I like Diablo I and Diablo II colors. The feeling I got from playing Diablo I is unlike any other game I played at the time. It was eerie, mysterious, and -- well, overall it felt like when I was a kid, sitting around a campfire telling scary stories to friends and family- that is what makes Diablo I and II so magical. The darkness, the burning, the flicker of the fire, it's all there.
I'm excited about the game and all, but the art direction seems a bit out-of-theme. Looking at it right now, I do agree it looks much like WoW with Starcraft II technology. Might as well call it Warcraft IV hah. Or Dungeon Siege with all that shiny weapon. (Never did like that WoW look)
point- Colors do affect mood and feelings... Art Class anyone? Even if they decide to add in happy colors, at least have some more contrast. The colors are dull, despite more colors than the previous games. I'm not talking about the skill special effects. (tone some of that down too... the barbarian was pretty much on fire with that fire axe).
The lighting is awkward too... firebombs from the necro-native class thing doesnt affect the environment. It would be totally cool if they made the environment reflect light from skills or whatnot. Yeah, and whats with the no light radius? People fear the unknown and having monsters fully appear 20 feet away seems boring.
I would like the Diablo game to stick more to the Diablo theme. That is, scary, dark, and... scary. We didnt wait8 years or so to be dissapointed!
my question is when sc2 was announced, it did look kind of cartoony, not too much, but i dont think people cared too much - for diablo though, man.. people really care lol, like i said, im halfway, its great but hey if they make it more darker im all for it
It's still very early and difficult to tell how the full project will pan out. Hopefully most of the gripes I have are just simple polish that will be added to the game over the next year(s?). But so far my biggest concerns are with the atmosphere and details:
* pentagrams: These iconic symbols of the dark lord (diablo) himself were a major part of the series' style. They were the highlight indicators in the pause menu, there were fiery or bloody pentagrams in many dungeons, and you even had the climactic battle with diablo on one huge stone pentagram over lava in the depths of hell. How much more evil than that can you get? But in the gameplay demo not one of these evil symbols were seen anywhere.
*gory details: In Diablo II bodies were a common sight. There would be dead bodies on the ground, rogues impaled on huge spikes (and often lit on fire), and skeletons locked in swinging cages (Act V). These many varied images of death and torture had a huge impact on the macabre atmosphere of dread and intensity. Nothing of this sort can be seen in the gameplay demo. The areas are squeeky clean. The demons even took the time to light a nice friendly little campfire without any human bodies roasting over it.
Common arguments:
*The world has recuperated in the last 20 years, not everything is death. .... Come on, really? You're fighting demons and undead for crying out loud! Has the world really recuperated that much when masses of Diablo's minions are every 20 feet you walk? Wherever you find monsters to fight there should be evidence of other much less lucky travellers who happened to stumble on them.
*They only showed 2 areas, not everywhere you go is going to be dark..... See argument above, this one is just as much a ridiculous attempt at logic.
*It's still early, this doesn't represent what the final product will look like. .... This is the strongest argument and the one I hope is the explanation for the lack of details. Hopefully the missing bodies/pentagrams/evil imagery is only a result of being an early build.
Well, that's my 2 cents. I can't wait to see if they actually listen to us fans and find a happy middle ground the majority of us can agree on. Right now the crowd seems very much split 50/50.
Being someone who is a Diablo fan and was a WoW fan (The game [WoW] is fine, but Blizzard doesn't listen to the players in it.) I honestly don't see this huge resemblance between the two. I personally from watching the gameplay videos and looking at the art (concept, screen shots, animations, special effects) enjoy the new slighter brighter and cleaner look to the game. We can finally see the detail put into the characters, environments, and equipment which the creators always intended. The game has shown a true evolution in the 3D Iso ARPG genre which I am quite please to see. Diablo 2 for it's time looked pretty solid and gave a nice feel even back in the 680x480 days.
I always hoped they'd go back and go above 800x600 to overhaul D2 which is definitely showing it's age. The game however is still fun to play and gameplay beats graphics any day of the week. Since D2 in the genre has been nothing, but bad clone after bad clone (Prince of Qin and Divine Divinity being exceptions) until Titan's Quest picked up the torch and created a very beautiful game in the spirit of D2. It however did not possess a MP worth using like we get with Battle.net to help the community stay together and grow. Diablo 3 however takes the torch away from TQ and expands on their own genre once again with lush [rich] world environments, destructible implementations, claustophobic dungeons, and character detail the likes of which we haven't seen in the genre.
I for one think the game looks amazing in it's current state and the slightly brighter presentation [color palette] doesn't take anything away from the previous Diablo installments. It still looks strongly like the previous games enough to have me not complaining over it's presentation. Many of those throwing the all too common "WoW" card I think are those who just want an expansion of Diablo 2 and not an evolution of the series as we are getting with Diablo 3.
I was first worried Diablo would look very colorful, before the trailers or any news were released, only because it stirs up dull memory's of Titan Quest and Wow for me,
(and face it blizzard, you left us for 6 years now? with D2. Any Diablo fan couldn't help but try TQ).
and yeah, my first impression of the gameplay trailer was that it feels like an upgraded version of TQ. where as diablo really did stand out for there high contrast(easily fixed you your monitor settings aswell i guess) but also the and gothic style and dark colours.
I respect blizzards challenge to make it just as atmospheric as the old ones, even with the vibrant color palate direction. but yeah, it feels to similar for yet another one of there awesome titles sorta clashing with diablos own unique feel. One other thing is Diablo, from what ive seen around in game forums, was always huge for the fans that could never get into the whole child friendly atmosphere feel to the games, mainly influenced by the colours, lol wow or the new SC art style aswell, which recently came under scrutiny from long time fans.
however... i would be disappointed if it ended up looking like gears of war in all honesty.
so If i could choose an alternative for feedbacks sake, it would be just to tone it down abit, just for atmosphere, and stick with very gothic designs for architecture and environments.
One other thing that D2 fans forget, is how significant the real horror was in the first one compared to the second oner. and i know i cant fairly judge this part from the vids ive seen. but best example to begin with, is the butcher.
I remember why he was so freaky, and it wasnt cause he leapt out at me going fresh meat (although it gave me quite a freak out the first time) but it was the aftermath, when you see his room, what he left behind, almost a peek into his warped existence, in all that darkness and with that eeiry music, which from then on made me go F^&k now this is one hell of a game, and left paranoid to explore all the dungeons.
in conclusion, im 100% sure it will be the most fun diablo, but i don't think i can get the same dark atmosphere diablo 1 was perfected for if its full of colors. and what i fear is it will be generically epic.
Its what made diablo feel unique, compared to sacred or TQ, and its why i enjoyed the D series the most, all the horror aspects, mixed with how fun it was and a sweet the story was, even the characters who you could see were deeply disturbed and almost struggling to be brave, in and by there surroundings, instead of just generic balls blazing in the dungeon.
it felt awesome going into god only knows what monstrous dungeon, with that paranoid feeling that something could be in the shadows that you missed forcing ya self to be brave and take on whatever demon lurked there.
i think its great.. some people saying it needs to be darker... well it needs to be like it is because we need to see a decent contrast between the character and the surroundings... and also i think that the 3d presentation is great... many people wil say its cartoonish just because of the 3d aspect... i love it.. plain and si mple
My opinion - No matter what every Blizzard game to date has been a hit. nothing will end that streak now.
Most of you think that game needs more work with textures and "backround dungeon colors" like the blue and green. Just hope you realize, no matter who you are, ALL of us have only seen ONE dungeon, and ONE piece of outdoor scenary. Just give the hard working poeple at blizzard a chance. Dont be so quick to judge. Blizzard knows thier fan base, they love thier fan base, they will ultimatly do what will please US.
The colors are just too much in my opinion, it doesn't feel diablo to me. The warcraft art style is ok, but again, it just doesn't feel diablo. Also, for people like myself who play lots of blizzard games, I think the warcraft style of art will get repetitive if used too often. When it comes down to it though, I don't think it would be worth the time to totally redo all the art with a different style, and I really doubt blizzard would consider it at this point. However, I would like to see some time spent on tweaking the colors and shading for a more diablo-like feel.
I never realized how much I appreciated the graphics of diablo and diablo II until this conversation came up. The graphics really set the mood. I've played other dungeon crawlers, with bright cartoon-like graphics, and it's still great fun, but it's just not the same, something is missing. I'm hoping blizzard will listen to us and tweak the art a bit, I think they can find a good middle ground and please both sides of this argument, for the most part.
It's still very early and difficult to tell how the full project will pan out. Hopefully most of the gripes I have are just simple polish that will be added to the game over the next year(s?). But so far my biggest concerns are with the atmosphere and details:
* pentagrams: These iconic symbols of the dark lord (diablo) himself were a major part of the series' style. They were the highlight indicators in the pause menu, there were fiery or bloody pentagrams in many dungeons, and you even had the climactic battle with diablo on one huge stone pentagram over lava in the depths of hell. How much more evil than that can you get? But in the gameplay demo not one of these evil symbols were seen anywhere.
*gory details: In Diablo II bodies were a common sight. There would be dead bodies on the ground, rogues impaled on huge spikes (and often lit on fire), and skeletons locked in swinging cages (Act V). These many varied images of death and torture had a huge impact on the macabre atmosphere of dread and intensity. Nothing of this sort can be seen in the gameplay demo. The areas are squeeky clean. The demons even took the time to light a nice friendly little campfire without any human bodies roasting over it.
Common arguments:
*The world has recuperated in the last 20 years, not everything is death. .... Come on, really? You're fighting demons and undead for crying out loud! Has the world really recuperated that much when masses of Diablo's minions are every 20 feet you walk? Wherever you find monsters to fight there should be evidence of other much less lucky travellers who happened to stumble on them.
*They only showed 2 areas, not everywhere you go is going to be dark..... See argument above, this one is just as much a ridiculous attempt at logic.
*It's still early, this doesn't represent what the final product will look like. .... This is the strongest argument and the one I hope is the explanation for the lack of details. Hopefully the missing bodies/pentagrams/evil imagery is only a result of being an early build.
Well, that's my 2 cents. I can't wait to see if they actually listen to us fans and find a happy middle ground the majority of us can agree on. Right now the crowd seems very much split 50/50.
I agree so much right here. Things just don't seem so.. Diablo'ish when they showed the gameplay video.. it felt like if Warcraft was made into an RPG.. seriously if you changed Diablo III to.. like, Warcraft Adventures! etc, it would pass for a Warcraft game right now. We need more gore, more horror, more dark gritty everything. I hope Blizzard delivers - and they most likely will.
D1 and D2, though made of 2d sprites, looked far more realistic, gothic, and dark in comparison to the d3 graphics that look too shiny, colorful, and overall have a very WoW-ish feeling.
this is what D3 should look like ....
As you can see the ones on the right side are what the fans who are complaining about the graphics want. We want a darker, grainier pallet and design.
I understand that Blizzard said they want to focus more on the EXPERIENCE OF A DARK FEELING, but how can you EXPERIENCE that when the visuals show otherwise? The way you experience a game is through sight, and what is on the screen is an extremely light color pallet, that looks very cartoony and destroys that dark and gothic feeling completely. It just looks like WoW with an overhead camera shot.
The design and colors just dont make the game have that feel or look that d2 had. The d2 sprites looked more real in comparison to the d3 graphics. I rather have the game look like the rightside pictures. They have a more dark feeling and also look more real, unlike the smooth cartoon drawings to the left.
Have you guy's even considered that this is probably one of the starting areas and they didn't want it to be too dreary yet because you are near to contested or even an area mostly controlled by forces of good the starting area of D2 wasn't that dark.
so in summation D3 will probably get darker as you progress though the game
i 100% completely agree with fargn. those edits on the right hand side make the game look sooooooo much better, when i first viewed the videos i was like ah to bright to many colors, with those mods that you made, it looks a million times better
my vote, it needs to look more like fargn made them look, maybe blizzard should hire u to fix all their colors n stuff good job
Personally I liked what I saw. As much fun as it is to fight in the depths of hell, in caverns filled with elongated shadows and pitch black corners, we need some light. I think the vibrant colors that I witnessed, especially in the Leoric Highlands, was fantastic! It was simply a nice change to see beautiful landscapes, yet, it retained the horror theme we love about the Diablo franchise, especially when the Gameplay Trailer neared the ending courtyard. Personally, I say balance it, just because you have some dark and spooky type areas doen't mean the whole game has to be gloom.
You are a Diablo fan who is not like "diabloic athmosphere".
I think game developers have to be loyal to what they have created on humanities brains. Diablo is a game is affected all the new cultural waves. I think gothic wave is effected from Diablo game.
Diablo series give the enegy of "red blood and darken ashes and the charismatic evil"
People knows Necromancer looks and feels like the magician of the D2 cinematics.
Where is the CHARISMATIC EVIL MAGICIAN? He must be a cool, aristoctaric lookin Evilish man. Where? I see only Tyrael flash logo like it. But "we need a class who seem dark, cool and evilish". If it will not be in the game, D3 will be a huge disappointment. I am afraid.
Diablo series give an impact on the worlds waves. It gives the impact on music bands, and gothic culture. This impression was "The Charismatic Evil".
If you are creating a funny cartoonish child game, anybody will not play it. Becouse, if i am searching a funny athmosphere, i can play WOW. Diablo players need a Hellish and "EVIL" thing. This game needs BAD ENERGY. Not the positive ones. The positive energies? Only charisma, braveness are intelligency are allowed i think. Diablo is a mature game. A serious game. I play Diablo II, becouse it is really serious and fearsome.
Players need a devilish character or class. But this class has to have a royality. Players have to have a respect for this evil class.
It is an equilibrium. If your evils are not cool, then your good side is not cool..
i 100% completely agree with fargn. those edits on the right hand side make the game look sooooooo much better, when i first viewed the videos i was like ah to bright to many colors, with those mods that you made, it looks a million times better
my vote, it needs to look more like fargn made them look, maybe blizzard should hire u to fix all their colors n stuff good job
This was a picture that's been posted before. Though I believe the person used photoshop and the noise tool to get it like that.
Have you guy's even considered that this is probably one of the starting areas and they didn't want it to be too dreary yet because you are near to contested or even an area mostly controlled by forces of good the starting area of D2 wasn't that dark.
so in summation D3 will probably get darker as you progress though the game
That would be great. Maybe if they show another video in another area deeper in the storyline.. and if its really dark and such, might be awesome.
Actually I didnt realize it until someone posted up a cerncern - I was too excited on having the game ACTUALLY COMING OUT. Having said that, I do feel that D3 looks abit cheerful. I'm no emo goth person but I feel that the game should try to stay true to the "LOOK & FEEL" of the first 2 games. Honestly Diablo 2 was abit rough on the viusal but they had delivered on the enviroment very well. Diablo 1 is a true classic. Again, i'm not saying i wont buy the game if they stick to this (I'm not INSANE yknow) but It WOULD be better if they can try to stick to the same lonely, eerie, dark look
PS: Totally agree with the visuals from Fargnbastage! I'm no game designer but the "How it should look like" hits the right G spot.
We need darker feeling, whether its colour or not, we need the area to be sketchy. Blood smeared walls, dead people in horrible positions, heads on pikes, impailed bodies. This game needs to look less nice and a whole lot more sketchy.
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I'm excited about the game and all, but the art direction seems a bit out-of-theme. Looking at it right now, I do agree it looks much like WoW with Starcraft II technology. Might as well call it Warcraft IV hah. Or Dungeon Siege with all that shiny weapon. (Never did like that WoW look)
point- Colors do affect mood and feelings... Art Class anyone? Even if they decide to add in happy colors, at least have some more contrast. The colors are dull, despite more colors than the previous games. I'm not talking about the skill special effects. (tone some of that down too... the barbarian was pretty much on fire with that fire axe).
The lighting is awkward too... firebombs from the necro-native class thing doesnt affect the environment. It would be totally cool if they made the environment reflect light from skills or whatnot. Yeah, and whats with the no light radius? People fear the unknown and having monsters fully appear 20 feet away seems boring.
I would like the Diablo game to stick more to the Diablo theme. That is, scary, dark, and... scary. We didnt wait8 years or so to be dissapointed!
- *gory details: In Diablo II bodies were a common sight. There would be dead bodies on the ground, rogues impaled on huge spikes (and often lit on fire), and skeletons locked in swinging cages (Act V). These many varied images of death and torture had a huge impact on the macabre atmosphere of dread and intensity. Nothing of this sort can be seen in the gameplay demo. The areas are squeeky clean. The demons even took the time to light a nice friendly little campfire without any human bodies roasting over it.
Common arguments:- *It's still early, this doesn't represent what the final product will look like. .... This is the strongest argument and the one I hope is the explanation for the lack of details. Hopefully the missing bodies/pentagrams/evil imagery is only a result of being an early build.
Well, that's my 2 cents. I can't wait to see if they actually listen to us fans and find a happy middle ground the majority of us can agree on. Right now the crowd seems very much split 50/50.I always hoped they'd go back and go above 800x600 to overhaul D2 which is definitely showing it's age. The game however is still fun to play and gameplay beats graphics any day of the week. Since D2 in the genre has been nothing, but bad clone after bad clone (Prince of Qin and Divine Divinity being exceptions) until Titan's Quest picked up the torch and created a very beautiful game in the spirit of D2. It however did not possess a MP worth using like we get with Battle.net to help the community stay together and grow. Diablo 3 however takes the torch away from TQ and expands on their own genre once again with lush [rich] world environments, destructible implementations, claustophobic dungeons, and character detail the likes of which we haven't seen in the genre.
I for one think the game looks amazing in it's current state and the slightly brighter presentation [color palette] doesn't take anything away from the previous Diablo installments. It still looks strongly like the previous games enough to have me not complaining over it's presentation. Many of those throwing the all too common "WoW" card I think are those who just want an expansion of Diablo 2 and not an evolution of the series as we are getting with Diablo 3.
"I am Shaolin-Style!"
"Monster + Explosion = Awesome!"
(and face it blizzard, you left us for 6 years now? with D2. Any Diablo fan couldn't help but try TQ).
and yeah, my first impression of the gameplay trailer was that it feels like an upgraded version of TQ. where as diablo really did stand out for there high contrast(easily fixed you your monitor settings aswell i guess) but also the and gothic style and dark colours.
I respect blizzards challenge to make it just as atmospheric as the old ones, even with the vibrant color palate direction. but yeah, it feels to similar for yet another one of there awesome titles sorta clashing with diablos own unique feel. One other thing is Diablo, from what ive seen around in game forums, was always huge for the fans that could never get into the whole child friendly atmosphere feel to the games, mainly influenced by the colours, lol wow or the new SC art style aswell, which recently came under scrutiny from long time fans.
however... i would be disappointed if it ended up looking like gears of war in all honesty.
so If i could choose an alternative for feedbacks sake, it would be just to tone it down abit, just for atmosphere, and stick with very gothic designs for architecture and environments.
One other thing that D2 fans forget, is how significant the real horror was in the first one compared to the second oner. and i know i cant fairly judge this part from the vids ive seen. but best example to begin with, is the butcher.
I remember why he was so freaky, and it wasnt cause he leapt out at me going fresh meat (although it gave me quite a freak out the first time) but it was the aftermath, when you see his room, what he left behind, almost a peek into his warped existence, in all that darkness and with that eeiry music, which from then on made me go F^&k now this is one hell of a game, and left paranoid to explore all the dungeons.
in conclusion, im 100% sure it will be the most fun diablo, but i don't think i can get the same dark atmosphere diablo 1 was perfected for if its full of colors. and what i fear is it will be generically epic.
Its what made diablo feel unique, compared to sacred or TQ, and its why i enjoyed the D series the most, all the horror aspects, mixed with how fun it was and a sweet the story was, even the characters who you could see were deeply disturbed and almost struggling to be brave, in and by there surroundings, instead of just generic balls blazing in the dungeon.
it felt awesome going into god only knows what monstrous dungeon, with that paranoid feeling that something could be in the shadows that you missed forcing ya self to be brave and take on whatever demon lurked there.
keep the fear alive in the dark blizz
altogether, Great job so far, keep up the work.
gamma11 > east
Most of you think that game needs more work with textures and "backround dungeon colors" like the blue and green. Just hope you realize, no matter who you are, ALL of us have only seen ONE dungeon, and ONE piece of outdoor scenary. Just give the hard working poeple at blizzard a chance. Dont be so quick to judge. Blizzard knows thier fan base, they love thier fan base, they will ultimatly do what will please US.
This petition is to KEEP the current art direction
Good Job Blizzard. Stay on Track
I never realized how much I appreciated the graphics of diablo and diablo II until this conversation came up. The graphics really set the mood. I've played other dungeon crawlers, with bright cartoon-like graphics, and it's still great fun, but it's just not the same, something is missing. I'm hoping blizzard will listen to us and tweak the art a bit, I think they can find a good middle ground and please both sides of this argument, for the most part.
I agree so much right here. Things just don't seem so.. Diablo'ish when they showed the gameplay video.. it felt like if Warcraft was made into an RPG.. seriously if you changed Diablo III to.. like, Warcraft Adventures! etc, it would pass for a Warcraft game right now. We need more gore, more horror, more dark gritty everything. I hope Blizzard delivers - and they most likely will.
this is what D3 should look like ....
As you can see the ones on the right side are what the fans who are complaining about the graphics want. We want a darker, grainier pallet and design.
I understand that Blizzard said they want to focus more on the EXPERIENCE OF A DARK FEELING, but how can you EXPERIENCE that when the visuals show otherwise? The way you experience a game is through sight, and what is on the screen is an extremely light color pallet, that looks very cartoony and destroys that dark and gothic feeling completely. It just looks like WoW with an overhead camera shot.
The design and colors just dont make the game have that feel or look that d2 had. The d2 sprites looked more real in comparison to the d3 graphics. I rather have the game look like the rightside pictures. They have a more dark feeling and also look more real, unlike the smooth cartoon drawings to the left.
so in summation D3 will probably get darker as you progress though the game
my vote, it needs to look more like fargn made them look, maybe blizzard should hire u to fix all their colors n stuff good job
You are a Diablo fan who is not like "diabloic athmosphere".
I think game developers have to be loyal to what they have created on humanities brains. Diablo is a game is affected all the new cultural waves. I think gothic wave is effected from Diablo game.
Diablo series give the enegy of "red blood and darken ashes and the charismatic evil"
People knows Necromancer looks and feels like the magician of the D2 cinematics.
Where is the CHARISMATIC EVIL MAGICIAN? He must be a cool, aristoctaric lookin Evilish man. Where? I see only Tyrael flash logo like it. But "we need a class who seem dark, cool and evilish". If it will not be in the game, D3 will be a huge disappointment. I am afraid.
LOOK IT:
img299.imageshack.us/img299/7807/itshouldrh5.jpg
Diablo series give an impact on the worlds waves. It gives the impact on music bands, and gothic culture. This impression was "The Charismatic Evil".
If you are creating a funny cartoonish child game, anybody will not play it. Becouse, if i am searching a funny athmosphere, i can play WOW. Diablo players need a Hellish and "EVIL" thing. This game needs BAD ENERGY. Not the positive ones. The positive energies? Only charisma, braveness are intelligency are allowed i think. Diablo is a mature game. A serious game. I play Diablo II, becouse it is really serious and fearsome.
Players need a devilish character or class. But this class has to have a royality. Players have to have a respect for this evil class.
It is an equilibrium. If your evils are not cool, then your good side is not cool..
Sorry for my poor english.
This was a picture that's been posted before. Though I believe the person used photoshop and the noise tool to get it like that.
That would be great. Maybe if they show another video in another area deeper in the storyline.. and if its really dark and such, might be awesome.
PS: Totally agree with the visuals from Fargnbastage! I'm no game designer but the "How it should look like" hits the right G spot.
Cheers!.