So the Mercenary system was fantastic, I truely thought it had potential, but I understand that due to the technical limitations all it could do was wander around like a pet, seeming somewhat animated and alive by randomly wandering around, but in close proximity to the owner, it really was primative, when the expansion came out they added inventories to the mercenary system, as well as a melee DPS class, the barbarian.

I was disappointed by the primative system because the mercenary died and was largely useless in the long run, it was unintelligent, the system of choosing a merc was portrayed in each town having a mercenary vendor, with no jeperody nothing engaging at all. These vendors all seemed unfit for such a thing, but of course this was a game with its limits, so I understand why it was a poorly delivered system. The inventory system helped make mercenaries engaging, as you could equip them with the kinds of armor you had, but they were limited to the Diablo 1 inventory.

What I am proposing is to change the way the system is projected, so that means the name of Mercenary is on hiatus as how you would define this companion is more of an Adventurer but for this proposal I will simply call them mercenaries.

Contents
1 – Tavern, mercenary recruitment and resurrection
2 - New AI, personality
3 – Skills, diversity, and dialogue
4 – Conclusion

1) Recruiting a mercenary should be different. It should be limited to taverns, you could enter a Tavern and talk to the Bartender, which would bring up a large list with a picture of the character and stats, as well as a small history of the character to make the characters existence in the world as your companion some how related in even the smallest way, for example: The mercenaries parents were killed by demons when they were young, they were tutored in demon hunting and have been drifting from town to town purging demons. The gold standard must never go away in regards to recruiting a mercenary, but it should not be cheap and easily affordable, it’s got to be spendy, mercenarys must give gold a presense. The way that mercenarys entered the world was so sudden and funny, it was less animated than summoning a poisonous vine. When you recruit a merc, it should come from a door you cannot open on the second level of the tavern, and walk down to you, and then greet you. The way you resurrect a fallen mercenary should be different from the bartender, like it used to be in diablo 2, it should be done by a healer NPC, the cost of reviving shouldn’t be scaled properly, making it 25% the price of purchasing the mercenary may be sufficient.

2) The mercenaries were much in the same regards to a golem, except that as they became more expensive the higher they became. Mercenaries simply followed you around in a somewhat drifting manner, however they never wandered on their own or showed any life, they were blandly following you within a specified radius, and drifting much like a necromancer pet, so basically they were universal pets. I think that the AI should be improved to accomodate a mercenarie that feels alive and has a common interest, that fulfills its story by matching with a personality, let’s say that you’re running through a forest and you’ve only been engaging creeps, but no demons, that demon hunter you recruited begins getting restless and chooses to run ahead a little and finds something to loot, setting an encounter in which demon ambush him, when you’re both done slaughtering the demons, a couple drop some interesting items. This is where he takes into consideration his stats and works on improving himself. When he looks at items, his icon will flash and a box will come up where the item is displayed and he says simply “This item will help me, do you want it instead?” with a Yes and No option. This item/stat checking will be based on a succession of Damage, Health, and Armor rating in relation to the current item, so say he finds a sword with +10 health but he has a sword with +10 fire damage, he will favor the damage over health unless the health bonus is more. With multiple stats he would take into account the size of the improvement of damage or health or Armor rating and adjust accordingly. You could even set what he favors aswell, this would not only make mercenaries viceral, but customizable. It would also be exciting to watch him trigger random encounters. It would also be quite useful to put those voice commands to use, which were unused in Diablo 2 in to this game, as a tool to communicate with your mercenary.

3) Mercenaries had a couple skills, this is the one part that doesn’t need much change, except that maybe all mercenaries should have something like 5 skills. In the diablo 2 mercenary system each type of mercenary had 3 types of skill trees, such as the Rogue having Fire, Ice, and Lightning. This diversity could switch over, it’s a good idea, they could even share traits with known classes, so it’s not like Blizzard would have to strain to make them totally unique. The diversity of mercenaries was limited to 4 types. In Diablo 3, this could be increased conservatively to 6 to give the mercenary system some depth but not overly demanding so it doesn’t dominate any other game mechanics. Within those 6 classes there could be 3 specializations, such as the Demon Hunter having specialtys in Bows, Melee, and Restraining. So for example with the Restraining specialty the Demon Hunter could stun the demons that ambushed him with some concussive explosives. This would give the mercenaries a bearing in the world by having tactical potential if you’re being overwhelmed in both PvP or PvE of stunning things that may otherwise give you trouble, this would add a new factor to how the game is played. The dialogue is also important, In diablo you would kill Diablo with your mercenary either dead or intact and he would say NOTHING, but you would, in diablo 3 maybe you could both say something together, at least a little dialogue, the only thing they said in Diablo 2 was “I feel stronger now” or something along those lines.

4) I can’t see why this idea would be shot down other than it would take emphasis off of your character and be a check and balance of your power aswell as time consuming to build the AI. This isn’t true, it’s not my intention to make the mercenary an equal, just a follower that is being pulled into the story unknowingly but of no more signifigance than a side quest in terms of impact on the story arc. It doesn’t have to be a super freaking smart AI. Blizzard had to create their own system just to show the opening cinematic of Starcraft 2 because of the limitations of the standard software. This Mercenary system is not out of their reach, this is what I have no doubt about and it could make a game that is anticipated to succeed greatly, something to marvel as time the ages pass. Much in the same way that the attention to small details in games like Mass Effect made it so fun. Natural motion, Dialogue based endings.

The mercenary system was not as cool as it could have been and that’s why i wrote this.
I think my idea is good and you may not agree but here it is anyway, discuss amongst yourselves.

Here’s the top 5 differences!

1) More color, less darkness
According to lead producer, Keith Lee, Diablo 3 is going to feature more outdoor environments with a lot more colors. Instead of pleasing the core audience though, this move has so outraged gamers that they started an online petition. They want good, old darkness back and the colors out the door!

2) Less monsters, more varied killing
Jay Wilson, lead designer on Diablo 3, states that instead of hack-and-slash through throngs of monster, Diablo 3 players will have to focus on killing fewer but tougher monsters. Things like positioning, skills, and so on will have a greater effect than they did in Diablo 2.

For example, the Berserker monster has a charged up attack that deals massive damage. If you dodge the attack though, the Berserker is left vulnerable. Similar fate awaits the Skeletal Shieldbearers when they drop their shields.

3) Epic heroes, class quests
According to Jay, the new Diablo 3 characters will be more badass than ever before. Judging by the demo, it seems likely that there could be fewer characters but with a lot less overlap than say WoW. Class-specific quests, armor, etc are also in the works.

4) COOP play – large-scale, harder battles
Judging by the demo, it could take four or more characters to kill a boss in Diablo 3. I hope these bosses can be defeated by a single player too (same as Diablo 2 ubers). The coop play will be through Battle.net – it’s not 100% clear whether that will be free (same as Diablo 2).

5) No more potions, less downtime
In order to speed up the game, the designers have removed the massive belts full of potions. Instead, each monster has a chance to drop a red sphere that replenishes health. That means that you can go into combat even when wounded and get healed that way.

There’s more than five differences? Discuss below!

UPDATE: Diablo 3 is OFFICIAL! Live news from the event:

12:15 — Announcement…..!! Guy playing Diablo music on an acoustic guitar…

12:18 — Footage of large scale battles, comets streaking across the sky, demons, Diablo 3 officially announced.

12:20 — Jay Wilson, lead designer on Diablo 3 coming out. He’s going to demo the game.

12:20 — It’s apparently still an action RPG. Same interface — red
health and blue orbs. Skill bar at bottom. 3/4 overhead perspective.
Character with 2 axes hacking at demons in what appears to be a foggy
cathedral. Has a jumping attack where he smashes the two axes into the
ground.

(Watch Diablo 3 trailer here)

12:21 — The axe guy is the barbarian class. Says improvements have
been made, like the hotbar for skills. Using the mouse wheel and tab
key you can quickly switch between skills. Whoing inventory. Appears to
still have slot limits. Using enchanted axes with frost and lighting
,which stuns and freezes opponents.

12:25 — Each piece of gear is custom designed for each class. Barbarian puts on demonic sort of garb with giant devil horns. Barbarian can hop across gaps on the map. Barbarian dislodged a rock wall and dropped it on zombies, killing them. Demoing moving whirlwind attack.

12:33 — Witch doctor can cast out locus swarm, which spreads between targets and deals damage. Can summon mongrel things that he can cast locust swarm on, which buffs their damage. Outdoor environment now. Quite pretty in that vibrant, slightly cartoonish Blizzard graphical style. Like with StarCraft 2 and it’s similarities to the original, Diablo 3 looks and sounds, at least at a glance, quite similar to previous games. Witch doctor also has a mass fear type of ability.

12:36 — Multiplayer will work over battle.net. Heads into a final fight against some gigantic moving trees. Final boss here, called siegebreaker assault beast, is absolutely gigantic, maybe around six or seven times taller than the player characters.

12:37 — Demo ends. The crowd roars…

You can download the high-quality gameplay footage here. Check out the Diablo 3 screenshots too.

Below is the main box image for Diablo 3!

Blizzcon 2008 has just been announced. For those interested to attend, it will be on Oct 10 and 11th at the Anaheim Convention center in California. The price for a ticket is $100.

Part of the lure for going to BlizzCon 2008 is the beta keys that you get which can get you into Starcraft 2 or another future Blizzard release.

So should we expect Diablo 3? There’s a ton of people on different game sites that argue (with passion) that the time has come for a Diablo 3 announcement. They bring up the job postings on Blizzard’s site, they talk about the next-gen MMO that’s currently in the works.

Don’t get me wrong, my hopes are high as well. And there’s my skeptical side that says … just look at the way Blizzard listed the franchises in their press release:

BlizzCon is a celebration of the global player communities surrounding Blizzard Entertainment®’s Warcraft®, StarCraft®, and Diablo® franchises.

Notice how Diablo has permanently moved to the back of queue. Hope this is all part of a plan to cover up what they’re doing, so they can surprise us!

The owner of Diablo3.com has “confessed” he has transferred the domain to Blizzard. Here’s the gist:

A few months ago we were contacted by Blizzard in regards to the Diablo3.com domain name. While they appreciate all the work that’s been put into running this big Diablo fan community over the years, they still want the domain name. Hmm, I wonder why?

I wonder why myself. It could be that Blizzard’s lawyers decided it’s high time they earn their keep. I mean apart from telling Uwe Boll to go blow when it comes to a WoW movie, they haven’t done anything.

Hmm, I wonder why Diablo2.com is still independent then. It has been out for YEARS and it’s a clear violation of the Diablo trademark. Blizzard can get it by just writing to ICANN. I think they care NOT about Diablo 2.

So although Blizzard do acquire domains (as they told the owner of Diablo3.com), I find their timely interest in Diablo 3 suspicious. Not in a bad way, though. I’d just love to hear more about Diablo 3!

This Flash Diablo game seems to be a tribute to the original Diablo. There’s some resemblance but how the hell do I turn off the annoying sounds?

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codebase=”http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=7,0,0,0″
width=”480″ height=”360″ id=”Diablo” align=”middle”><embed src=”Diablo.swf” menu=”false” quality=”high” bgcolor=”#000000″ width=”480″ height=”360″ name=”Diablo” align=”middle”
type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” pluginspage=”http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer”>

Anyone managed to save the Princess already?

Note: Game courtesy of Necromanthus.

The game comes from the team who did Diablo II so naturally the expectation are running high!

Gamespot haven’t reviewed it yet but here’s a few bits from other reviews:

Besides the simple fact that no map generation program is ever going to be as good as a human designer, the random maps introduce some other problems too…

That same room layout, that same pair of tunnels, repeated over and over in slightly different configurations… We don’t doubt that Underground tunnels really are quite monotonous, but there’s no need to inflict that on us in a videogame. It’s bad enough having to go through them in packed train carriages, frankly…

Each of the six classes is genuinely fun to play, which is rare enough in RPGs. Most players will probably settle on their preferred archetype pretty quickly, of course, but it’s definitely good to see a game where you can roll just about any class, and be fairly confident that you won’t be coming back to restart in disgust a few hours later.

That’s from Eurogamer giving it 7 out of 10. The user reviews are equally split, there’s some guys that couldn’t play for more than 15 minutes without restarting which naturally got frustrating pretty quickly.

Oh well, I’ll be playing the demo anyway. The question remains whether I want the game as well.