Diablo III Review: Does it Live Up To The Hype?

Just 2 weeks ago Blizzard released its insanely popular action RPG title Diablo III. This is the third sequel in the popular action RPG series by the developer. The third installment comes nearly after 11 years of Diablo II: Lord Of Destruction. We sat down and played the game throughout these two weeks to see if Blizzard actually managed to bring the addicting mechanics of the game back to this latest sequel.

Diablo has always been a fast paced action RPG and it seems Blizzard hasn’t forgotten that. As soon as you start the game you confront undead and monsters in legions. Diablo III brings 5 classes to the game with the classic Barbarian class making a return. Other classes include Wizard, Witch Doctor, Demon Hunter and Monk.

As far as the gameplay goes, Blizzard has done an excellent job on making each class feel different from each other. If you are a fan of slaying demons with single blows, the Barbarian class is a classic example of a monster slaying countless demons with single powerful blows. Around this time Blizzard has completely removed the classic Mana points from the game, instead all classes have their own energy bars and since there are no potions to refill energy, each class has a unique way of filling up their energy.

The Barbarian class for example generates most of its fury by hitting and killing enemies. The Wizard on the other hand has to wait for the arcane energy to refill overtime after using it through abilities.

The fun fast paced monster slaying is back. The loot system of Diablo III has also been changed around the corners. When I sat down to play the game the loot was coming at a steady pace in the start, but as soon as I went on higher difficulties I realized that getting loot from just killing monsters becomes a tedious job. This is when I felt a lot of disappointment. I believe that in order to get the Real Money Auction House working smoothly, the item drop rate is reduced to so much less that it easily takes days to get an item you want through monsters. This means that at one point of the game you will be forced to use the auction house whether you like it or not.

When you hit the end game content at level 60, this is where things start getting really tricky. The game as of now has various class balance issues, and with less than one percent chance of getting your desired item, the end game difficulty mode can be a hardcore grinding experience.

I am not afraid of taking challenges, but I believe that the current situation of the game with its random server issues and class balance, the inferno mode is slightly broken. There are various other issues with the game throughout which shows that either Blizzard ran out of time or they simply got over confident with the game. The server problems and frequent maintenance shows the lack of interest the developers had.

I wouldn’t call Diablo III a bad game, no it is actually an amazing and addictive game. But since there are various issues almost hitting the game on daily basis, I would recommend that people wait for a bit before buying the game and getting in on servers that are already suffering from various issues.

The visuals of the game are not the best you will see during this generation of video games, but as far as all blizzard games go, they are usually designed to work on various systems, which bring me to another technical issue that the game currently faces. I tested and played the game on a very powerful machine, at least better than the recommended specifications released by Blizzard. I keep facing Frame drops during my playtime most of the time. After doing a little research I figured out that I am not the only person experiencing the issues. It seems that people on AMD based graphics chip are having massive frame drops when there is a lot of stuff going on screen, and for a game that is known for slaying hordes of monsters, this means virtually every minute is being spent on frame drops.

Even though Blizzard spent a lot of time creating and expanding the lore of Diablo III, I felt the story was quite mediocre. It feels like a third grade movie with very predictable and cheesy story. But since the CGI created by Blizzard are of unmatched quality, I did not mind the story being average. For those who enjoy good stories, this really isn’t a game that will entertain you. But if you are someone who just wants to pop in and slay massive demons using powerful abilities, welcome to the world of Diablo III.

Final Verdict:

Gameplay 8/10: Diablo III really is all about its gameplay. If only some class balance issues were polished before release, we would have given it a 10. As of now, Diablo III suffers from various bugs and balance issues, forcing us to give it an 8. Online only ruins the fun because of servers, but we believe Blizzard will get the issues fixed soon.

Visuals 7/10: Not the best in the industry but good enough. The tone of the visuals doesn’t really appeal because the game is meant to be dark, not colorful. Also because it suffers from various technical issues, we give it a 7.

Story/Dialogue 7/10: The dialogue is quite average and not really entertaining. You will see your character going on about the world and then shifting focus immediately on slaying demons. The story itself is very bland and predictable but kudos to Blizzard for creating fine CGI pieces.

Replay value 10/10: With the current loot system and hardcore difficulty never getting easy, this game will keep the players occupied for a long time to come.

Final Verdict 7.5/10: Diablo III is a great and addictive game. For hardcore fans of the series it may be a little disappointing since a lot has changed, especially with the new skill system taking away a lot of freedom from gamers. But if you casually want to log in and slay some demons for fun, Diablo III is an amazing game.