you are sort of suggesting that D1 & D2 were "heady" games. They were not. People keep going on about playing D2 for a decade. That's brains? how could that game possibly stimulate people of such high mental aptitude, and for so long? I played D2 and the expansion back in 2006 for the first time. Me and a couple of friends played it all the way through and then again on nightmare. It took less than a week and I never loaded that game ever again. Guess what, I really enjoyed the game. I played it through a couple times, then I was done. To each his own I guess, but I had other games calling, as always.
I think at the time the game had a lot going for it, mainly that 50% of every title released then was unplayable garbage. That's not the case anymore. Games are f'n awesome. In the last couple years I've played a grip of really fun, exciting, challenging, thoughtful, engrossing, beautiful, and artistic games. These are the games D3 is competing against, not D2, and for that reason I see the game as an overall failure. Add in the fact that its been a decade in the waiting and it paints an even more discerning picture for fans of the series.
I'm sure many will buy D3, and that is all matters to Blizzard, and that's all that should matter to Blizzard. They are a publicly traded corporation. Shareholders don't care about the future of Blizzard's lowly, underachieving, runt of the family, nor should they. They are working on another MMO for pete's sake. Short term investing is the name of the game in electronic media right now anyway. New IP's popping up all over the place with unheard of success in the industry. anyone ever see a game known as Minecraft? Me either, but I hear its hot.
People need to wake up and realize massive corporations, not unlike Blizzard, have agenda's that revolve around economics. And here comes the shocker for all of the economically uneducated: corporations do everything they can to diversify their consumer base, and video games publishers are no different, in fact, they benefit from it more than most. They do not want a large "core" fanbase. Thats gives the consumers "buying power" and more control over the products they consume. You don't have to be Einstein to realize thats the last thing a corporation wants. They want to sell you what they want to sell you. This is big business, not a mom & pop shop who know's your face.
You think we have it bad now? Just wait until developers and publishers are almost entirely "mobile" entities, and the only games we get are iPhone 17 (or whatever # they're at by then) ports. Yeah. Scary isn't it. By 2020 mobile devices are predicted to be the most widely used form of video entertainment. ponder that. Publishers will go where the money is. How could they not?
This months Gameinformer has a great article on the finacial future of gaming. I recommend it highly.
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