are not original..Check torchlight 2 items all original, im not comparing the two games or maybe i should..fourthly the skill slots what where they freaking thinking..Look at torchlight 2 sets 30 skills for 3 or 4 classes..I still play that game after many months of being on the market..Ive rebuilt my computer twice this year..Ive yet to reinstall diablo 3..I have d1 and d2 on my pc..Refuse to reinstall 3 thats telling you some thing right there..
Its beyond me what this team did for 10 years..Its like star wars the old republic, that game fell short along with diablo 3..Had high hopes for both games..Was in diablo beta for a few years..Yet i find it boring rofl..It has some thing very much to do with those things ive mentioned above..Diablo 3 lovers this is my opinion remember that..You guys may love it..How ever there is a lot missing under the hood of this crap that is diablo 3..Id really like to smack the guy who thought of the skill slot idea its horrible..Terrible job..
Diablo III was the first Diablo game I've ever played and I actually enjoyed it a lot. The only problem is the replay value. There's only so many times I could continue playing through the same dungeons over and over again. It's weird, because the game isn't necessarily short, but it feels really short because there's only four "destinations" to explore. I definitely enjoyed the first one the most... it had a great dark/gothic feel to it.
@diskotheque well that is what you get from 7 years if work, kind if tell us how slow and bad blizzard are
1 Like And after all of this time they JUST realized that a game needs objectives and rewards to keep it interesting? I think its all a load of bull****
1 Like @Arcantoss Well sorta, but the fuckwits on the dev team saw it like this "Their objective is to get gear, their reward is to get gear, DONE"
1 Like Balance what? its team death match, the team composition is the same and the team play like a team. There is nothing to balance.
Only reason classes need to be balance is because there are players who don't understand there is no I in team and those people should just not play...
I in TEAM is what destroyed WOW PVP.
If you want to 1V1 play Street Fighter...
2 Like Oh, you mean you'd have to work harder on BALANCE to make the game in PvP be fair, so why do it right?
......
POS game. Thanks for ruining Diablo Blizzard!!!
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@Richardthe3rd Feedback is never a negative thing. It will help your game become better if you listen. What you are witnessing now is not feedback however, it is people expressing their disgust and disappointment on how blizzard designed the game and how they are not making good on their promises.
@Yagami-san @Richardthe3rd Wrong, its bunch of retarded kids whining their bizarre dreams weren´t fullfiled. Hundred of thousands play D3 and have a blast at it.
2 Like @Richardthe3rd While I agree that there a lot of haters, I must point one thing out: community feedback is important and what it's telling us is that peopl are not happy about D3. Doesn't matter if that is philosophically or even logically justified, it just is. People think D3 was horrible, hence it was horrible.
@BuzzLiteBeer @Richardthe3rd I believe you are generilizaing, because there is people actually playing a game a lot, the last time i log in a month ago some of the friends i had, played the game over 300 hours. If some people expectations were let down that is a whole different subject.
Given the amount of time people spent complaining about how badly implemented D3 was at release I would think they'd be happy to see Blizzard is willing to start from scratch to make the PvP something players will like
2 Like @Wango_Tango You'd have to be unbelievably naive to think that "something players will like" means something other than "something we can make money from."
2 Like Wow, I can't believe people are still hopping on forums and bashing D3. If you hate the game so much why are you paying so much attention to it? I read this article cause I still play the game, love the game and am very excited for the next patch. Haters, move on.
@Eggs-Benedict because the first and second games meant alot to me, and I will not stand idly by as jay wilson shits on my memories and over the Diablo legacy, Diablo is not a Woman, they wouldn't do that shit to Arthas!!.... So why was it okay to do it to THE LORD OF HELL.
3 Like @Eggs-Benedict I love bashing D3 because it was so full of potential. This game could have been easily been game of the year .... maybe game of the decade. But they decided their pockets were the highest priorit over the game experience, and you get the current D3.
@Eggs-Benedict Saw this in the news feed and had to comment since it has no place here. People dont care about D3 anymore. No one actively goes out to bash D3, but when it get treated as front page news, something needs to be said.
@BuzzLiteBeer @Eggs-Benedict BuzzLiteBeer, your totally right. Doesn't need to be front page material, just post it in the D3 forums. The hype for this game was so unreal before it was released, it even got its own section in gosugamers. Now the number of people posting in that D3 section is so pitiful. Just shows how much people have stopped caring about the game.
1 Like @Eggs-Benedict if you love this game then you most haven't played the first 2 D3 is unacceptable to diablo fans especially for how long we have been waiting for it
@shadowhunter0 Actually played the first one when I was very young. Played the second one for a few years as well.
1 Like This game shouldn't have came out until the PvP was included. But you know Blizzard is just pushing it back until the expansion pack.
9 Like "high-quality Blizzard experience" HAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Blizzard you disgust me
@blackothhtheir on their way, "choo choo", all blizzard personnel aboard the hammerpoint express, "CHOO CHOO!!!"
Longtime developer Jay Wilson leaving game after seven years; will transition into new role at Blizzard in the next few weeks.
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