Seasoned Diablo players will know there’s a huge difference between Diablo 2 and the more recent Diablo 3 and now Diablo 4. The pacing is worlds apart. Diablo 1/2 creator David Brevik thinks this has cheapened the ARPG experience.
Talking to Videogamer, Brevik stated, “When you’re shortening that journey and making it kind of ridiculous. You’ve cheapened the entire experience, in my opinion.” There is some merit in that comment as players of each Season of Diablo 4 know too well. Mashing your way through swathes of monsters with ease becomes less and less challenging with every Season.
Brevik added, “I think that ARPGs in general have started to lean into this: kill swaths of enemies all over the place extremely quickly. Your build is killing all sorts of stuff so you could get more drops, you can level up, so you can like, and the screen is littered with stuff you don’t care about.”
One thing that’s evident in Diablo 4 is that the “journey” that Brevik talks about has just about been eradicated with Seasons. Characters can level up at such a rate it pushes players toward the endgame as quickly as possible. This does appeal to some players but it’s evident that veterans of Diablo 2 tended to stay away from Diablo 3 and Diablo 4 for this very reason.
The challenges of the early Blizzard North Diablo games are so different from what we see today. Whether it’s “cheapened” the experience is up for debate because the gaming audience has changed and is more demanding than ever. As Diablo 4 is a live service game, it needs to be constantly evolving to keep players engaged, and if that means pushing players to the endgame faster to satisfy their hunger, then so be it.
The Diablo 2 community is still thriving all these years on but we have to accept that the modern experience is very different from the old.
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