Not worth the 12 year wait.
Am I wrong for buying this game even though I have never played any prior version? I think so, because my experience thus far has been luke warm at best.
First let's get the big one out the way, the online requirement, or DRM as people call it. Is it a problem? Yes.
You see, other RPG's like this will store a save file on your computer. This has been standard gaming practice since games could save. But here it's stored in the ever talked about amazing cloud.
That's fair enough I suppose but unlike other games, you will need an always on connection to the internet to play this game and there are NO exceptions to this rule.
Other games use this practice too; I think I remember games like Anno using a similar procedure. But Diablo is more aggressive; every byte of data is stored and verified to the server. Meaning that even IF you managed to bypass the online verification and some how played it offline, none of your character data will remain.
Furthermore, this online only stance takes something away from the player. Say you have played for a few hours and want a break. Other games like The Witcher 2 will allow us PC gamers to save on the spot. Not so here, it saves when it wants to, namely at checkpoints and when you are in a town. But if you are deep in a dungeon and want to quit, prepare to lose all your progress so far.
Even worse is because of this online only attitude, you will see messages at the bottom left of the screen informing you that the server will restart, go offline for maintenance, or is experiencing problems. Either way, you will be disconnected in 5 minutes and there's nothing you can do about it.
This proves that the online only path is flawed. How many other games can you mention, which are single player, which forces you to quit after a random time? It's the digital equivalent of your parents/wife/children asking you to come off the PC. You want to play this game and even the game is telling you, you can't. Believe me, there is nothing more frustrating than these server messages. Even worse is the fact there is no notification, just a small line of text in the bottom left corner.
No sound, no popup, no dialogue box. If you miss that message then you may as well lose all your current progress too.
Another issue is that when you are disconnected, because of lack of internet/maintenance or even if you quit the game yourself, you will lose some progress. So if you're deep in a dungeon and you lose the internet or the server farts and throws you out, all your current progress is lost and you're taken back to the last checkpoint. And I haven't even spoken about the game yet.
The game looks meh, not worth the 12 year wait. With all settings on high it still looks mediocre and animations and such look the same. I was seriously unimpressed by the visuals to put it mildly.
The gameplay itself is fun without doubt and a unique control system does take some getting used to, but overall I found I got bored really quick and could only play for 30 minutes a time before I just got bored.
You can get a companion to accompany you, but your limited to only one and they are pretty useless. The first companion you find will be a Templar who will join you, but he does so little damage you may as well not even have him. He will swipe at skeletons for about a minute just to kill one, while I can kill them in one wave of my wand. He is just a meat-shield at the moment. And yes, he is geared the same as me.
The replay ability is also lacking severely. If you play for 3 hours and want to try another class, you have to play everything again and believe me; it gets really boring really quick.
To help in this, you can leave items in your stash from one player, to be picked up by the next, but if these items have a level requirement, which decent weapons/armour does, and then it's pointless anyway.
I'm not going to say this game sucks, that the gameplay is crap. It's great fun, but I honestly feel that all the hype, the waiting, the crowds gathering at launch, the countless web pages dedicated to this game have ruined it for me. It's just not THAT good. It's fun but games like the Witcher 2 put it to shame and that's my honest opinion.
Overhyped to within an inch of its life and if the online DRM doesn't make you give up, the lack of replay ability will.
All this complaining though is pointless. Game review sites will give this a 10 or 9 and Blizzard will cheer, "GREAT SUCCESS". Rather than people make a stand on this online DRM, it will be deemed a success and will continue into many future games.
