Diablo 3 Dev Talks Multiplayer Options, Long Dev Cycle

AusGamers spoke with Blizzard's Jay Wilson recently about Diablo 3's multiplayer experience. Among other things, Wilson said the developers were making an effort to encourage cooperative gameplay. For example, each player within a particular game will see different loot drops from monsters, which prevents competition over who can click an item the fastest, and encourages trading. He also mentions that a team is already working on methods to prevent cheating, and he discusses why Blizzard games tend to be announced so long before they're completed. "One of the reasons why we actually prefer a really long window before we release a game is because we want a lot of feedback; we want to hear what people like and don't like about it; we want to give them several opportunities to play it before release."

Comments

More skill combinations

[Anonymous Coward]

The only combos that really made the difference in pvm was the enchantress/necro-summoner combo. It really made for a huge advantage, and there should be bosses that can only be beaten with teamwork to further encourage cooperative gaming.

Re:More skill combinations

[KDR_11k]

Those bosses better be optional or multiplayer-only then, it'd suck to run into something you cannot fight in singleplayer and get stuck.

Re:More skill combinations

[Merls the Sneaky]

Bowzon/summoner was kick ass aswell.

Won't be available for Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't care.

Next?

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[Samantha Wright]

Maybe that produces a disappointingly small market, no? Keep in mind that WoW doesn't exactly have a small consumer base.

Single Player please.

[Smartcowboy]

I loved Diablo 1 and Diablo 2. However, I'm not really interrested in multi-player games. I only hope Diablo 3 will keep an enjoyable single player mode.

Re:Single Player please.

[Tenek]

Diablo wasn't significantly different in multiplayer. D2 was even less different. In D3 you will presumably have the option of playing by yourself. Hell, you can even do that in "multiplayer" mode if you join a game by yourself and don't let others in. Alternatively, you could check out multiplayer and see if you like it any better in D3. *shrug*

Re:Single Player please.

[Anonymous Coward]

While I agree that a good single-player mode is important.. You're missing out on a LOT by not playing online. Find a group of friends that have D2, and just play online for a bit. Trade on battle.net. Share loot, cooperate to take down the biggest and baddest of monsters, and just experience it.

It's not the same as single player. There's a lot to like about it. Give it a chance. You might get hooked. (Again.)

Re:Single Player please.

[mqduck]

Can a session really be "fag" if there's only one person playing?

Re:Single Player please.

[AlpineR]

You might get hooked.

Well I think that's part of the problem! I quit playing World of Warcraft because I got to the point where I needed a group to make progress. But if you're part of a group of friends or a clan then you have to play whenever the group plays, whether you want to or not. Otherwise you get left behind levelwise.

Multiplayer RPG is really fun if you and your friends have a ton of time to spend. But people who are busy, have scattered friends, or just want to play occasionally need a valid single-player mode.

Re:Single Player please.

[fgaliegue]

>Diablo wasn't significantly different in multiplayer. D2 was even less different.

D2X in single player is close to impossible in Hell difficulty. Only a few characters, with very high end equipment, can hope and complete the game.

Also, a lot of items were available in multiplayer only, and that's a pity. Like Smartcowboy, I very much prefer single player.

Re:Single Player please.

[TheRaven64]

Diablo 2 was a lot of fun in multiplayer, but you really need a group of friends who are willing to play the whole game through with you, which was very difficult given the amount of time it took. When I was at school, it wasn't a problem - in the holidays we'd have LAN parties stretching over several days, which gave enough time to play at least a couple of acts of D2 in between Quake games. As a student, I didn't go to any LAN parties, but I could play for an hour or so a week with my housemates (although the temptation to do the quests in single player was high, and so it was easy to get out of sync). Now I pretty much only play it in single player, and generally get bored by around act 2 or 3.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

And it's also ruled by 12 year olds who spam immature shit and make the game horrible for anyone with an IQ over 80 to play. I, as well as many others I've talked to, don't want another Diablo 2. Though I'm sure you're proud of your p torch and endless numbers of uniques and rune words that you scammed off of the people who used to occupy your friends list. Have fun jacking off to your mule accounts alone in your basement.

The biggest problem with D3

[Anonymous Coward]

There shouldn't be colors involved with every sword and axe swing. Magical effects should be used sparingly in order to maintain realism and create greater contrast. Realism and atmosphere is what immersed the gamer into D1, and D3's nonstop WoW effects are a huge turnoff.

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[afidel]

That's funny, I play D2 with Glide wrappers so that I can have more of the pretty effects =)

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[CronoCloud]

There shouldn't be colors involved with every sword and axe swing.

I disagree. If I'm wielding a sword with fire attributes I want to see the sword flaming when I'm carrying it. When you play a tabletop game, and your character has a badass magic weapon, don't you imagine the weapon glowing/sparking/flaming?

Realism and atmosphere is what immersed the gamer into D1,

It was? I thought it was the fun of nonstop hacking and the ability to fire tons of arrows without having to carry any and the ability to cast walls of fire on all who oppose you. That doesn't sound realistic to me.

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[PMuse]

There shouldn't be colors involved with every sword and axe swing.

There should be swords and axes that don't have colors involved with every swing. And not just ones that suck.

There. Fixed that for you.

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[Anonymous Coward]

If I'm wielding a sword with fire attributes I want to see the sword flaming when I'm carrying it.

Yeah, me too. But look at the first part of the gameplay video--the weapons are two regular hatchets, and nearly every swing is a bright red streak, and every stomp creates a blue and yellow effect. There's nothing magical about a barbarian's stomp on enemies, so adding colorful effects kills contrast from actual magic and hurts realism.

nonstop hacking and the ability to fire tons of arrows without having to carry any and the ability to cast walls of fire on all who oppose you. That doesn't sound realistic to me.

There are degrees of realism. Not counting the number of arrows you shoot, or casting a magical fire wall, are obviously part of the fantasy game. That doesn't nullify the advantage of realism in other aspects. Lord of the Rings was an awesome movie, in spite of its fictional components, but it was awesome because it was all made to appear realistic.

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[Sibko]

When you play a tabletop game, and your character has a badass magic weapon, don't you imagine the weapon glowing/sparking/flaming?

No, actually. My DM personally prefers to have the particularly powerful items/artifacts rather mundane. Sometimes you'll get something flashy, usually it only extends as far as Sting glowing in close proximity to orcs in the LoTR.

There are times where we've almost thrown an item away [ie an old rusty dagger] but decided to cast an identify spell on just in case, and it turns out to be [in this weapons' case] a +2 dagger of levitation or similar.

More importantly, if we run a campaign in a particularly low-magic setting we don't typically ever see a magic item at all, let alone something flashy. If we do, even a +1 butter knife becomes a long lost artifact sitting inside a jungle tribe's ancient catacombs.

So, to answer your question, no I don't imagine every magic weapon or even most magic weapons in my D&D games to be constantly glowing/sparking/flaming. Sometimes gaudy and flashy works in a particular setting, other times it doesn't. Depends on the setting and what kind of world the players want to be in.

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[Anonymous Coward]

It was? I thought it was the fun of nonstop hacking and the ability to fire tons of arrows without having to carry any and the ability to cast walls of fire on all who oppose you. That doesn't sound realistic to me.

Maybe not where YOU live.

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[narcberry]

When my leather-bound he-elf dances through the trees he calls his friends, something will be flaming.

Re:The biggest problem with D3

[CronoCloud]

They probably gave special effects to the stomp because it is probably a "spell like feat type" ability, even if it's not truly magical. Charge attacks in the PS2 Diablo clones have similar effects.

As for the red streaks, I didn't notice those. Ahhh, if you pay close attention the red streaks don't happen for every axe strike. Bet those are specials too, notice how the mana doesn't go down? Bet he's using feats all the time with an umlimited mana cheat to show off the eye candy.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[bigstrat2003]

If the only thing Blizzard does is to remove incentive for assholes to play the game, it will be a resounding success for the vast majority of players, and for Blizzard. Griefers ruin the game for everyone except themselves.

Sorry you want to grief players to have fun. Go ahead and leave, because we won't miss you one fucking bit.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[HBI]

Actually, that's incorrect. That player type is a parasite, but a necessary one. Without the griefers, things are boring.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[afidel]

Play HC if things are boring, much more fun and if you get in with a good group there are no griefers.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

That's weird, I'm pretty sure that where you typed "boring" you meant "fun."

No they aren't

[Anonymous Coward]

All games get boring eventually, griefers or no.

However, games that give plenty of room to griefers are only more interesting to griefers. Griefability does not make the games at all more interesting to the rest of us.

Griefers always insist that their selfish and rude behavior is actually of benefit to those whom they make suffer, and it simply isn't true.

Yes, anti-griefing rules makes the game more boring....to griefers. I say good. I hope they make it as boring as possible to griefers, because the fewer of them the better.

Go grief each other somewhere else. And good riddance.

Re:No they aren't

[Anonymous Coward]

Except on Second Life, which is pretty much a big griefing competition.

Re:No they aren't

[Anonymous Coward]

Griefability does not make the games at all more interesting to the rest of us.

MMO's are supposed to be plot-driven, not just a mindless hack-n-slash. In order for a story to exist, you need two opposing sides, a 'good' one & an 'evil' one.
There is a common misconception that if you are a human player, you should be forced to be 'good', and that only the mindless NPC charactors are allowed to be 'evil'.
Most of the MMO's out there are only creating a game for you to be the 'good hero', while many people would like a chance to play a truly 'evil' charactor, and even some people that prefer a charactor that has both good & evil qualities.
Through proper design and game-integration, the griefers could be tapped to create a truly fun story. It is much more fun to match wits with a human than a computer; although I am not a griefer myself, me & my friends often have more fun 'griefing' the griefers than simply killing more of the 'evil orcs' that politely stay in their assigned zone, walking in circles.

In the end, if you complain about griefers you are more than likely simply suffering from small E-penis syndrome i.e. you can't handle the fact that someone has outsmarted you, and would prefer to feel good because you can kill the NPC for the 1millionth time.
Either that or the game is simply horribly bugged, in which case blame the programmers or go play a different game.

& to all you griefers out there- bring it on, some of us are ready for you to give it your best shot.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[runlevelfour]

"One of the reasons why we actually prefer a really long window before we release a game is because we want a lot of feedback; we want to hear what people like and don't like about it; we want to give them several opportunities to play it before release." Or it could be the fact they want their marketing machine ample time to get the hype running....

Re:The Case Against Barack Hussein Obama

[Anonymous Coward]

go fuck your cousin you inbreeding hick

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

I like the idea of seeing different loot drops for different players. I wonder if it will be tied to different races/classes, or just different players playing at that moment?

Either way, I hope its in stores by 2010.

What kind of cooperative gameplay?

[tepples]

Wilson said the developers were making an effort to encourage cooperative gameplay.

How can you encourage cooperative gameplay if the players who want to cooperate live together? Does this mean there will be support for dual USB gamepads and TV-as-monitor like on that other popular action RPG series?

Re:What kind of cooperative gameplay?

[doctrbl]

How can you encourage cooperative gameplay if the players who want to cooperate live together?

Any time I've ever lived with people who game, all of us had their own PCs. Network them together and off you go.

PS: Some friends bought Kane & Lynch for the PC and were shocked to discover that cooperative multiplayer was not available by using 2 PCs; you had to both huddle over 1 PC with a split screen, one player using an XBox gamepad. For this reason I won't trust any title with the "Games for Windows" MicroSoft tag...

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[Kane Devaid]

I disagree. If you announce too early, people get fed up of waiting and move on - the excitement dies down. After that, people start saying "Vapourware" etc. The trick is to announce at just the right time so the game is released just as the hype reaches its apex. Unfortunately, games get delayed so much you end up either missing this, or releasing an unfinished game. Usually both.

Griefer

[AlpineR]

Wow, at first I thought you were complaining that Diablo 2 is filled with jerks who just click and cheat and make your games unfun. Then I realized that you're that jerk and don't want your own fun spoiled!

I'm not very impressed by your ability to click a mouse or to download hacks that somebody else wrote. But I've learned that different folks get their jollies in different ways. It'd be nice if Battle.net could set aside a server just for all the jerks and hackers. Call it "Thunderdome". Or "Hell". They can go click, exploit, scam, and spam to their hearts delight. The rest of us will go play something fun and friendly.

Re:Griefer

[narcberry]

I don't think you appreciate the Diablo's. The best part was hearing people cry when you loot their gold. It's so great because the economy in Diablo is so broken, they may as well be crying that you stole their pocket lint.

It never gets old.

Also, you carebears out there would enjoy griefing too. All you have to do is fake interest in an obvious scam. Ask dumb questions the whole time and see how long you can maintain the scammers interest. Not only is is a hoot, but you're making the world a better place too so you can have happy dreams of rainbows too.

Re:Griefer

[garylian]

There is only one problem with your suggestion.

Griefers don't want to have fair competition, and don't really want to fight other griefers. It's why UO died such an ugly death. They were hemmoraging subscribers at a pretty awful rate before they made the whole "light/dark shards". That just happened to get rid of the rest of the players. (And while the UO fanbois always recall how absolutely GREAT the game was prior to that change, I noticed that after the change, the PvP side of things was a barren wasteland with no players.)

Their whole game enjoyment comes from making others miserable. That's why they call it GRIEFing. It's all about them and how much they can annoy another player. These people are simply anti-social. They don't care about making friends, or enjoying the game with others. They want to see how much frustration they can cause, and what it takes to make other players log out and/or quit.

So, trying to get these knuckleheads to a server where they can exploit and grief each other to hell and back won't work, because they won't want to play there either. They'll be trying to get away with stuff on the regular servers, just so their e-penis will grow bigger and they can strut around talking about how awesome they are. And when they do get banned, they will go insane on the Blizzard forums for that game.

Alright - I'll start

[spineboy]

WHAT?! - NO PALADIN CLASS?!
Now I'm a little disappointed that the Barbarian is (so far) the only class that is returning to Diablo.
Maybe they will call it something else, but it will still function as a pally.

OK cue the WHAT NO XXXX class for the other classes now. The only other classes I played were the occasional necro and barb.

A sufficiently large monitor

[tepples]

Any time I've ever lived with people who game, all of us had their own PCs.

You have a point about M rated games like Diablo III is expected to be, as each player is expected to either be in college or have a job. But E, E10+, or T rated games have players under 18, who due to school and child labor laws usually can't work to buy their own PCs and have to play on the family PC. Besides, two copies of a $40 game without single-screen multiplayer are more expensive than one copy of a $60 game that includes it.

you had to both huddle over 1 PC

A sufficiently large monitor should not require "huddling".

with a split screen

Diablo shouldn't have to split anything if both players' characters stick within a few meters of each other. Secret of Mana didn't.

Re:A sufficiently large monitor

[doctrbl]

I clicked your link from your previous post, had a quick read of the Mana series wiki; that, together with the ideas you espouse of single-box multiplay on a large screen suggest that you want Diablo 3 to be a console release. After all, a console is a computer purpose-built for gaming, connected to the TV (usually), and with controllers for multiple simultaneous players.

So are you wanting it to be a console release?

Re:A sufficiently large monitor

[tepples]

that, together with the ideas you espouse of single-box multiplay on a large screen suggest that you want Diablo 3 to be a console release.

No, I want PC games to support both PC-style and console-style gameplay, so that indie developers have an inroad to release console-style games without having to first become a large enough company to get a console maker's attention.

Re:A sufficiently large monitor

[morari]

Besides, two copies of a $40 game without single-screen multiplayer are more expensive than one copy of a $60 game that includes it.

This has only ever been a problem with Steam games. Unfortunately, family-oriented LAN play is almost impossible byway of Valve's idiotic DRM.

Diablo shouldn't have to split anything if both players' characters stick within a few meters of each other. Secret of Mana didn't.

No. Just no. The Playstation version of the first Dialbo forced you to stick together and it was horrid. Not being able to go off on your on severely gimps everyone.

It sounds to me as if you just need to buy a console, dude.

Re:A sufficiently large monitor

[tepples]

The Playstation version of the first Dialbo forced you to stick together and it was horrid. Not being able to go off on your on severely gimps everyone.

Then split the screen into two 640x720 pixel windows when the players split up, and join them back together when practicable.

It sounds to me as if you just need to buy a console, dude.

I own a console. But I want to play major label games and indie games without turning off one machine and turning on another, and I want a market that would let me develop indie games designed for intra-household multiplayer.

Re:The Case Against Barack Hussein Obama

[EmperorKagato]

Terrorists regimes around the world have said that they want Obama to be president. Would you take advice from people who want to kill you and elect the person they want elected?

Yes, they would be more receptive to negotiations.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[genghisjahn]

You're right. Blizzard usually doesn't time things right which ultimately screws up their games. WOW and Starcraft are two prime examples. Those went NO WHERE. In case you couldn't tell I was being sarcastic.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[Anonymous Coward]

Games should be started by the users like in CounterStrike or DoD. That user is the admin of that game. Then they can KICK BAN IGNORE said asshole. Problem solved.

Why I quit playing games:

#1 Online subscription play only.
#2 Cheating, hacks, farmers, etc.
#3 Greifing

btw: If a game is only fun because of cheaters then it's not worth playing to begin with.

different loots

[Anonymous Coward]

well ... i liked the d2 style of grabbing
if you didn't want to fight for it you could play with ppl you knew and share the loot ... and if you joined a public game ... you could try to grab stuff ... it was fun too
why change this system?
i traded very very much in d2 ... even with the 'not trade encouraging' drop system

Re:different loots

[Anonymous Coward]

Online only multi play for less hacking/cheating may slow down people playing the game. How many people got killed at level 9 in D2 by someone level 50+. No hacks/cheats at all there is no way a level 9 can beat a level 50 or higher. Well maybe if the higher level is afk the whole time.

I remember getting tired of all the PK only characters the ones when they opened their inventory screen their game crashed. Remember those characters that ran so fast they just blinked across the screen? I found a PK killer game mod that was fun for a while. It used a a really cheap bow and it shot arrows really fast. It was fun to use on a amazon (with the knock back on) and watch the PK characters freeze and get knocked back a bit. But shooting them for and hours straight took too much time though. They did die eventually. Then they bitched and called me a cheater. Which was so funny.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[narcberry]

Don't care if I'll be missed, and I'll find a way to grief you in game. If we can interact, I will find a way.

Re:The Case Against Barack Hussein Obama

[Jekler]

Wow, I haven't played Diablo 2 in quite some time, I guess I missed a lot of content. This Barack Hussein Obama character has really extended the Diablo mythology quite a bit, I didn't even know there were cars, internet, and government in the game now. I guess that's cool and all, I just wished they would have balanced the Paladin a little better.

Re:Here's some fuckin feedback

[Kane Devaid]

Perhaps those games were successful in spite of bad timing? I wouldn't say the success of WOW was based on an early announcement.

Just for the record, I have no idea what the announcement lead time was for those games, only I, as an individual get less interested the longer I have to wait. Will I play DNF? Not likely.