Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
It's like nobody possesses the slightest bit of critical thinking... A company does not give away 99.5% of its game and make $40M on .5%.. in one month.
The first run though is to hook you... sure you can decide "I'm not gonna pay" and move on. But if you want to continue the journey you will pay up, or progress at a snail's painful pace pace. Then there is the whole PvP portion... where you are either a minnow who is there to be eaten, or have paid enough money to be an actual factor.
It's like none of these people ever PLAYED a Diablo game prior to this... maybe they didn't...
No, it's like those specific folks only want to play ARPGs for the campaign, this monetization gives them that for free, so they aren't interested in its effects beyond how it immediately and directly affects them personally. No foresight whatsoever. Just now now now.
Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
It's like nobody possesses the slightest bit of critical thinking... A company does not give away 99.5% of its game and make $40M on .5%.. in one month.
The first run though is to hook you... sure you can decide "I'm not gonna pay" and move on. But if you want to continue the journey you will pay up, or progress at a snail's painful pace pace. Then there is the whole PvP portion... where you are either a minnow who is there to be eaten, or have paid enough money to be an actual factor.
It's like none of these people ever PLAYED a Diablo game prior to this... maybe they didn't...
You know, I did enjoy the first Diablo which was heralded as the rebirth of a flagging RPG genre, (many disagreed saying it was too different) but IMO didn't really play like it's successors D2 (which I didn't care for nor stay with for long) and other ARPGs.
By playing differently I mean it was more of a one play through and done experience for each of the classes.
After beating Diablo there wasn't really any incentive to further develop the same character that I recall, if there was I easily ignored it.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
It's like nobody possesses the slightest bit of critical thinking... A company does not give away 99.5% of its game and make $40M on .5%.. in one month.
The first run though is to hook you... sure you can decide "I'm not gonna pay" and move on. But if you want to continue the journey you will pay up, or progress at a snail's painful pace pace. Then there is the whole PvP portion... where you are either a minnow who is there to be eaten, or have paid enough money to be an actual factor.
It's like none of these people ever PLAYED a Diablo game prior to this... maybe they didn't...
Here you are using critical thinking wrong, as an insult again, disgusting.
A lot of people played Diablo and quit after the campaign, they like the initial playthrough but could give fuck all about grinding loot. It isn't just YOUR Diablo experience.
Diablo 2 stayed more relevant because of mods and in some cases the speed running community. 1.10 saw to the death of the joy of grinding loot for many as well. Most players never leave Nightmare, even fewer beat hell and even smaller yet see an Ubers.
Diablo 3, people play for the season and the small group that comes back every season falls off rapidly after seasonal rewards are done. The loot is always boring and never exciting. Very few grind the leaderboards, get to ancient gear or even bother.
You can play Diablo Immortal free, doesn't mean it is a good experience for YOU. Just like Diablo 2 is for some and Diablo 3 for others.
Either way I'm done, holding a conversation with most of you people is impossible.
Too funny... critical thinking is not an insult. It's the basic and minimum effort that should be applied to the situation. But since you are "done" with us, I wish you well.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
When you play your first game of chess you have access to the whole board and all the pieces, but when you finish that first game, how much of chess have you really experienced?
We can say that the content of chess is not just the pieces and the board but also includes the various encounters and scenarios that you have the opportunity to experience. This is a more comprehensive way to define content.
To that we can add player driven goals. These are goals decided by the player that drive how and what they experience in the game ("I am going to do this self-imposed challenge." "I am going to repeat this activity until I earn this reward."). Cosmetics then represent player goals and the process of attaining them is therefore a form a content.
So the question then becomes "What (challenges, encounters, scenarios, goal attaining processes) does a player have the opportunity to experience for free?" I think it would be hard to do an exact calculation. The president of Blizzard is obviously just using a figure of speech, but my guess is that he is just referring to the board and pieces, which is a less comprehensive way to think about content.
Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
It's like nobody possesses the slightest bit of critical thinking... A company does not give away 99.5% of its game and make $40M on .5%.. in one month.
The first run though is to hook you... sure you can decide "I'm not gonna pay" and move on. But if you want to continue the journey you will pay up, or progress at a snail's painful pace pace. Then there is the whole PvP portion... where you are either a minnow who is there to be eaten, or have paid enough money to be an actual factor.
It's like none of these people ever PLAYED a Diablo game prior to this... maybe they didn't...
Here you are using critical thinking wrong, as an insult again, disgusting.
A lot of people played Diablo and quit after the campaign, they like the initial playthrough but could give fuck all about grinding loot. It isn't just YOUR Diablo experience.
Diablo 2 stayed more relevant because of mods and in some cases the speed running community. 1.10 saw to the death of the joy of grinding loot for many as well. Most players never leave Nightmare, even fewer beat hell and even smaller yet see an Ubers.
Diablo 3, people play for the season and the small group that comes back every season falls off rapidly after seasonal rewards are done. The loot is always boring and never exciting. Very few grind the leaderboards, get to ancient gear or even bother.
You can play Diablo Immortal free, doesn't mean it is a good experience for YOU. Just like Diablo 2 is for some and Diablo 3 for others.
Either way I'm done, holding a conversation with most of you people is impossible.
Not really sure what you expected your argument to represent, but you bring up points that run somewhat counter to the ultimate narrative goal.
A personal Diablo experience does not define the entire scope of a game's content or potential experience. That's like saying you only played through Skyrim's main storyline so you now know what Bethesda games are all about.
Instead we have a variety of things that have kept these Diablo titles alive for years, some of which you even mention. Content that sure, you got a bunch of people who never consumed. But content that is there none the less. You even say as much yourself, yet there seems to be a disconnect in recognizing or acknowledging what that actually means to the series and the experiences they have put on offer.
The 80/20 rule applies here pretty well, with knowing the majority of users are only going to churn through the story content and sample some of the extra bits. F2P accounts for that in the most corporate way possible.
"If you're not paying for the product, then you're the product."
Blizzard and NetEase know there's plenty of people who will happily enjoy a truncated experience for free. That's what we get with Immortal. For some that may be a good deal. Those that may not really be into the ARPG genre for the progression mechanics, seasons, etc.
Even then you have to ask what you're actually getting. How good is the Immortal storyline really? For free, might be pretty good. Objectively, it's filler that barely justifies the game's gem grind and ultimately adds little to nothing to the actual scope of the setting. It's nice and polished with voice acting yeah, great quality "for a mobile game", but how's that really stack up to the series? It's always pushed to have some of the best visuals and even nails voice and audio back in 1 with voicing all the characters. They only grew that with the series over time.
The polish there isn't unique or above what Diablo is already known for as a result. Where it stands out is largely in how they have fractured the user experience for the dedicated fans. For the people that look at everything beyond the campaign and sample platter.
Diablo 3, people play for the season and the small group that comes back every season falls off rapidly after seasonal rewards are done. The loot is always boring and never exciting. Very few grind the leaderboards, get to ancient gear or even bother.
Right.
That must be why the PC NA seasonal leaderboard, which only displays the top 1,000 has the 1,000th solo Wizard at GR 113, the 1,000th Barbarian at GR 118 and the 1,000th group of 4 at GR 140. The top players for all categories are either at GR 145+ or GR 150 which is the absolute max.
Literally tens of thousands play seasonal D3 and that's just on the NA PC server. EU, SEA, Xbox, PS4 and Switch all have their own servers and leaderboards of the top 1,000 for each class.
All you're doing with your posts is displaying your ignorance and the opinion of a clueless casual gaming tourist who doesn't have an inkling about why ARPG fans play these games.
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
So this article tries to say that Blizzard wanted to give 99.5% of the game away for free, yet also tell us they made godly amounts of money in the first month...
Those things do not compute.
Nobody every follows up.. It's question... answer.. then amplify answer as truth.
So sad.
It computes just fine. Many simply find the equation displeasing.
One can complete the game spending $0 on it, with the .5% accounting for those for whatever reason unable. That playing ARPGs past that initial completion is common to the point of near universality doesn't change that the game was completed.
What DI doesn't well provide that previous Diablo games did is playing beyond that at no additional cost to the player, but Ybarra's argument is worded in such a way that such play is not included in his claim.
Beyond that, the core of f2p monetization is that some will pay more than they need to and that some of those will pay substantially more. That one or indeed many don't pay for such games doesn't prevent them from being potentially absurdly profitable if the remainder of players overcompensate.
That's a silly answer. Seriously. If you don't get it by now... that's on you.
It's not a silly answer. It's one dismissed rather than countered. The former is an inadequate replacement for the latter.
So this article tries to say that Blizzard wanted to give 99.5% of the game away for free, yet also tell us they made godly amounts of money in the first month...
Those things do not compute.
Nobody every follows up.. It's question... answer.. then amplify answer as truth.
So sad.
It computes just fine. Many simply find the equation displeasing.
One can complete the game spending $0 on it,...
That shows a profound lack of understanding of what ARPGs are and how they are meant to be played. They are not linear adventure RPGs with tidy beginnings, middles and an end. They are replayable forever games.
Only someone who doesn't play them can think that they're ever "completed." They are not the kind of game where you can say "I beat the game."
They are both, actually.
The vast majority of ARPGs I've played include a linear adventure with a beginning, middle, and end that I can replay to my heart's content, just as I could the linear adventure in Diablo Immortal by simply making a new character. One can beat them over and over and over again if they wish. Each time one does so is still a completion of the game just like any other than can be played through multiple times.
Most now have ways to extend that play beyond the repetition of that linear adventure, generally through somewhat less linear play but about as much repetition. A few have that repetition spiced up occasionally with periods of variation which may or not extend to the base game depending on the title. None of that prevents the ability for one to start the game from scratch and complete it. It is in addition to that linear adventure, not in replacement of.
My understanding of ARPGs is precise and complete, considering all aspects of them rather than being selective in my appraisal.
Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
True, but playing through the story is one of the ways one can use an ARPG, making your response rather inapplicable to my points.
So this article tries to say that Blizzard wanted to give 99.5% of the game away for free, yet also tell us they made godly amounts of money in the first month...
Those things do not compute.
Nobody every follows up.. It's question... answer.. then amplify answer as truth.
So sad.
It computes just fine. Many simply find the equation displeasing.
One can complete the game spending $0 on it,...
That shows a profound lack of understanding of what ARPGs are and how they are meant to be played. They are not linear adventure RPGs with tidy beginnings, middles and an end. They are replayable forever games.
Only someone who doesn't play them can think that they're ever "completed." They are not the kind of game where you can say "I beat the game."
They are both, actually.
The vast majority of ARPGs I've played include a linear adventure with a beginning, middle, and end that I can replay to my heart's content, just as I could the linear adventure in Diablo Immortal by simply making a new character. One can beat them over and over and over again if they wish. Each time one does so is still a completion of the game just like any other than can be played through multiple times.
Most now have ways to extend that play beyond the repetition of that linear adventure, generally through somewhat less linear play but about as much repetition. A few have that repetition spiced up occasionally with periods of variation which may or not extend to the base game depending on the title. None of that prevents the ability for one to start the game from scratch and complete it. It is in addition to that linear adventure, not in replacement of.
My understanding of ARPGs is precise and complete, considering all aspects of them rather than being selective in my appraisal.
Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
True, but playing through the story is one of the ways one can use an ARPG, making your response rather inapplicable to my points.
Another possible way of playing it is getting to the main city and just standing there and watching players run by, listening to their chat and never doing anything else 9 hours per day every day.
But any opinion anyone who plays like that about the subject of what you get to do for free vs. what you need to pay for is totally irrelevant when ARPG fans discuss the subject of monetization and what % of the game is monetized and by how much.
Anyone playing the game in an unusual, unique snowflake way or engaging with it as a do the story only casual has nothing relevant to add to the discussion.
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
So this article tries to say that Blizzard wanted to give 99.5% of the game away for free, yet also tell us they made godly amounts of money in the first month...
Those things do not compute.
Nobody every follows up.. It's question... answer.. then amplify answer as truth.
So sad.
It computes just fine. Many simply find the equation displeasing.
One can complete the game spending $0 on it, with the .5% accounting for those for whatever reason unable. That playing ARPGs past that initial completion is common to the point of near universality doesn't change that the game was completed.
What DI doesn't well provide that previous Diablo games did is playing beyond that at no additional cost to the player, but Ybarra's argument is worded in such a way that such play is not included in his claim.
Beyond that, the core of f2p monetization is that some will pay more than they need to and that some of those will pay substantially more. That one or indeed many don't pay for such games doesn't prevent them from being potentially absurdly profitable if the remainder of players overcompensate.
That's a silly answer. Seriously. If you don't get it by now... that's on you.
It's not a silly answer. It's one dismissed rather than countered. The former is an inadequate replacement for the latter.
Like I said... by this point it's 100% on you. If you do not get it by now you never will.
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
It's like nobody possesses the slightest bit of critical thinking... A company does not give away 99.5% of its game and make $40M on .5%.. in one month.
The first run though is to hook you... sure you can decide "I'm not gonna pay" and move on. But if you want to continue the journey you will pay up, or progress at a snail's painful pace pace. Then there is the whole PvP portion... where you are either a minnow who is there to be eaten, or have paid enough money to be an actual factor.
It's like none of these people ever PLAYED a Diablo game prior to this... maybe they didn't...
Here you are using critical thinking wrong, as an insult again, disgusting.
A lot of people played Diablo and quit after the campaign, they like the initial playthrough but could give fuck all about grinding loot. It isn't just YOUR Diablo experience.
Diablo 2 stayed more relevant because of mods and in some cases the speed running community. 1.10 saw to the death of the joy of grinding loot for many as well. Most players never leave Nightmare, even fewer beat hell and even smaller yet see an Ubers.
Diablo 3, people play for the season and the small group that comes back every season falls off rapidly after seasonal rewards are done. The loot is always boring and never exciting. Very few grind the leaderboards, get to ancient gear or even bother.
You can play Diablo Immortal free, doesn't mean it is a good experience for YOU. Just like Diablo 2 is for some and Diablo 3 for others.
Either way I'm done, holding a conversation with most of you people is impossible.
Too funny... critical thinking is not an insult. It's the basic and minimum effort that should be applied to the situation. But since you are "done" with us, I wish you well.
It should be, yet you fail consistently to apply it in your DI arguments.
In previous versions of Diablo the financial cost was the same regardless of how one played it. You could barely scratch the surface and move on or plumb it's depths relentlessly for years on end. Either approach was price neutral.
DI is a departure from that. You can play through the main story at no cost whatsoever as many times as you wish. Going beyond that becomes a labourious grind with minuscule progress through play alone in comparison to previous versions of the game. Should one choose to pay to advance their pace rather than a flat cost the price accommodates as much escalation as the player can stomach.
This version of Diablo is fundamentally different in this aspect from every other that came before. Failing to recognize that in one's consideration of the game demonstrates a lack of critical thinking rather than providing evidence of it.
Yeah and you can take a popsicle and stick it to your forehead but that's not how you eat a popsicle.
It's like nobody possesses the slightest bit of critical thinking... A company does not give away 99.5% of its game and make $40M on .5%.. in one month.
The first run though is to hook you... sure you can decide "I'm not gonna pay" and move on. But if you want to continue the journey you will pay up, or progress at a snail's painful pace pace. Then there is the whole PvP portion... where you are either a minnow who is there to be eaten, or have paid enough money to be an actual factor.
It's like none of these people ever PLAYED a Diablo game prior to this... maybe they didn't...
Here you are using critical thinking wrong, as an insult again, disgusting.
A lot of people played Diablo and quit after the campaign, they like the initial playthrough but could give fuck all about grinding loot. It isn't just YOUR Diablo experience.
Diablo 2 stayed more relevant because of mods and in some cases the speed running community. 1.10 saw to the death of the joy of grinding loot for many as well. Most players never leave Nightmare, even fewer beat hell and even smaller yet see an Ubers.
Diablo 3, people play for the season and the small group that comes back every season falls off rapidly after seasonal rewards are done. The loot is always boring and never exciting. Very few grind the leaderboards, get to ancient gear or even bother.
You can play Diablo Immortal free, doesn't mean it is a good experience for YOU. Just like Diablo 2 is for some and Diablo 3 for others.
Either way I'm done, holding a conversation with most of you people is impossible.
Too funny... critical thinking is not an insult. It's the basic and minimum effort that should be applied to the situation. But since you are "done" with us, I wish you well.
It should be, yet you fail consistently to apply it in your DI arguments.
In previous versions of Diablo the financial cost was the same regardless of how one played it. You could barely scratch the surface and move on or plumb it's depths relentlessly for years on end. Either approach was price neutral.
DI is a departure from that. You can play through the main story at no cost whatsoever as many times as you wish. Going beyond that becomes a labourious grind with minuscule progress through play alone in comparison to previous versions of the game. Should one choose to pay to advance their pace rather than a flat cost the price accommodates as much escalation as the player can stomach.
This version of Diablo is fundamentally different in this aspect from every other that came before. Failing to recognize that in one's consideration of the game demonstrates a lack of critical thinking rather than providing evidence of it.
Sorry but this literally made me laugh out loud. Your rebuttal to critical thinking is to argue that 99.5% of content is free and then talk about the "labourious grind..." to go anywhere beyond the basic story unless you pay. (and pay obscenely BTW)
Glad you got the game you deserve
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
They are kind of stuck in a corner in some ways. they've made $50 million+ at this point. Let's assume they publicly admit that their system was too restrictive to F2P, honestly any non-whales.
Do they fix the systems and offer all spenders compensation?
If so, how much compensation? A certain amount of BNET credit?
Also, if the game does launch in China is there any issue with keeping the aggressive monetization there but not in the rest of the world?
End of Devils Advocacy:
Ybarra messed up. He should have just stated that he's heard the complaints and concerns and that they are evaluating the systems moving forward.
Doubling down on a VERY exploitative monetization model shows 100% that they don't care. AT ALL.
free quality ? far from it , and i love arpgs but inmortal wasnt fun at all...
looks like Mike hasnt played any diablo game or is lying
arpgs are loot grinders , no different than mmorpgs tbh , leveling story zones are there to hook u , but at the end u are there grinding new gear and materials etc
free quality ? far from it , and i love arpgs but inmortal wasnt fun at all...
looks like Mike hasnt played any diablo game or is lying
arpgs are loot grinders , no different than mmorpgs tbh , leveling story zones are there to hook u , but at the end u are there grinding new gear and materials etc
I won't say it's not fun at all, but my (very short) experience with it, along with reading about it, leads me to believe it is no better than D3 right now, likely a bit flatter.
So why would PC players, who are fans of the IP and likely own both D3 and D2:R, fool with a F2P mobile game?
Yet Blizzard announced and advertised this thing directly to their core Diablo fanbase. It got time on the main stage at Blizzcon, now an infamous scene. Just an astounding case of being out of touch with your own fanbase.
Comments
Same old song and dance as ever with consumers.
By playing differently I mean it was more of a one play through and done experience for each of the classes.
After beating Diablo there wasn't really any incentive to further develop the same character that I recall, if there was I easily ignored it.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
We can say that the content of chess is not just the pieces and the board but also includes the various encounters and scenarios that you have the opportunity to experience. This is a more comprehensive way to define content.
To that we can add player driven goals. These are goals decided by the player that drive how and what they experience in the game ("I am going to do this self-imposed challenge." "I am going to repeat this activity until I earn this reward."). Cosmetics then represent player goals and the process of attaining them is therefore a form a content.
So the question then becomes "What (challenges, encounters, scenarios, goal attaining processes) does a player have the opportunity to experience for free?" I think it would be hard to do an exact calculation. The president of Blizzard is obviously just using a figure of speech, but my guess is that he is just referring to the board and pieces, which is a less comprehensive way to think about content.
A personal Diablo experience does not define the entire scope of a game's content or potential experience. That's like saying you only played through Skyrim's main storyline so you now know what Bethesda games are all about.
Instead we have a variety of things that have kept these Diablo titles alive for years, some of which you even mention. Content that sure, you got a bunch of people who never consumed. But content that is there none the less. You even say as much yourself, yet there seems to be a disconnect in recognizing or acknowledging what that actually means to the series and the experiences they have put on offer.
The 80/20 rule applies here pretty well, with knowing the majority of users are only going to churn through the story content and sample some of the extra bits. F2P accounts for that in the most corporate way possible.
"If you're not paying for the product, then you're the product."
Blizzard and NetEase know there's plenty of people who will happily enjoy a truncated experience for free. That's what we get with Immortal. For some that may be a good deal. Those that may not really be into the ARPG genre for the progression mechanics, seasons, etc.
Even then you have to ask what you're actually getting. How good is the Immortal storyline really? For free, might be pretty good. Objectively, it's filler that barely justifies the game's gem grind and ultimately adds little to nothing to the actual scope of the setting. It's nice and polished with voice acting yeah, great quality "for a mobile game", but how's that really stack up to the series? It's always pushed to have some of the best visuals and even nails voice and audio back in 1 with voicing all the characters. They only grew that with the series over time.
The polish there isn't unique or above what Diablo is already known for as a result. Where it stands out is largely in how they have fractured the user experience for the dedicated fans. For the people that look at everything beyond the campaign and sample platter.
That must be why the PC NA seasonal leaderboard, which only displays the top 1,000 has the 1,000th solo Wizard at GR 113, the 1,000th Barbarian at GR 118 and the 1,000th group of 4 at GR 140. The top players for all categories are either at GR 145+ or GR 150 which is the absolute max.
Literally tens of thousands play seasonal D3 and that's just on the NA PC server. EU, SEA, Xbox, PS4 and Switch all have their own servers and leaderboards of the top 1,000 for each class.
All you're doing with your posts is displaying your ignorance and the opinion of a clueless casual gaming tourist who doesn't have an inkling about why ARPG fans play these games.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
It's not a silly answer. It's one dismissed rather than countered. The former is an inadequate replacement for the latter.
True, but playing through the story is one of the ways one can use an ARPG, making your response rather inapplicable to my points.
But any opinion anyone who plays like that about the subject of what you get to do for free vs. what you need to pay for is totally irrelevant when ARPG fans discuss the subject of monetization and what % of the game is monetized and by how much.
Anyone playing the game in an unusual, unique snowflake way or engaging with it as a do the story only casual has nothing relevant to add to the discussion.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
It should be, yet you fail consistently to apply it in your DI arguments.
In previous versions of Diablo the financial cost was the same regardless of how one played it. You could barely scratch the surface and move on or plumb it's depths relentlessly for years on end. Either approach was price neutral.
DI is a departure from that. You can play through the main story at no cost whatsoever as many times as you wish. Going beyond that becomes a labourious grind with minuscule progress through play alone in comparison to previous versions of the game. Should one choose to pay to advance their pace rather than a flat cost the price accommodates as much escalation as the player can stomach.
This version of Diablo is fundamentally different in this aspect from every other that came before. Failing to recognize that in one's consideration of the game demonstrates a lack of critical thinking rather than providing evidence of it.
Glad you got the game you deserve
All time classic MY NEW FAVORITE POST! (Keep laying those bricks)
"I should point out that no other company has shipped out a beta on a disc before this." - Official Mortal Online Lead Community Moderator
Proudly wearing the Harbinger badge since Dec 23, 2017.
Coined the phrase "Role-Playing a Development Team" January 2018
"Oddly Slap is the main reason I stay in these forums." - Mystichaze April 9th 2018
They are kind of stuck in a corner in some ways. they've made $50 million+ at this point. Let's assume they publicly admit that their system was too restrictive to F2P, honestly any non-whales.
Do they fix the systems and offer all spenders compensation?
If so, how much compensation? A certain amount of BNET credit?
Also, if the game does launch in China is there any issue with keeping the aggressive monetization there but not in the rest of the world?
End of Devils Advocacy:
Ybarra messed up. He should have just stated that he's heard the complaints and concerns and that they are evaluating the systems moving forward.
Doubling down on a VERY exploitative monetization model shows 100% that they don't care. AT ALL.
looks like Mike hasnt played any diablo game or is lying
arpgs are loot grinders , no different than mmorpgs tbh , leveling story zones are there to hook u , but at the end u are there grinding new gear and materials etc
So why would PC players, who are fans of the IP and likely own both D3 and D2:R, fool with a F2P mobile game?
Yet Blizzard announced and advertised this thing directly to their core Diablo fanbase. It got time on the main stage at Blizzcon, now an infamous scene. Just an astounding case of being out of touch with your own fanbase.