Diablo III

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Diablo III

Diablo III text Type Video Game Launch Date 2012 Status Active Product Line product Platform Microsoft Windows, OS X Website http://us.blizzard.com/en-us/games/d3/

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iablo lll is an online action multiplayer role-playing game developed and released by Blizzard Entertainment in May, 2012 for both PC and OS platforms. Like its predecessors, Diablo lll preserves its third-person hack and slash style of gameplay while offering users with many new additions to improve gaming experience. Having been popularized by its previous two predecessors, the release of Diablo lll was accompanied by the highest selling records in the history of computer game releases, totaling over 3.5 million copies sold within the first 24 hours.

Gameplay

Taking place in a the world of Sanctuary, players assume the role of one of the five heroes: The Barbarian, Monk, Witch Doctor, Wizard, and Demon hunter. Each hero has a distinctive storyline and background as well as their unique set of weapons, skills, and resource system. The style of gameplay varies greatly depending on the hero that the player chooses to play. The different styles of gameplay is furthermore increased through the combinations of weapons and armor the player wishes to use, different skills players chose to use and the newly integrated rune system.

The storyline in Diablo III is divided into four different ACTS, each taking place in a different setting. In each ACT, players will need to complete a quest chain by navigating through randomly generated maps and dungeons filled with many types of monsters and bosses. The monsters will increase in difficulty as players progress throughout the game. At the end of each ACT, players will be challenged with a final boss, which takes more effort to defeat. The death of each boss is often accompanied by a cut scene revealing an important section of the storyline. When a player completes all four acts, the player is will be granted the choice of moving onto the next level of difficulty. In total, there are four different levels of difficulty: Normal, Nightmare, Hell and finally Inferno. The Inferno difficulty was a new installment in Diablo lll for re-playability. The Inferno difficulty was implemented to challenge players who have finished the game, and offered incentives of better gold and item finds.

Storyline

Twenty years have passed since Diablo ll, the long awaited demonic evasion is imminent. As the worldstone (stone that locks the forces of hell out of the realm of men and the heavens) has become corrupt, Tyrael, the angel of justice, sacrifices his status as an angel and immortal to help the mortals in Sanctuary (Realm of man). There, a wandering hero assists Tyrael in combating the forces of evil. Eventually, Tyrael and the hero to High Heavens, in pursuit of Diablo, the 'Prime Evil'.

Item Types

Items in Diablo III are categorized by different qualities. Weapons of different qualities hold different numbers of and qualities of attributes. The game uses a item-name generator system to determine items with different qualities. There are a total of 6 different qualities an item can assume:

Inferior

Inferior items are the weakest. Inferior items normally harbor less-than-average attributes. Inferior items are commonly deemed useless and therefore left behind.

Normal (Common)

Normal, or common items are items that hold no special attributes. Normal items are frequently used for only the first few mission of the gameplay.

Magic

Magic items are the first grade of items that provide bonus attributes. These items are normally used by players for the first play

Hero Classes

In Diablo lll, there are five different heroes which a player can choose from. Each hero holds different back story as well as playing styles as determined by its set of available skills, items and resource system. Although players have the choice in making their characters male or female, the characters are illustrated with specified genders in the game. However, each character has been voiced by voice actors of both genders to improve gaming experience.

• The Barbarian is one of the two class to have been preserved from Diablo ll. The Barbarian uses brute strength to defeat his foes. The Barbarian is commonly viewed as the 'tank', or damage taker.

• The Demon Hunter is a newly added class to the Diablo series. The Demon Hunter excels in ranged combat with her arsenal of traps and ranged weapons. The play style of the demon hunter requires the user to be always on the move as the Demon Hunter is coined to be a "glass cannon" - Having strong damage output with low survivability.

• The Witch Doctor is similar to the necromancer in Diablo ll. The Witch doctor utilizes voodoo and dark magic to corrupt his enemies. The Witch doctor can also summon many undead minions to fight on his side.

• The Monk is a new addition to the Diablo series. The Monk excels in agility and dexterity. The Monk's survivability is measured in his ability to dodge incoming strikes as compared to the Barbarian's ability to take damage.

• The Wizard is the second character class to have been adopted from Diablo ll. The Wizard excels in arcane magic, utilizing the forces of nature to take down his enemies.

Ethical Issues

Gold Farming

A major ethical issue faced in Diablo lll is the issue of 'gold farming'. Traditionally, the issue of gold farming started in China, where gamers undertake terrible living conditions to perform repetitive tasks in order to gain virtual currency. After, players sell the accumulated in-game currency for real-world currencies. As a method of mitigating this issue, Blizzard incorporated an Auction house system into the game which includes a feature allowing players to trade in-game items and currency for real-world currencies. However, the implementation of the auction house has been viewed by many as a 'virtual sweatshop' where Blizzard collects a dollar + 15% of all transactions. With the auction house, Blizzard also has the power to set different rates for in-game to real-world currencies.

Power Leveling

Another prevailing ethical issue similar to gold farming is the issue of power leveling services. Against the code of conduct on Diablo lll, many gamers will offer to level up one's character for a small fee. This, often times, involve either the seller to manually level up, use bots and scripts to level up characters or sell bots and scripts to the user to level up their characters with.

DRM (Digital rights management)

A major complaint brought to Blizzard by a majority of the gaming community is the issue of Diablo lll's DRM (Digital rights management). Unlike both of its predecessors, Diablo lll can no longer played offline. Instead, all players are required to log into Battle.net and remain connected for the duration of their game. Diablo lll's DRM raised a lot of debates regarding the "stripping away of ownership rights in place of leasing non-tangible, non-sustainable services." Some issues caused by Diablo lll's DRM include players not being able to play during server maintenance and server down-times. The inconvenience brought about Diablo lll's DRM was made most public shortly after its launch, when servers experienced constant crashes due to many people wanting to log in to play at the same time.

Controversies

Shortly after launch, players discovered an exploit in Diablo lll that allowed the sorcerer class to have invincibility or 'God-mode'. As this exploit was discovered shortly after launch, players who have been playing sorcerers held the advantage in being able to hunt stronger monsters without having to worry about dying. As a result, players who decided to use this exploit had the advantage in finding better gear and more gold without having to put in as much effort. In response, the Diablo lll community shared an uproar and demanded immediate balancing of the character classes.

See Also

• Diablo II
• Blizzard Entertainment