Diablo 2 Veterans Set Up New Studio to Work on Original IP

https://nordic.ign.com/diablo-ii/54589/ ... riginal-ip

Consider me...guarded? Sounds nice, but expectations are going to be high. Plus, everyone is going to be expecting a AAA quality game, which is tough for a start-up, even with the experience so described running the show.

Further, if D2R has shown us anything, it is that the Diablo community is divided in what they want, so getting a single coherent game that makes even half the people happy most of the the time will be a tall order.

But, I wish them well, and if they get something awesome together, they make money and we are happy, so win/win.

These guys were part of Runic games, a studio that was formed from the original Blizzard North team after D2 LoD was finished.

They went on to build Torchlight and Torchlight II, so they have a track record for producing quality titles already. Excited to see what gets made this time around!

Sadly, this won't be the first time former D2 folks teamed up in a "winning combination". So far, those subsequent attempts to return to their glory days have yielded things like torchlight, hellgate: london and so on. So "mweh" at best.

Mind you, I would love for the brilliance that once was Blizzard North to be recreated somehow but looking at everything the

Key players have done since, I won't hold my breath for anything above average. Though I will very happily be proven wrong.

I have more hope for Microsoft eventually deciding to want to use the eternal hardcore fanbase of D2 to find a market for some new generation of their holo lens, resulting in D2:Re-Resurrected. Same game, different, then functional lobby (please!), remastered as a full first person AR/VR experience.
Given, that's not exactly a realistic hope by any means..but a boy can Dream!

Schnorki wrote: 2 years ago

I have more hope for Microsoft eventually deciding to want to use the eternal hardcore fanbase of D2 to find a market for some new generation of their holo lens, resulting in D2:Re-Resurrected. Same game, different, then functional lobby (please!), remastered as a full first person AR/VR experience.
Given, that's not exactly a realistic hope by any means..but a boy can Dream!

I'm not sold on VR in general, I've had a couple of HTC Vives over the years and it's always the same - feeling like I should want to use it, but never actually putting it on & then eventually selling it again. But I am also extra not sold on horror games in VR. What works well and is fun on a screen in front of me ends up being a lot less fun when you feel like you're there. Diablo and Resident Evil style games are fun on a computer screen, but when I put myself in that world with a VR headset it stops being fun and I just want out, lmao.

Beardozer wrote: 2 years ago

I'm not sold on VR in general, I've had a couple of HTC Vives over the years and it's always the same - feeling like I should want to use it, but never actually putting it on & then eventually selling it again. But I am also extra not sold on horror games in VR. What works well and is fun on a screen in front of me ends up being a lot less fun when you feel like you're there. Diablo and Resident Evil style games are fun on a computer screen, but when I put myself in that world with a VR headset it stops being fun and I just want out, lmao.

I hear ya. If I want to enter the world of Diablo, I can probably get pretty close by going to a Renaissance Fair and drinking till I see demons. Or going to Medieval Times or something. Both of those are mostly USA only, sorry to my foreign co-forum dwellers.

There's plenty of horror VR games already, no need to make a Diablo version. It would be better to just make a good solid title for the genre. Is that so hard? Apparently yes, yes it is.

Wishful thinking, but I am not going to expect much.

It's too bad the original Condor crew never wanted to get involved in diablo again.

Schnorki wrote: 2 years ago

Sadly, this won't be the first time former D2 folks teamed up in a "winning combination". So far, those subsequent attempts to return to their glory days have yielded things like torchlight, hellgate: london and so on. So "mweh" at best.

Excuse me, Torchlight 2 is a masterpiece of a game. I've sunk 500 hours into it, and return to it time to time. Fondest memories, couldn't recommend it more.

Beardozer wrote: 2 years ago

Schnorki wrote: 2 years ago

I have more hope for Microsoft eventually deciding to want to use the eternal hardcore fanbase of D2 to find a market for some new generation of their holo lens, resulting in D2:Re-Resurrected. Same game, different, then functional lobby (please!), remastered as a full first person AR/VR experience.
Given, that's not exactly a realistic hope by any means..but a boy can Dream!

I'm not sold on VR in general, I've had a couple of HTC Vives over the years and it's always the same - feeling like I should want to use it, but never actually putting it on & then eventually selling it again. But I am also extra not sold on horror games in VR. What works well and is fun on a screen in front of me ends up being a lot less fun when you feel like you're there. Diablo and Resident Evil style games are fun on a computer screen, but when I put myself in that world with a VR headset it stops being fun and I just want out, lmao.

I love the potential I see in it. The problem seems merely that most games today just don't make real use of it yet.

A lot of them are still just random indie projects or half-baked basic VR compatibility slapped onto non-VR titles. As a result, most of them come with horrid graphics (significantly below the quality that headsets could offer already today) which then takes you out of the immersion it should offer again, simply by looking way too unrealistically crap. And adding to that, hardly any of the existing titles make real use of the controls a VR setup could offer.

But the ones that do go in the right direction are just glorious. Take Wizards for example. Given, the graphics are again very mweh and the game itself feels more like an overdone tech demo than a story driven world but the fact that you actually conjure up a frost bow that handles like a bow, draw up and actually throw fireballs and so on is just genius. Once today's controllers get replaced with proper VR gloves, those sorts of controls will just be phenomenal in terms of immersion.

I'd agree on the "extra not sold on horror games in VR", based on existing titles. But that's more for the same reason that 999 out of 1000 horror films just suck as well. I'm inclined to say that horror is probably one of the easiest genres to get wrong. One wrong step in how you present the atmosphere and the horror feel is gone. One misstep in a story line and you're completely taken out of it again. And leading back to the above...one clunky, chunky square face that jitters at you and gets stuck behind a pebble because the game/implementation is shit..and there's nothing left of actual horror feel/atmosphere. There's genres where a lot of missteps can be overlooked and forgiven because they still work overall. But horror is not one of them.

I don't know man, there is definitely an argument for 'nobody has made a good game for it yet', but I got two main things going against it - I can enjoy a good horror or diablo style game when it's confined to a screen sitting on my desk. Once I put myself into that world with a VR headset, I quickly want to leave. It's not fun "when I'm there". But the other problem is I get mad VR sickness. After about an hour I'm done for the day. And I've gotten that feeling with HTC vives, the original oculus Rift, even high resolution headsets like the stuff from pimax. It's just not a good time all around. Makes me not want to try it again no matter how good a game may come out for it.

Well, fair enough. VR sickness would ruin any experience I suppose, no matter how good the title.