Well D3 was darn popular

Well it seems Blizzard has more than one cash cow after all, as Diablo 3 made a fair crop of cash for the studio (Polygon article). 20 million sales of the game. The subscribers numbers for WoW have lead some folk to say that WoW is in trouble, and perhaps even the concept of an MMO is in trouble too (MMO’s are dying). I don’t buy into that because frankly I think MMOs are another arrow in the quiver of game styles that gamers like myself enjoy. D3 was popular, as was D1&D2; they’re not the same as WoW, but they represent that games are still able to make a tidy profit and that the audience for games hasn’t evaporated as much as some of the end of the world style blog titles imply. These games don’t signal the end of anything except the short period while one game has it’s pinnacle of popularity. I’ll wait for D4 happily, or a variant clone from another source happily.

The games will transform, might shudder a bit, but multiplayer games have been around for a darn long time, and we’re only seeing better and better graphics and gameplay as the decades roll along. A good game is worth paying for. A great game is worth following, and any studio which can release a solid product often will garner loyalty from wallets. As much as I sometimes dislike small parts of Blizzard’s approach, they do keep creatig things I find fun. I don’t kickstart/crowdfund much at all because I think I could use my money on other things, and the risk is not worth it. That might mean that I’m not on the cutting edge of new games, but I’m also not dropping US$80 every three or four months on the same set of tripe shooter, mmo clone, or games that never get completed.

I would spend something on a single player, turn based, strategy game set either in misc fantasy land or space … if it was a revamped and upgraded Master of Orion 2. MoO3 was awful, and MoO2 hit that sweet spot of fun that I still think about. What happened to the popularity of the turn based games? I guess I’ll wait for them to come back into favor.

Play for free, Up to level 13

A few weeks ago Blizzard announced that D3 was going to have a free play option for low level characters (FAQ here). I’m not sure why I missed this initially, but perhaps the silly work and wow cycle was as much eye candy as I could take in.

Regardless, this is offering which I think is a benchmark for game distribution in today’s market: give the player an opportunity to see if they like your work. Do not expect that people will pay to test if the game sucks. They won’t. If they trail it, then they can pay for the full thing when it makes them happy, if not then they get caps and limits that might keep them interested periodically. That demo might be a week’s grace, or a level limit, or whatever style is suitable. Either way you get players who wish to play, not players who are angry about getting some of the money’s worth.

A long time ago I played and loved Master of Orion 1 and 2. When MoO3 was released I pre-purchased that game and regretted it straight away. It was a poor imitation of the old game, with bright and shiny graphics which did nothing to distract from the shitty actual play. A total waste. Since then I’ve been a mad and angry purchaser of any game product. Temple of Elemental Evil was a similar experience as while the game was technically playable the crash rate and list of things that when SNAP! was too large.

So now I rant about free to play capped options with furvor and wrath.

For Diablo 3’s free play option they chose a max level number like unlucky 13 for the free players. That is just too much fun. Well done guys, it made me smile.

The demonically-besieged world of Sanctuary needs heroes. Now you can join in the apocalyptic battle for FREE via the all-new Diablo®  III Starter Edition.  Available exclusively via Battle.net®, the Starter Edition allows you to fight your way up to the Skeleton King boss in Act I, and advance all the way to level 13, without having to purchase a copy of Diablo III.

Recently Star Wars did this too, and it was enough in the 7 days of trail time for me to know that it was not the game for me while I still wanted to play wow. If I get sick of wow, then SWToR might be an option. They even had free trail weekends which were great too. I can imagine that this added a few odd players into the pool. Perhaps there is a snarky comment to be made about giving it away for free, and that it might be a precursor to going fully free-to-play, but in 2012 I think that is still not a conclusion that is accurate.

Diablo 3 is enough of a game that I think I would have purchased it away way, especially as it has no ongoing subscription; but I might have avoided it early on if I hadn’t had a Blizzard annual pass. I feel the same way about trialing GuildWars2 – play it if its free to see if its good, but otherwise I’m not interested in paying box price to evaluate software anymore.

I generally assume that most games released are not worth it until I read staggeringly good reviews from multiple sources, and a friend says its good, and it is released. A little while ago I said “I’m planning a short return plunge into WoW briefly before playing Diablo 3, and possibly SWToR. I’ll wait till Panda-randa is released, then decide if I pick it up.” Now that more details are about I’ll probably buy MoP in advance. It is good enough and close enough that it is a low risk.

I still don’t like Pandas though. Perhaps that means I’m looking forward to killing a few.

Related articles

• Trial Games and Distribution
• Diablo III FREE Starter Edition Now Available (us.battle.net)
• Play Diablo III for free up to level 13 (massively.joystiq.com)
• Diablo III Starter Edition Now Available to All (techie-buzz.com)
• News: Blizzard announces free Diablo III Starter Edition (atomicmpc.com.au)
• Diablo III Starter Edition is Available (kingtoko.wordpress.com)
• Blizzard Entertainment Releases Free Trial Version of Diablo 3 (games.com)
• Diablo III Starter Edition is now free (gamesradar.com)

Prestige for endgame D3 players

Ding 60! Grats. And then ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. You get the idea.

D3 is adding 100 extra “paragon” levels of character advancement into the game with a coming patch, to satisfy the endgame players who desire more power and prestige.

Here’s how it works:

– After you hit level 60, any further experience you earn from killing monsters will begin to count toward Paragon levels

– There are 100 Paragon levels
– Every Paragon level will reward you with:

Core stats such as Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, and Vitality in amounts similar to what you’d gain from a normal level 3% Magic Find and 3% Gold Find

– In addition, a distinctive increasingly-impressive border will surround your character portrait in the in-game party frame to denote your Paragon progression, with a new frame earned after every ten levels. Your Paragon level will also be visible to other players wherever your normal level is shown

Excellent. Players who desire this style of grind and advancement will likely love the idea, and it shows that Blizzard is still very interested in keeping the long tail of players active in D3 as much as they were in D2. It allows the really advanced players better odds of finding good random loot, and feeds that gear through to the Real Money and Gold Auction Houses.

It’s not for me, but hey – everything can’t be. Welcome news, and if generating 75 pages of comments on an announcement is a sign of success, then this is being taken in a mostly positive light by the community too. The negative comment seem to be focused on a dislike of grinding out levels as “endgame” and a dislike of the motivations of driving activity to the AHs. I paused to wonder if the negative players actually played the other Diablo games if this was unexpected or disliked. D1&2 were all about the grind.

Perhaps the new content should include twenty or so new level features as mini-experiences (save the ghost lady, etc), and ten or so new monster models with a variety of new spell colours and effects. Then attach an achievement to getting each and collecting the set, so that the completionists can get their groove on as well. What is even considered endgame for Diablo anyway? Certainly not raid content.

Refs:

• D3’s Announcement
• Progression Obsession: Diablo Adding 100 More Levels | Rock, Paper, Shotgun.

Related articles

• Blizzard to extend Diablo III endgame with 100 new character levels (arstechnica.com)
• Diablo III Adds 100 Levels In New ‘Paragon’ System [Diablo] (kotaku.com)
• Blizzard Reveals Diablo 3 Paragon System (incgamers.com)
• D3 Team Introduces Paragon Levels (iamjoe.wordpress.com)
• Blizzard Adds 100 New Levels and Hours of Clicking to Diablo 3 (forbes.com)
• Diablo III upgrades to level 160 with Paragon system (slashgear.com)

Diablo 3 patch … What exploit?

Aside … Diablo 3 has a mini-patch 1.0.3a to address some small issues, and it reminds me that I’m out of the loop in terms of game exploits (via wowinsider).

Fixed several gold and leveling exploits

Gone are the days of getting out a hex editor to snaffle straight 24 stats in Bard’s Tale 2. I wish I knew more about the exploits they were fixing, just to have cool insight into how it worked. Darn it.

It is no longer possible to create fake achievement links.

Ha! I’m sure there was some comedy gold in there due to that, the odd complaint, and perhaps a dummy spit. Fixing it is a fair thing though.

Witchdoctor – Zombie Bears should no longer become stuck on objects with which they shouldn’t have collision.

But they will still be stuck on items for which they do have collision? Whew! Why do they get stuck, instead of either pathing to the toon?

You know a game is wonderful when the collision mechanics for Zombie Bears is a consideration. This note alone should be a marker for people to try the game. Now if it was Zombie Bear Cavalry then the world would play. Or Feral Zombie Bear Tanks with Guns!

Go read the rest, I’ll stay here and create more silly Zombie Bear notes.

Happy killing, TyphoonAndrew

Quick aside on D3

Diablo III Act III (Photo credit: JBLivin)

I enjoy that I can play Diablo 3 for a minute at a time, and not be punished. Casual? Yes. The game so far has no respawns that will find you when you if AFK. That makes coffee/wife/kid/phone breaks easier.

A few things I’ve changed in the game settings: Turn off auto join, and Turn on move key. Both are tweaks which make the game more pleasant.

Real$AH WTB Authenticator

Apparently the Real Money Auction House will be up for play tomorrow, and restricted to people who have authenticators. Shucks, I think that is good news.

Why? – Well security, and knowing that the cash transaction is far more likely to be the real people involved, not a hacker exploiting. The only barrier I can see if those people who cannot afford or desire either a dongle authenticator, or a mobile device authenticator, and I seriously think that if you are willing to risk your game account by not using the almost free tools then you are not really invested in the game(s) at all.

Wanted: Account Setting Lockout – I still won’t be using the real money AH though, my real money is far too valuable to see being spent on golden pixels, and I have not interest in selling gear for cash. I would like an account setting in the Battle.Net profile to block all Real Money AH type transactions. This way even if my account is compromised, the hacker needs to make a setting change, and kids and partners cannot buy/sell “by mistake“.

Fire from the sky has ended

To postpone the hungry cadre of gamers trying to install Diablo 3, the system declared that the fire from the sky had not ended. We waited. None patiently.

Now the great zerg to play D3 has begun. A few updates and patches, some apologies for errors, and a lot of persistence has players now enjoying the game. My take – well I’ve created a toon and entered the world, but I’ll only be commenting on major stuff in the first ten levels which is different from the beta, or where something is darn odd. I’m pleased to say that it is exactly as expected so far. It’s entertaining.

The class intro media were very good too, which was new to be from beta. It does feel forced to have such a strange mix of heroes from all over the world converging, and that was always going to feel a bit forced. At least we didn’t meet at an inn, with a fight breaking out like a D&D game. Well, ahem, perhaps that bit is in the starter story too.

A few thoughts from around the web worth reading too, Tobold has an observation about D3’s pricing, and Keen and Graev have 5 Things We Like and Dislike about Diablo 3.

Happy killing.

Excellent D3 Prequel Cartoon

D3 is only a week away, and Blizzard has released a darn good 6 minute cartoon which tells the pre-story to Diablo. More games should be released with this style and flavour of side-material. It shows (at least to me) that Blizzard understand the audience who arekeen to play Diablo 3, and that they are really aiming to create something worthy of the lore we have grown to love.

We have also had the “End of Days” tv spot / promo for the game too, which is also very good, but not a cartoon akin to the one above. The animation in End of days is more realistic than the prequel, but it only shows a smattering of the video we know is included. It’s a good hash of the full video.

I really looking forward to D3.

Playing many games, casually.

I’m in that happy state where I get to play many games. World of Warcraft has taken a significant backseat due to real life events, and along with that I’ve chosen to look into the MoP Beta and the Diablo 3 Beta. The odd distracting iphone game gets a look too.

Playing of the big three games very briefly and casually is actually more satisfying in the short term than trying to play one game solidly. Initially I would doubt that to be true. In a nutshell I think being moderate has pushed my expectations, and I now find the small elements of fun amongst a range of games. For now its working. I am looking forward to the official release of Diablo so that I can see the full content and play online with some friends that it is hard to hook up with in other games. I would still like to get SWToR loaded and play that in the future when my PC has been upgraded, as the content was impressive enough that I think it will be a fantastic distraction.

There is also a set of play-by-post tabletop RPG games that distract me, and between them, the healthy posts from the players, and the rest of life short stint gaming is still working. So for now a quick 15 to 30 minute session will do, with much gnashing, power-ups, and gear to be swindled from the nefarious foes.

Happy gaming folks.

Diablo Beta thoughts

After completing the Diablo Beta I have some thoughts.

It is a good game, and feels basically ready. I’m looking forward to it. In the Beta test I played a Barbarian almost through to the end, and a Wizard through to completion. I’ll go back and try the other classes now, but probably not play them right through, as I want to also play them when the game is actually live.

Play-style wise I’d recommend that every player try each class; they really play differently. Music was nice, sound effects, nice, and the few special encounters and scenes I saw (Sword of Leoric) were really nice. Well done Blizzard.

I’d love a D3 beta key!

Just saw the news that D3 betas have started the second round of offers; a lazy 100,000 keys – wow. As a player with an “annual pass” its fragg’n disappointing. I’m not playing wow much at the moment as I need to be distracted often, but D3 is a game where I think it would be plausible to play in small blocks (based upon D1 and D2).

Kudos to the lucky 100k folks, and to Blizzard – make with the key gents. Ta.