Zero Punctuation: Diablo 3

[PingoBlack]

That was the most uninspired ZP I have seen so far ...

A collection of internet QQ without research, coupled with his problem for being addicted to Blizzard games and hating himself for it. Weak.

I give props to "carpet bombing" joke, that was inspired.

 

[necromanzer52]

Ever hear of a book called "beyond the deepwoods"? As long as you read the first chapter first, and the last chapter last, you can read all the intermediate ones in whatever order you feel like, and it'll basically make the same amount of sense. It's still a really good book.

 

[Denamic]

Witch Doctor is disco mode.
SO MUCH STUFF GOING ON!
It is very confusing, I have to say.

 

[Smertnik]

Ah, yes, the elusive elective mode. A friend of mine managed to miss it as well and was completely flabbergasted when I told him about it. This is why I always look through every option available before starting a game.

 

[Casey Goddard]

Best ZP review I've seen in months!

 

[Zulnam]

Wait...

Yahtzee never played either of the other Diablo games?
Yahtzee didn't BEAT the extremely short campaign that is Diablo 3?
Yahtzee didn't turn on elective mode to use whatever spell in whatever category?

GOOD GOD MAN! I CANT DEFEND YOU ON THIS ONE!

I was thinking the same thing. His charm can only get him out of so many shenanigans.

 

[Breywood]

I'm a little let down, but you brought out some excellent points. I thought the cheesy character designs would also have obtained honorable mention. The story was better than I thought, but when all I was getting was fanboys trying to outdo each other with speculation, you can only imagine how low the bar was set.

 

[Epona]

Randomly generated terrain just means that my explored maps never save when I leave the game. I no longer see any point to completely exploring a map since it won't stay explored when I leave the game.

 

[CaptainMarvelous]

I still don't get why people who didn't play any of the sequels review THIRD game in the series. That's like reviewing Lord of the Rings: Return of the King without watching or reading previous chapters.

OK, take issue with this. Ignoring the fact the rest of this post could be summarised "With I like Blizzard and Diablo 3 and this is why everyone who dislikes it is wrong", claiming you can't review a game without playing the games that came 12 years before it is just bias at it's highest.

If someone posted in Yahtzee's Skyward Sword review that his opinion was invalid because he didn't play A Link to the Past on the SNES, you wouldn't accept that argument for shit, even LESS if it was to the first Zelda game from 86. From what I remember of Diablo 2, Diablo's soul gets destroyed at the end, I don't recall that being explained in Diablo 3? The storylines aren't even sequential as far as I can see, so it's really not like the Lord of the Rings example.

Defend the game you like all you like, but claiming you have to play the preceeding games is fanboyism at it's highest. I know because -I- have that response to some of these ZP reviews, but I stop myself from saying it.

 

[yundex]

You've watched over 100 zero punctuation episodes, you should already know the answer. You should know that Yahtzee constantly spoils entire plots and endings of the games he rants about. This is also the reason I have not even watched his screed: revelations video.

You're going to have to really stretch the definition of the word "spoiler" to make it work in the way you're trying to make it work.

And I do mean REALLY stretch it. For the record, "spoiler" generally doesn't refer to things that are stupidly obvious, like "Diablo appears in Diablo 3". Giving an explanation for how Diablo is resurrected in Diablo 3, despite managing to get his SOUL destroyed in Diablo 2, WOULD be a legitimate spoiler. (btw, still waiting to find a good explanation for how the hell that works at all that isn't a giant middle finger to D2 fans) >_>

But I'm willing to hear this out. Tell me, can you please provide multiple examples of ZP reviews in which Yahtzee spoiled the entire ending of the game while reviewing it? And I do mean the ENTIRE ending, not just pointing out one or two plot points that show up halfway through the game and continue to have an impact on the game's finale. I think the last I can recall is Kane and Lynch 2....and did you really need Yahtzee to tell you not to buy that game?

Besides, even if your assertion were as true as you try to make it sound (and I'm not convinced it is), your point still really doesn't dismiss the rest of the post you quoted, in which I also stated that there are lots of other ways to get information about a game, too. So....

Mass effect 3, spoiled the final mission mission. And SCREED brotherhood, which I finished before watching. I didn't actually mean that ENTIRE endings were spoiled, bad choice of words. But they're spoileriffic enough for me and many others. My only point is that you do not watch Zero Punctuation to determine weather or not you want to buy a game, I do not care about the rest of your post or diablo 3, which is why I did not and will not address it.

 

[GloatingSwine]

It's a shame Yahtzee didn't play it through until the end. The final boss fight was so anticlimactic and the ending comes close to mass effect 3 bad. I was really looking forward to him bashing on that part.

People said this about Borderlands as well, but it's because they don't understand the game.

When you are assessing how good the last boss of a trouser-hunt is, you don't look at the fight itself, or the design of the boss, but whether it dropped good trousers.

 

[Doclector]

Great review and all, but...

Thanks for all the pictures of the spiders. I really didn't need to sleep tonight, I was planning to spend all my time nervously twitching around everytime I get an itch.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Randomly generated terrain just means that my explored maps never save when I leave the game. I no longer see any point to completely exploring a map since it won't stay explored when I leave the game.

That's one of the things that bothered me about Diablo in general. The environment RARELY MATTERS. There's a few levels in Diablo 2 where you can ply the environment to your advantage, but most of the time you're just wandering through a semi-open dark corridor.

For games like Nethack or Terraria, where I'm expecting to backtrack to some other new location, this can work just fine. You establish some sort of landmarks, order within chaos.

But for Diablo, unless it's a preset map, once you've murdered all the forces of hell, you're never going to set eyes on that room ever again.

 

[0over0]

I could be wrong, but I think part of the idea of randomly generated dungeons is, besides replayability, is that your experience will be different than your friend's experience so you can stand around the water cooler comparing.

I think the main reason is that proceedurally generated dungeons saves the developer huge amounts of money that they can then reinvest...into their own pockets.
You don't actually compare notes on the room layout, do you?

 

[zefiris]

That's one of the things that bothered me about Diablo in general. The environment RARELY MATTERS. There's a few levels in Diablo 2 where you can ply the environment to your advantage, but most of the time you're just wandering through a semi-open dark corridor.

And in later difficulties, most enemies just teleport to you, so you can't even use terrain cleverly.

Even Terraria feels more strategic

 

[Unsung]

If you don't like the genre, you won't like games in that genre. It seems like a fairly simple equation to me, but I guess people just don't understand.

A lesson in Action-RPG tropes:

-Randomized content
-Character progression (hence the RPG bit)
-Mass genocide (hence the action bit)

People bitching about randomized content make no sense. That's...what the game is. That's what the genre is.

Do I think Diablo III is an exceptional game? No. I think it's fairly mediocre and is not worth 60 bucks. Their DRM scheme successfully drove the price up and the auction house will monetize the game further.

I don't think Yahtzee even wanted to review this game. He knew he was going to hate it from the get go because he's not into this genre. That's completely understandable. However, he could have made better points, like the complete absence of skill trees and the shoddy writing. Instead, he chose to target one of the basic proponents of the entire genre, which is just silly.

Titan Quest: Immortal Throne is a better game that came out in 2006. It had a much better story (great writing overall), is technically on the same plane, and was addictive. However, the vast majority of it was handcrafted (IE not randomized). I'd like to see if Yahtzee would enjoy that game, since it's in the same genre but would seem to suit his tastes much better.

I'm not talking down to Yahtzee or anything, I just feel that he could have really delved into Diablo III and the genre as a whole and related the two together for a better review. As it stands, his argument is basically, "well, uh, it's randomized and the story isn't too memorable."

Anyway, it was funny.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

I could be wrong, but I think part of the idea of randomly generated dungeons is, besides replayability, is that your experience will be different than your friend's experience so you can stand around the water cooler comparing.

I think the main reason is that proceedurally generated dungeons saves the developer huge amounts of money that they can then reinvest...into their own pockets.
You don't actually compare notes on the room layout, do you?

No, obviously not. However as the dungeons are randomly generated each player's experience is going to be different and that would be worth comparing notes about.