Bethesda Softworks’ Ashley Cheng, the Producer of Fallout 3 stated his disappointment of Diablo 3’s announcement on his blog in a post entitled “When the ship runs out of ocean.” This is what he wrote:
[INDENT]Diablo III announced. Nice. It looks pretty amazing, especially the gameplay video. Loved the destructible environments.
I must say I am disappointed that Blizzard has stayed on the conservative side in terms of design with their updates to Diablo and Starcraft. Diablo will be interesting since World of Warcraft has a lot of Diablo-like qualities. I have no doubt, however, that they will be incredibly fun, addictive and polished games. Blizzard is the top of the class when it comes to game development - nobody does it better.
In fact, World of Warcraft is currently banned from any computer I own due to its highly addictive qualities. Its easily one of my favorite RPGs.
I know they are working on another Massively Multiplayer Online (MMO) game. I hope its World of Starcraft.
[/INDENT] It’s certainly a nice attempt to backpedal on his negative comments about the game by citing World of Warcraft’s addictive nature, but one can only surmise that his reference to the Diablo 3’s so-called “conservative” design is due to its lack of a first person perspective, as is often touted as a ‘feature’ of the upcoming Fallout 3; a ‘feature’ that nobody even asked for.
Now, unlike Bethesda, Blizzard actually stays true to its fans and gives them a game that they actually want to play.
but one can only surmise that his reference to the Diablo 3’s so-called “conservative” design is due to its lack of a first person perspective
Hm? Where do you get the idea that this is inevitably about the camera/player perspective? Blizzard is working on teo sequels that will stay close to the respective original title. One could complain that SC2 has the same three races the prequel had, and Cheng probably was hoping for a new IP or something that goes further than ‘only’ being an evolution of the source concept.
It’s certainly a nice attempt to backpedal on his negative comments about the game by citing World of Warcraft’s addictive nature, but one can only surmise that his reference to the Diablo 3’s so-called “conservative” design is due to its lack of a first person perspective, as is often touted as a ‘feature’ of the upcoming Fallout 3; a ‘feature’ that nobody even asked for.
Not sure how “I was hoping for something a bit fresher, but Blizzard is still awesome” counts as a frantic back-pedal.
Haven’t really looked that closely at Diablo 3, but IMHO not fixing what ain’t broken is a brilliant decision. I’ve never seen the point in innovation for the sake of innovation. The Diablo concept obviously works brilliantly, so subtle changes and improvements will do just fine. If you want do do a different kind of game, then make something new from scratch, don’t fuck up a given success.
I don’t get it either. He pretty much describes how I feel perfectly. Slightly disappointed it wasn’t something revolutionary, still utterly stoked for a proper D2 successor.
You must be able to read minds to make the connection between:
I must say I am disappointed that Blizzard has stayed on the conservative side in terms of design with their updates to Diablo and Starcraft.
and
but one can only surmise that his reference to the Diablo 3’s so-called “conservative” design is due to its lack of a first person perspective, as is often touted as a ‘feature’ of the upcoming Fallout 3; a ‘feature’ that nobody even asked for.
Notice he calls out both D3 and SC2. I guess you should edit your statement to include a 1st person perspective for SC2 as well, right?
A Starcraft shooter might be fun. The point is that Blizzard won’t (and shouldn’t) turn Starcraft 2 (or SC3 for that matter) into a shooter if they want to enter the FPS business. They’ll make an SC-Shooter offshoot instead, and rightly so.
We all know that if blizzard tampered with the starcraft or diablo formula too much there would be legions of fans screaming their bloody heads off demanding a “real” sequel to the games. I think blizzard is taking the correct middle ground balancing what works and whats new. Valve certainly didn’t go crazy revolutionizing half-life when they made half-life 2. They refined what was there into something amazing.
Because an Uprising/BZ hybrid in an SC universe done by Blizz would not rock your fucking world? It’s not like they haven’t experimented in that area, the many iterations and cancellations of SC:Ghost are testament to that. I don’t think it’s realistic to literally expect Blizz to deviate on such a large scale with one of their “old” (read: timeless in the eyes of fans) franchises, but if your job is to develop games I would hope you’re thinking larger, and not just for the sake of it. I’m constantly let down by many things not reaching what I consider to be their full potential, that doesn’t mean I hate puppies. I would have liked to see D3 ported to the 360, for example, not that I expected it to happen. Crucify me!
I can understand people wanting to see a BZ/Uprising style game in the Starcraft world, much as I can see people wanting to play Starcraft Ghost. AS SPINOFFS. Not as freaking Starcraft 2.
I’m really glad I didn’t like the fallout games that much. It seems to lead to a strange condition that leaves fallout fans bitterly unhappy with all other games.
(looks at his blog post where he posts more information)
He’s not talking about Starcraft 2, he’s talking about what he thinks would be cool in a hypothetical World of Starcraft, and specifically mentions why it wasn’t going to be the case in the sequel proper. No story here, except that a designer at Bethesda likes Blizzard games but was hoping for something more than a straight sequel.
