There have been many recent discussions about how the ARPG genre needs to evolve. I have a question for the Diablo community. How would you feel if the Diablo series decided to stray from the traditional isometric perspective we've enjoyed for the past 20 years? Obviously, it's more than the camera perspective that makes an ARPG and Diablo game but would this change be too bold? Could it be made to still feel like a Diablo game?
Let me know what you think below. How would you approach future titles?
I've created a few mockups of Diablo III using a third-person perspective to add to the discussion.
I don't see a reason to. Blizzard does what works, but the change has to be warranted.
World of Warcraft was made because Everquest was something they thought had potential and they could do a better version of, not because Warcraft RTS needed to be evolved. If Diablo has to evolve its camera positioning, then it has to be to support some core game design element, not just because it looks cool or different.
Kinda like Resident Evil games, how it changed from being static positioned horror genre into more action gameplay controlled by a character; the change was made to support the gameplay. I don't think Diablo necessarily needs that kind of change unless they really want to bring back the original atmospheric horror style. They risk giving up practically everything else by doing that. The fast-frantic powergaming aspects wouldn't translate in a 3rd person over-the-shoulder view. This view is best for a slower paced action game that doesn't clutter the screen with spell effects and hundreds of enemies/pets at a time.
I agree that there is no need to change the camera. I have been a long time fan of Diablo since the first game simply because it was not like all of the others. If they must change the game then I would like to see more interaction with other NPC's. That is the one thing I really loved about the Dragon Age series was that as you progressed through the game your followers would react differently depending on the choices you made. But Diablo is more of just a dungeon crawl game but I would like to see it get a little more role playing aspects but keep the dungeon crawl feel and play
The moment they take away the isometric view from Diablo, is the day they change something fundamental to something entirely else. Isometric view in an ARPG dungeon crawler like Diablo is a key style and genre factor.
Isometric games, with high-res backgrounds, excellent music, excellent characters and excellent "setting" and story, are magical in their own way.
I hope they never remove the isometric view from Diablo, like they removed runes, runewords, map-randomzation, character-development, skill-trees, charms, diablo-music, diablo-npc's etc.
Diablo 3 failed in many ways, and also brought some obvious improvements (right-click to equip or move around items for example, or the shared stash space etc.).
However, Diablo 3 IMO failed also at one crucial aspect. You see... Isometric games don't live off fancy views of a huge world etc, but they live off of detail of the world presented in the isometric view. That is why the world must be made with a huge love for details in landscape, objects, architecture, monsters, NPCs etc.. This is one of the main reasons why washed out textures work in WOW but not in Diablo 3. In WOW the world lives off the ability to look far at the horizon, and be intrigued to go there and explore. But a game like Diablo that has an isometric view, MUST have much more love put into world-details, high-quality textures, High-quality NPCs, High quality Music and atmospheric ambience sounds, character development, etc.
Its because those two games capitalize on an entirely different aspect of "graphics". IMO Blizzard failed in terns of "graphics" and art-style in Diablo 3, because they used what worked in WOW, but you cant do that, due to the reason explained above.
If they would zoom-out the camera a little bit more in Diablo 3, it would make a big difference in how the game would looks. The camera zooms out during the fight with Belial, and if they would zoom out the camera to a point between what we have now and halfway to how the camera is zoomed out during the Belial fight, the game would look much better and combat would also be better IMO.
Lets see if they can show the world that they know what an isometric ARPG can be, by showing that they finally understand what made D2 the best isometric ARPG for almost two decades.
There's plenty of fast-paced third person games now, but they are basically built for consoles/controllers first. Even though MMOs are getting more actiony, they are typically still more about skill rotations. So going here would depend largely on how Blizzard feels about consoles IMO. (Hell, maybe that is why D3 is largely abandoned now...)
That said, yes I still want a first person Diablorim with the atmosphere of D1. Don't mind if the gameplay slows down for it.
The ISO view is a standard for the genre, there are way more failed 3rd person diabloesque games than successful. Honestly only 2 come to mind and they are more hybrid fps, Borderlands and The Division.
Just saying - current diablo3 AND this new version are both the same "point of view": an external camera looking at the character.
1st person: me, mine
2nd person: you, your
3rd person: them, their
Now you could make an argument that it is 2nd person, if you are considering the avatar on the screen to be "you."
But traditionally... you are not your character, so they're both 3rd person.
So given that they're both the same "external camera looking at the avatar," the question should be
what if it was an over the shoulder camera (3rd person) instead of fixed isometric (also 3rd person). The over the shoulder camera, once that's enabled, also allows 1st person view by zooming in until your screen = your character's eyes.
The real question is why is it a FIXED isometric view? Why can't you simply change the camera around? Does that detract from some of the engineering of the assets? Does the "zoom in" feature imply that the world is entirely 3D?
The biggest problem you can already see with the mockups is you get almost zero vision behind you, for an increased forward vision that doesn't help much with decisionmaking. This reduces the speed of the game tremendously, when you actually have to go up to a corner to see what's behind it. There's absolutely no way that some of the speed builds would work.
No, don't remove it. ISO view is a staple of these games and give you full view of whats going on in your vicinity, with that third person view you barely see anything.
How would it differ from Dark Souls or WoW? Faster-paced? Multiple mobs and powerful AoE moves instead of dangerous one-on-one battles?
Probably taking more from dynasty warrior series, you can cut through hordes of foes in third person just fine. That would probably involve more focus on combos and timing than just blitzing through though.
Hells yes! It would a dream for blizzard to make a 3rd person game like dragons dogma or dark souls. Why not make it a Diablo game? Those games are way more immerssive. I've enjoyed playing all the Diablo games. If they take their time on making good models, they will knock this game out of the park. They don't need to make it an mmo. But there can be aspects to let people to play together. Please. Bring on the 3rd person.
As long as they don't call it Diablo it could be nice, but let's be honest Diablo IS an isometric perspective game, besides why would they make another RPG that shares the same camera with their top franchise?
i've played wow since release, stopped after d3 released, played all the way till season 8 even got a few top 100 EU, but just got back to wow since d3 is way beyond stale and i can say in my honest opinion that Diablo's isometric camera > wow's 3rd person camera, the amount of bugs + lack of proper vision with 20+ mob pulls on wow's camera is much higher.
There have been many recent discussions about how the ARPG genre needs to evolve. I have a question for the Diablo community. How would you feel if the Diablo series decided to stray from the traditional isometric perspective we've enjoyed for the past 20 years? Obviously, it's more than the camera perspective that makes an ARPG and Diablo game but would this change be too bold? Could it be made to still feel like a Diablo game?
Let me know what you think below. How would you approach future titles?
I've created a few mockups of Diablo III using a third-person perspective to add to the discussion.
I don't see a reason to. Blizzard does what works, but the change has to be warranted.
World of Warcraft was made because Everquest was something they thought had potential and they could do a better version of, not because Warcraft RTS needed to be evolved. If Diablo has to evolve its camera positioning, then it has to be to support some core game design element, not just because it looks cool or different.
Kinda like Resident Evil games, how it changed from being static positioned horror genre into more action gameplay controlled by a character; the change was made to support the gameplay. I don't think Diablo necessarily needs that kind of change unless they really want to bring back the original atmospheric horror style. They risk giving up practically everything else by doing that. The fast-frantic powergaming aspects wouldn't translate in a 3rd person over-the-shoulder view. This view is best for a slower paced action game that doesn't clutter the screen with spell effects and hundreds of enemies/pets at a time.
I agree that there is no need to change the camera. I have been a long time fan of Diablo since the first game simply because it was not like all of the others. If they must change the game then I would like to see more interaction with other NPC's. That is the one thing I really loved about the Dragon Age series was that as you progressed through the game your followers would react differently depending on the choices you made. But Diablo is more of just a dungeon crawl game but I would like to see it get a little more role playing aspects but keep the dungeon crawl feel and play
honestly i'd rather see a variety of other changes before something like this would ever be thought of, think of the game how it is...
The moment they take away the isometric view from Diablo, is the day they change something fundamental to something entirely else. Isometric view in an ARPG dungeon crawler like Diablo is a key style and genre factor.
Isometric games, with high-res backgrounds, excellent music, excellent characters and excellent "setting" and story, are magical in their own way.
I hope they never remove the isometric view from Diablo, like they removed runes, runewords, map-randomzation, character-development, skill-trees, charms, diablo-music, diablo-npc's etc.
Diablo 3 failed in many ways, and also brought some obvious improvements (right-click to equip or move around items for example, or the shared stash space etc.).
However, Diablo 3 IMO failed also at one crucial aspect. You see... Isometric games don't live off fancy views of a huge world etc, but they live off of detail of the world presented in the isometric view. That is why the world must be made with a huge love for details in landscape, objects, architecture, monsters, NPCs etc.. This is one of the main reasons why washed out textures work in WOW but not in Diablo 3. In WOW the world lives off the ability to look far at the horizon, and be intrigued to go there and explore. But a game like Diablo that has an isometric view, MUST have much more love put into world-details, high-quality textures, High-quality NPCs, High quality Music and atmospheric ambience sounds, character development, etc.
Its because those two games capitalize on an entirely different aspect of "graphics". IMO Blizzard failed in terns of "graphics" and art-style in Diablo 3, because they used what worked in WOW, but you cant do that, due to the reason explained above.
If they would zoom-out the camera a little bit more in Diablo 3, it would make a big difference in how the game would looks. The camera zooms out during the fight with Belial, and if they would zoom out the camera to a point between what we have now and halfway to how the camera is zoomed out during the Belial fight, the game would look much better and combat would also be better IMO.
Lets see if they can show the world that they know what an isometric ARPG can be, by showing that they finally understand what made D2 the best isometric ARPG for almost two decades.
If it's that 3rd person view - keep isometric. Literally all that's happening is that the camera is moving down, so no reason to change it.
If it's FIRST person, then yea I'd like to see something happen, could be fun.
asking how this could be is just a step blizzard want to see if fan could love it, for maybe a futur diablo mmo;p
There's plenty of fast-paced third person games now, but they are basically built for consoles/controllers first. Even though MMOs are getting more actiony, they are typically still more about skill rotations. So going here would depend largely on how Blizzard feels about consoles IMO. (Hell, maybe that is why D3 is largely abandoned now...)
That said, yes I still want a first person Diablorim with the atmosphere of D1. Don't mind if the gameplay slows down for it.
I'm sure a Diablo-game with that view could be really good.
That being said I still prefer the isometric view to third person view.
The ISO view is a standard for the genre, there are way more failed 3rd person diabloesque games than successful. Honestly only 2 come to mind and they are more hybrid fps, Borderlands and The Division.
Looks a million times better in 3rd person. It also makes the game more immersive, as your view is from within the enviroment, instead of above it.
Just saying - current diablo3 AND this new version are both the same "point of view": an external camera looking at the character.
1st person: me, mine
2nd person: you, your
3rd person: them, their
Now you could make an argument that it is 2nd person, if you are considering the avatar on the screen to be "you."
But traditionally... you are not your character, so they're both 3rd person.
So given that they're both the same "external camera looking at the avatar," the question should be
what if it was an over the shoulder camera (3rd person) instead of fixed isometric (also 3rd person). The over the shoulder camera, once that's enabled, also allows 1st person view by zooming in until your screen = your character's eyes.
The real question is why is it a FIXED isometric view? Why can't you simply change the camera around? Does that detract from some of the engineering of the assets? Does the "zoom in" feature imply that the world is entirely 3D?
The biggest problem you can already see with the mockups is you get almost zero vision behind you, for an increased forward vision that doesn't help much with decisionmaking. This reduces the speed of the game tremendously, when you actually have to go up to a corner to see what's behind it. There's absolutely no way that some of the speed builds would work.
No, don't remove it. ISO view is a staple of these games and give you full view of whats going on in your vicinity, with that third person view you barely see anything.
How would it differ from Dark Souls or WoW? Faster-paced? Multiple mobs and powerful AoE moves instead of dangerous one-on-one battles?
Isometric ARPG might be the right game style for what Diablo uniquely brings to the table.
looks awesome...
as it is, there is little environment immersion and it makes it suck more... this would make it suck less
Hells yes! It would a dream for blizzard to make a 3rd person game like dragons dogma or dark souls. Why not make it a Diablo game? Those games are way more immerssive. I've enjoyed playing all the Diablo games. If they take their time on making good models, they will knock this game out of the park. They don't need to make it an mmo. But there can be aspects to let people to play together. Please. Bring on the 3rd person.
As long as they don't call it Diablo it could be nice, but let's be honest Diablo IS an isometric perspective game, besides why would they make another RPG that shares the same camera with their top franchise?
i've played wow since release, stopped after d3 released, played all the way till season 8 even got a few top 100 EU, but just got back to wow since d3 is way beyond stale and i can say in my honest opinion that Diablo's isometric camera > wow's 3rd person camera, the amount of bugs + lack of proper vision with 20+ mob pulls on wow's camera is much higher.
Those Who Do Not Know True Pain Cannot Possibly Understand True Peace...
I would love to see a 3rd person cam at Diablo séries, but only if it becomes an open world game...
But we can heve na open world game without a 3rd person cam too!
If Diablo series become a 3rd view perspective, it would be a totally diferent game. Nice, but not a Diablo game at all as we are used to play.
1- No more endless mobs to stack kills
2- No more speed builds as they are now
3- No more teleport skills as we would not know what could have behind every corner
4- No more impressive effects from AoE
5- No more pet builds as we know it too
6- Much more NPCs to Interact with
7- Less image quality or less interaction with scenario/background (no more rack, just slash!)
8- List keeps going on...