Have you heard? Diablo III came out this week! I’ve been playing it! But yeah, Diablo III is pretty fun, and I say that as someone who didn’t really care much for Diablo II. I remember playing through the original Diablo way back when it came out and thought it was fine, and then tried my hardest to enjoy Diablo II. It just didn’t happen. I’ve never been the world’s biggest loot lust guy (which is still true), I’m a bit of a completionist, and I played Diablo II purely single player. I think all of these things combined to cause me to burn out on the game well before its end. It was always in Act III too. I hated that damn forest; what a grind.

Anyway, I’ve been much smarter about the way I’m playing Diablo III, and it’s led to me liking it a lot more so far. Rule number one is that I’m not playing it single player at all. A handful of friends have the game, and I’m simply not playing if they’re not on. This was a lesson I learned from Borderlands, that other loot lust game. I loved Borderlands, but it was also mind numbingly dull whenever I played it by myself (which I practically never did). That was my main problem with Diablo II, so I’m taking that lesson to heart. Otherwise I’m just not worrying about stuff overly much. I don’t need the best gear, I don’t need to see every class, I don’t need to explore every inch of the map, etc. Those are some of my completionist tendencies that can lead to extreme burnout, and I’m keeping that stuff in check.

It also helps that I think Diablo III is a better game than its predecessor. Micromanaging the little tasks (stash, blacksmith, socketed gear, reviving, potions, etc.) is way less tedious than what I remember, and the way the skills have been revamped is absolutely fantastic. I love knowing that I’ll unlock every skill just from leveling, and can switch them around on the fly as I want. It makes me want to experiment more rather than be overly concerned with min-maxing, because I know I’m never making irreversible choices. That they’ve then managed to offer a ton of different skills that still allow you to customize your character in countless different ways is pretty impressive. And it’s not like there won’t be room for number crunching and min-maxing my skills at some point (likely after I hit the level cap). It’s just that by letting me try all of the skills without having to blindly commit points to a skill tree, I’m better able to make informed decisions. It lets me build the character I want to build without having to start over from scratch if I make a bad choice. Combining accessibility and depth; that’s what it’s all about.

Those skills are doled out at a great pace as well, and I feel pretty comfortable and knowledgeable of each and every one of my skills just by fiddling with new ones as I unlock them. To me, this is the real draw for playing Diablo III. I know everyone gets really into finding better loot, but I find the actual skills much more interesting. Loot is just higher numbers and more DPS; skills change the way you play. That doesn’t mean it’s not exciting when I find new awesome gear. I’m just not the kind of person to farm a boss over and over in hopes of an upgrade. I’m more excited to hit the level cap, thus unlocking all the skills, and fiddling with different character builds. I’d really like to dig into that stuff, and hopefully come up with something cool to try and tackle Inferno mode with.

Right now though, I’m at level 31. I’m playing a Witch Doctor, named Jimarcus. He’s awesome. I’ve seen a lot of polls along the lines of “What class did you choose in Diablo III?” Every one of them has shown the Witch Doctor to be the least played class, which I don’t get. I mean, I can summon giant spiders, explosive frogs, and eventually zombie bears. I’m not going to lie; I chose the class because I saw it had a skill called “Snake to the Face”. Pure gold. I’ve not been disappointed either, as the Witch Doctor has plenty of incredibly goofy looking skills that also get the job done, which is what I signed up for. Maybe most people take their Diablo too seriously or something. As for me, I’ll never get tired of hearing Jimarcus scream as he hurls frogs at giant demons.

Pretty much everything else you probably already know. The Diablo formula is well established by now. In fact, excluding the skill related stuff I mentioned above, I’m continually reminded of how similar this game is to Diablo II. The enemies, the characters, the setting, the story beats, the general progression; it’s all super familiar at this point. The Diablo series is basically a thinly veiled excuse to get you hunting “dat phat lewts” at this point, defined by 2 simple steps: 1. Stay awhile and listen. 2. Diablo’s back, kill him again! It’s simple, it’s silly, but it’s fine. The game is generally executed well enough on pretty much every front for me to be okay with that. It’s got snappy pacing, looks and sounds great, and has enough interesting stuff going on to be a fun time. I’ll of course keep rolling with that, and am sure I’ll have more to say on it next week. Maybe we’ll find some time to finish Magicka sooner or later as well. Anyway, that’s all for now, until next time!

Currently playing: Diablo III, Magicka