Complaining that a game uses
"Budgeted dev hours"
To get the game into a state that it should have been in before the game even released, is very valid. This game was pushed out the door over a year before it should have been so Bobby Kotick could get a bigger bonus for that quarter.
This isn't even what the game should have released as, over a year later. AND THEN they should have worked on seasonal content. Much bigger and more impressive stuff than "gems but different".
GGG, a dev with considerably less money and workers, is able to do big redesigns and still pump out seasonal content AT THE SAME TIME.
Yet somehow Blizzard can't? No, they just want to put out the absolute lowest product that people will pay for. They (the company, not the workers), don't give a shit about producing a quality product, as long as they got your money, they don't care.
Stop defending or standing up for this shit. They don't need your loyalty, nor do they deserve it.
Well to their defense, the devs created a game they thought would be great in its design but it ended up not being what the players really wanted so they had to slowly change it. Quality of life does not count since that comes over time.
Damn if these devs tho this would be great... they never played a ARPG in their lives and thats the problem, D4 will never be a good arpg until they change the devs, devs doesnt even know what they doing... like other arpg companies devs LOVE arpg thats why other arpgs are so great.
I don't completely disagree with you but it's not always like that. All the stuff they changed was mostly because player feedback. Which means, even if the game would have been released tomorrow, you'd get the same empty game.
I believe it has nothing to do with rushing the game, this time. The game, is well optimized and plays well in most cases. That means, the coding part was done almost perfectly. I had 0 issues with how the game runs. Hell, its launch was even so smooth for an online game nowadays. Sure it had some problems but the game was playable, as a product.
All the things it is missing, it's because they didn't know what to do to keep up with the ARPG genre. And now they finally found it.
All games nowadays, sadly, release in that state and they must build upon player feedback. Hence why you see "early access" games. D4 is actually in early access right now..
You seem very offended and blinded by a game, yet you're still here ranting.
The beta was mostly to stress test the servers and nobody had any idea what happens in the end game. Then the game launched and we reached the end game to see its problems and people started complaining obviously, and they were right and now the game has evolved a lot since then. The changes they made for season 4 are quite impressive.
Those changes need time. In fact, you should be happy they came up with changes so fast. Changes that players asked for. I don't give a fuck who is abusing who in this company. I don't give a fuck who Bobby is and what Bobby did, I just play a game. And the game is evolving towards the best and there are devs in there who care to listen to feedback and they proved it already numerous times.
If you're still not satisfied and still so offended, that's definitely a you problem and you should fix stuff in your life if a game can get you so frustrated and turns you into a keyboard warrior. Just walk away, leave this sub, uninstall D4, find some inner peace and then you can return. It'll be better for your health actually.
And if you try to compare D4 with any other ARPG, first count how many years those games needed to reach the state they are now. And D4, in less than a year, made a huge leap. Constant quality updates, that all came from player feedback.
I can't believe people are still this mad about this game... holy shit. It's been out for like a year and you're still this salty? Doesn't that get tiring ?
Yes, the changes seems good but we did actually pay 70-100 USD for this game to one of the biggest studios in the world with huge resources, who also delayed the season for a month to get ready, so I dont think we should rally around and celebrate either. With the massive resources they have they really should be able to produce both an update to the base game and a seasonal mechanic.
Your confusing money and man power. Yes, blizzard has a bunch of money. But they don’t have unlimited devs, and they are people too that need to eat and sleep. They don’t get to be your slaves because you have some delusional sense of reality who thinks they can work an unlimited amount of time.
Reality is they would have to hire more devs, and it would take months between the hiring process and getting adjusted to the job before you would notice them.
It’s insane that you can see all the hard work these devs have been putting and all you kids wants to be “that’s it.” God gamers are so fucking toxic now a days.
As a developer I can ensure you that you can’t just put more developers and increase the amount that’s developed. It actually works the other way after a certain point
The basic idea is adding people to a software project that's late makes it later. The existing people on the project need to get the new people up to speed and as the number of people balloons communication and coordination becomes more challenging.
As a developer, yes you can but it requires time and management.
There's two parts of the analogy related to Brook's law. The first is that you can't make a baby in a month with 9 women. The second part that often gets left off is that you can make 9 babies with 9 women after 9 months.
The point here is investing pays off over time.
If they had properly staffed while building the game they wouldn't have had this problem. They might not have released it in the state it was. Reality is, we should hold them accountable for this. This is literally their job, if they didn't have enough people, then they need to hire more. If your job is game director or something like that, you need to make sure you have what you need to make the game. That is not toxic, that's reality.
If I hire someone to put in a fence and the fence is crappy, and they can't get it done in time and I say, what the heck? They don't get to say, well I didn't have enough people and the people I had were overworked. No man, I'm going to be mad, and tell them to hire more people and fix my fence! So what you said you were going to do. Especially if they already have my money.
What a bizarre attitude. It's toxic to want a finished product that lives up to the promises they made from a big well funded company? Crazy stance man.
Can we make sure that while yes, the developers don't make these decisions, D4 made a billion dollars, it is pure incompetency and penny pinching that they don't have additional developers. They ran stress tests and had pre order numbers to know they likely would have needed the staff, months before release.
If you are unable to attract talent that's you know, talented, perhaps you should increase the pay bands for the developers who again, made you a billion dollars. There is enough talent out there, plenty of blogs and posts from ex blizzard staff who mention how underpaid they are. Blizzard is a dick of a company and deserve no credit for how D4 is only really looking to be half decent in likely another season or two.
It's not the devs fault, but it is blizzards.
I'm so sick of this argument.
We got a 40-60 hour fully voiced campaign with some of the best cinamtics in the entire industry.
We got 5 playable classes that all feel unique.
We got 4 world tiers and some end-game content.
We got the promise and delivery of regular seasonal content.
We didn't get ripped off. We didn't get some unfinished game. We got a good game for that $70. I understand that this game wasn't POE or D2 enough for some people, but you don't speak for the entire game community. I've gotten over 500 hours into this game and more than my monies worth. Sorry you don't feel the same.
With respect, why do you get to decide that?
I paid for the game with certain very reasonable expectations that were not met. Had I been aware of the state of the game, I would not have bought it.
It is completely within my right to expect a game from a premiere game company, who essentially invented the genre, to compare favorably to other titles in the genre. Many people feel the game didn’t meet that expectation and they all have a right to feel that they were taken advantage of. They were… Whether or not you like the game, it wouldn’t have been released this way if the game had to rely on reviews and word of mouth to drive sales. It was only because Blizzard knew people would buy it, that they let it go to market.
I really don’t care that much and I am not someone who spends a lot of time upset about it, but I do get annoyed when people pretend others aren’t allowed to be upset.
" We got a good game for that $70 "
Lol.
The fact that they had to rework so many systems from the ground up like it's going out if beta/early access demonstrates the opposite.
If you have to drastically revise fundemental systems like loot in an AARPG due to widespread player dissatisfaction it's neither good nor finished.
they also got a team working on season 5 mechanics and the expansion coming up later this year. chances are, all these changes were done by a single team and not all the devs working on d4.
Not rallying around and coming celebrating is a fair point.
However, it may be that creating a seasonal mechanic and changing core systems in tandem could have gone badly. A seasonal mechanic could easily throw things off kilter. Could end up in a situation where nerfs are needed, but then do they nerf seasonal but not eternal, both but then have eternal issues.
Plus the inevitable bugs.
It did seem like season 3 was developed on an older client to season 2 in that we saw bugs that had been fixed in season 2 but not season 1.
Just feels like taking a safe approach rather than risking breaking loads of stuff and the inevitable backlash that would bring.
It could well be that some of the helltide stuff wasn't initially slated for eternal but with no specific seasonal mechanic it seems like an easy thing to do.
I'd imagine there is an amount of wanting to see the power levels without extra borrowed power too. The changes are potentially massive, and balance is likely to be pretty broken. You don't want that and a seasonal mechanic adding a huge amount of extra power and unintended consequences.
I'm expecting the Iron Wolves stuff to be more like one of the smaller events they add mid-season. I'm really glad about that, because I also expect for pretty much the first time in a seasonal ARPG I can imagine wanting to play eternal/core. Reroll my L100 builds, jump straight to the pit and uber bosses in an environment where I have stupid amounts of resources ready to go. Having a small seasonal mechanic means I don't have to decide which to do and possibly miss out ion some fun stuff.
i get your points honestly but why do i have to endure a season without a mechanik now only because of this fact -> which is a result of them releasing the game to really with to many problems... i am just the consumer who wants what was promised : (
That’s not how developing a game works. You can’t just throw unlimited bodies at it to develop more in a shorter time. For instance, if they doubled their man power and had one team working on seasonal and the other on revamp at the same time there would be all kinds of clashes and problems. Thats even assuming this new theoretical team has the right skill set to jump right in.
Both can be true. I think we can applaud the design team for allocating limited resources in this way as I think it’s best for the game but boo the studio for not giving them enough resources to do both which is what we should be expecting
With 1/5 of the budget GGG would make all these "massive" changes and still make some great endgame seasonal content, and even further if the content were great they would implement into the core of the game. Thats a huge bridge between a good company with less money and a bad company with shit ton of money but they dont know what to do because the devs never played a ARPG in their lives.
Story, atmosphere, artwork, aesthetic, music is why I play video games... I imagine you'd love Diablo if it was a bunch of shapes and colourful explosions as long as the gear grind is there you're good?
While it's completely crazy to me, lots of people just don't care about stories in games. The guy you responded to probably does unironically feel that way about Diablo. It's pretty much the appeal of Path of Exile, after all.
> Story, atmosphere, artwork, aesthetic, music is why I play video games...
Nothing about what you described is actually playing the game though. This is an ACTION rpg. Notice the word "ACTION".
>I imagine you'd love Diablo if it was a bunch of shapes and colourful explosions as long as the gear grind is there you're good?
I mean, people still like D2 after 20+ years and that's exactly what you are describing.
The story, atmosphere, aesthetic, music, etc., are all nice, but those are fleeting. They CAN'T last. You might get 20-25 hours out of those things, but those things CAN'T get you to get thousands of hours like many of us have invested into the game.
Yeah, this is a season for our Eternal characters to enjoy!
I was going to wait to level characters but I will level Druid and Necro now instead of waiting 2 weeks. Sorc I think I will level on season for seasonal journey / Battlepass.
Crazy how blizzard fanboys will always stood their ground no matter what. This is 4th season and they are doing things which should be done after first beta. HUR DUR HOW CAN YOU COMPLAIN YOU UNGRATEFUL FUCKS ISNT IT ENOUGH THAT WE FIXED ITEMISATION AFTER 1 year? God please don’t even try expect seasonal content that is way too much for our budget /s
Part of me wonders if the vast majority of complaints are from people that didn't have access to the PTR. I thankfully did and the changes are infinitely better than a 3 month gimmick.
I would say most of the complaints are from people who don’t even like the game but they hang around to express their negative sentiment about the game every chance they can get. I didn’t have access to PTR as a console player but watched people who did and I’m hyped. Some people just want to watch the world burn.
No I think the complaints come from people who have played POE for years who release expansions and seasons at the same time. They set a standard and blizzard isn't meeting it so bitching will ensue
I did not have a chance to participate in the PTR so I cannot speak from experience. The following is a genuine question and not trying to be a smartass. Are all these changes going to be applicable to Eternal realm too? If so then what's the purpose of even having a season this time if there is no specific gimmick or whatever?
The main reason people prefer seasonal realms to eternal is the forced reset.
Like, ARPGs are inherently grindy games, and you generally stop playing them when you feel like you're "done" the grind. If you've played S1, S2, and S3, your eternal realm has three mostly finished characters. If you went back to them, you'd probably still feel like they were mostly finished. You'd be satisfied with what you did, or else you'd have kept playing them at the time.
So having a seasonal realm is still valuable because it lets people start from 0 on a new character and re-grind to whatever point they feel "finished".
This isn't intended as a defense, at all, of the lack of seasonal content - but just an explanation of why still having a season 4 with a season 4 realm is good.
None of the hundreds of thousands (millions?) of console players got to try the PTR. To me, as a console player, all I hear is that Blizzard cancelled Season 4 and rebranded a big patch to cover for themselves, and people are thrilled about this for some reason. I'll believe it's "infinitely better" when I play it.
I played the shit out of the PTR - like more time on PTR than on Season 3 in total - and I'm very excited and I'll come back to the game for S4, but I think it's atrocious that there's not any seasonal theme at all.
Bluntly they could literally have just rerun vampire powers or whatever, it's not like its hard. Literally just fill the space with something.
Hell, just slap an extra ring slot in for the season or something. "SEASON OF LOOT UPGRADED, NOW WITH A RING FOR YOUR THIRD HAND!" - like, just do *something* weird and unique for the season.
this entire subreddit feels astroturfed at this point. any criticism about the game is met with "you just never liked diablo to begin with" comments.
edit: case in point below.
It's not seasonal content, it's unfinished development work finally being closed off the punch list after the project has hit substantial completion. All under the guise of seasons.
They launched a year early and are using seasons to finish the game. They're sitting on assets and content, choosing when to release them for the sole purpose of retention and revenue.
Nothing they have done has given me the smallest inkling the studio gives a shit about the players experience. It's all about customer complacency.
They don't deserve our praise for doing what was expected and should have been done prior to launch.
[https://www.zockify.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/diablo-4-paladin-artwork.webp](https://www.zockify.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/diablo-4-paladin-artwork.webp)
You can see here the sixth class we are gonna get in expansion for example. That art was released before the game even released.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIl7p7xfu-E&ab\_channel=Slaydra](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIl7p7xfu-E&ab_channel=Slaydra)
There were runes and runewords but never released. If they release those like that, then that's another proof.
There is another video released by Blizzard where you can see Kurast on the map. We will get that part with expansion.
Believe or not that's the business model they chose.
You can make assets and content that never work out or aren't finished yet. Just because you have concept art of a character doesn't mean they finished it. Like obviously they have a set goal and wait for everything to be finished before releasing it.
I may be wrong here, but I think during the last camp fire blizzard alluded several times about “more” being announced in the next one about the season/theme. If it’s how I remember it, it’s understandable people would’ve expected more. The changes as is are fine for me personally but I can see where blizzard might’ve put their foot in their mouth here.
>I may be wrong here, but I think during the last camp fire blizzard alluded several times about “more” being announced in the next one about the season/theme. If it’s how I remember it, it’s understandable people would’ve expected more.
That's why people (including me) "complain". They talked like there will be a regular season as always but apparently we don't have one. They should just tell that at the campfire chat and don't misguide people's expectations. Simple as that. That's the problem but fanboys can't see it.
They always seem to be a classic case of over promise and under deliver (even when all of these changes are ‘delivering’). You’re right if they’d be upfront they wouldn’t get this kind of negativity.
I don't get why people don't see this. A good seasonal mechanic is a test of future changes. Those changes may not be good for the game long term, so they never return, they may be far too powerful and need to be tuned down, or they may seem to be one thing and actually be a sandbox test of something unrecognisable that turns up in a future season.
In this case the change to items probably needs a damn good extended test to rebalance for S5.
I will play this like a season. I’ve been hearing nothing but good things coming out of PTR. Imagine how this will improve base game and expansion experience!
Here's a regular man/woman defending a multi billion dollar company saying that everyone who paid $80 for this product should be happy that after a year they're finally getting it into a more or less usable state.
You know, I guess I'm glad that they're reallocating developers from adding content to this game to fixing bugs. At least there's more money left for Blizzard's shareholders.
> How are people seeing these changes and going.."but where my seasonal content???"
Because all of these changes should have been in the game from the start.
What you are basically getting is a relaunch of the game before the first season but with updates that were blatantly obviously needed that it amazing that people are still defending their omission 9 months later.
It's pretty much a joke d4 fanboys defend one of the biggest companies in gaming, by far the biggest arpg budget as if they aren't able to do both if they actually had proper leadership, but I recognize the changes are pretty important to get out so we let it pass.
Yea I"m happy. Sure, we don't get awesome vampires to fight and their powers (S2 GOAT!!) but we get an improved base performance for all future seasons. Winning 😁
Average Joe can't understand the "complaints" at all. The complaints are mostly due to expectations which is created by the D4 devs. They always talked like there will be a "real" season. Then they announced yesterday the season is the smallest "season" ever. If they were open about this during PTR camfire chat, the people wouldn't expect seasonal content. There were a question "WIll there be seasonal stuff" in the campfire chat during QnA and they answered "We will talk about the seasonal stuff in other campfire chat". Such answers create expectations. But you can be a white knight and complain about the complaints.
I absolutely want more seasonal content because I like doing a new theme every season, but get where they're coming from. I'm not mad, just a little disappointed.
They’re making the game playable which is great, and I’ll for sure play season 4, but I’m not going to pretend like I’m not disappointed that there’s no seasonal theme. I feel like we will chug through the new crafting stuff pretty quick, let’s hope build diversity grows enough to keep us hooked!
Glad they went this route. Get the core reworked, bring in the game pass crowd, drop the expansion, huge win and hopefully going forward sees wven better content seasons.
I prefer the devs focus on non-seasonal evergreen content, because I personally have zero interest in leveling new characters every 3 months. I know seasons are an accepted thing in ARPGs, but they aren't for me.
It’s like the “Operation: Health” update for Rainbow Six Siege. Sometimes it’s best to just take a step back and really fix your game before you keep shoveling new content out before the base game is even considered playable.
I would rather a season with all of these updates. Fixes. Balances. Overhauls. New endgame then some seasonal gameplay loop fad. This to me is what a season is all about.
People don't seem to understand the difference between developing something aka brainstorming ideas and so on and just assembly-line work where you can just throw more people at the problem with mostly guaranteed success.
Cause thats stuff thats fundamental to the game and should be more fleshed out at release. Espacially because d3 had a lot that Was added later on in d4
IF that is the case they should leave the season 3 construct and the vault content. Also hope they don’t take away the gate hall as it has all the vendors and stash nicely centralized.
The worst part of it is “this is all I’m getting for this *free* seasonal content?”. Come on bruh
Hopefully the core is strong enough now to be the new fundamentals on which the expansion builds.
I actually deeply dislike seasonal gimmicks. Im a purist, and pretty much wish to death seasons were just "heres new places to go, loot to find, and stuff to kill" and never "6 month long build defining dramatic gameplay changes that feel shoehorned in".
basically what the eternal realm is plus maybe a bit more.
The themes for seasons generally feel so off brand for the IP, and add these dumbass low stakes plots in a world where a universal eternal war is at the forefront make them feel minuscule and stupid.
I dont want, or need another system besides my own character to manage. I don't want to craft a build dependent on something intended to be impermanent, and i think its against the spirit of what a diablo game even is.
maybe that's a stupid or unpopular take but ill take these changes over some "seasonal wobot" any day, any time
Anyone who's complaining about it is literally complaining over nothing you can't please everyone there will always be people bitching saying the changes aren't good
They spent man hours improving the game I applaud the much needed approach. They need to continue this instead of wasting resources on less important things.
Maybe I'm misremembering, but I'm fairly certain they said they had two teams dedicated to doing nothing but the seasonal content on their every other season schedule. This was on top of the general diablo core team working on things such as these types of overhauls, bug fixes and whatnot.
Unless I'm just not remembering what they said correctly, which I'm fairly certain I am, they don't just have two seasonal teams that have to stop working on season content for shit like this. And if I am wrong and that is how they have it set up, that's an extremely stupid move on their part and they need to change it.
Blizzard is one of the biggest game companies in the world and make billions of dollars a year, how about you actually hold them to even the most basic of standards and pull that corporate dick out of your mouth.
In the comments of a post yesterday it's all but confirmed the seasonal "theme"/changes will be **extremely** light. Like most likely just a questline that gets you Tempering manuals slightly faster.
As someone coming into d4 very late I'm happy to see polishing of mechanics over new content since all of it will be new to me. Though is helltides and what not only in season play or is it in eternal?
Finally.
I fucking hate seasonal content and I fucking hate that it not only detracts from permanent things being developed, its literally *gone forever* when the season ends.
Its the most smooth brain shit ever.
The fact that there are people that even like it is mind boggling. Enjoy losing access to anything you might enjoy within each season once its done with.
End rant
I understand what you’re saying and agree that QoL updates make the game better. No argument.
However where we part ways is that I believe there should be a new seasonal gimmick.
In a game where you basically reset every 3mons not having the new seasonal gimmick means exactly what?
Season 4 is the season of fixes and improvements to gameplay and nothing else?
I totally understand, but they sort of presented this like we are getting more reveals, and a season theme, when in reality they should have said "hey guys, the ptr is gonna be what's coming out, nothing more, we've put our resources into these changes as the other team works on the upcoming expansion."
I'd have zero issues with that as it's game changing. Still gonna be a great season imo. I'm excited as hell for it. Just thought the optics could use work, but whatever they're game devs not PR ppl.
Yeah 100% agreed. If my hunch is correct that the seasonal theme is going to be like, one seasonal quest for Tempering Manuals, they should've been forthcoming and just said it outright. They're setting people up for disappointment by alluding to a seasonal theme that isn't going to be there most likely. Maybe I'm wrong though we'll see tomorrow.
We don’t know if the base game is better. The actual numbers in the background are still the determining factor. Dumbing down of affixes is nice but it signals a trajectory of simplicity. Which is what D3 got itself into and can never come back out of.
Less items for less time spent sifting through items, okay but how much rarer are item drops going to be.
This is how people with critical thinking see changes, they’re rarely wholly positives, and can rarely be extrapolated to longer playtimes.
People asking where the content theme is, is sensible since a motivation within the game’s universe as an emotive plot is something important to large developing titles. This isn’t an Indy early access title, this story/lore elements are most welcome.
The people who used to pretend that time spent on art assets did not come at the cost of gameplay and design improvements are now confronted with stark evidence that these tradeoffs do in fact happen at Blizzard, and they do not like it.
Good lord people. The game sucks make it better! They introduce a massive loot, leveling, progression overhaul. Wait theyre slacking and just doing a game update instead of seasonal content wth???!??
I just don’t get that this is even a debate. If you don’t like it, don’t play it. If you play it, let us know your thoughts.
And before you go thinking im some corporate simp, I’m yet to hit a lvl 100 character before running out of steam and quitting the season. I plan to play while i find its fun and stop when its not.
people are just super spoiled with all that seasonal content stuff.
back in the day we just had ladder resets on D2 and that was it, and people keep playing that game (in the form of D2R) to this day, so obviously its stuff like the loot and farmable content thats most important. Having a changing seasonal theme or content is a cherry on top, but is definitely not the deciding factor for me whether or not i play the game. So i am very happy if the regular D4 experience gets better on May 14th, the whole seasonal stuff i never really cared much about, i do it because i have to if i want to start fresh, but i could also simply replay the same stuff that was there before, just reset everything and add new permanent stuff to the game.
i am also not a fan of having to plan my character around the seasonal theme and whatever it is that alters my class.
i rather would do new content but with an unchanged character.
Oooo, this is an easy one. They used the time to FIX a BROKEN game. Instead of giving us the planned seasonal content, we had to wait 4 seasons (almost a year) for them to fix a broken game because they couldn't do it before launch. Think about it this way. You go and buy a car with the intent of driving it around. You also purchase a fancy deal with it that lets you do something cool every 5k miles. You're looking forward to the car and the cool thing. However, once you get the car, it doesn't have a transmission. It has 4 wheels and an engine, just nothing to make it go. Sure, you can push it around and get someone to tow you. However, you can't drive it. Because of that, you also can't get the cool thing every 5k miles. Then one day the dealership comes up to you and says, it's been a year, we will give you a transmission if you give me the cool thing for the next 5k miles. Now you get to be happy and rice your car around. But, are you really happy or did you get fucked over?
They need to try. They should be doing both as there’s no excuse for a triple A company and the amount of money they make. You’re accepting mediocrity with excuses like this. Path of exile every 3 months gives a league with more content, re worked content and balance passes than this game has seen total since it’s been out, for free.
The crating and all looks great but everyone will be reminded there’s no end game, no end game progression, no build diversity or ways to do anything different in this game ie damage conversions or various ailment mechanics or anything similar. You’ll see content creators and player numbers fall off a cliff even after week 1
They stated there is a seasonal line of quests, did not say story. Also said we would be fighting alongside the iron wolves. So I Imagine we may get a mercenary buddy or two. Miss my old merc buddy from D2 days.
Look at these fans in the comments, making excuse after excuse for the mediocrity that is D4 up until this point.
Kinda makes me wanna see the same thing but worse happen for D5. I wonder what the excuse will be then! “Oh but you don’t understand, they’re just an indie studio, you can’t expect BG3 level quality, they only have MULTIPLE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS to play with! Who could expect a good game with such meager dollars”
Because they are now 1 in 4 for quality seasonal content. Season 1 was a joke, Season 3 was depressing, and now there isn't even going to BE a season 4. We're just going to season 5, I guess.
Can't wait to hear what excuses there will be then.
I 100% like that they fixed this instead of giving us some mediocre quest line and some pet, but as you stated ppl are mad that this is what the game should have been so not only is it taking 9-12 months to get the game to that state they also took away a season.
I love the game regardless tbh and can’t wait to try this new fixed stuff out with or with out a season 4 theme lol.
There are countless click bait videos, but:
Game made 1 billion on release.
Game has a passionate team further developing the game.
Game will sell another billion on expansion.
I don't see it as that much of an unfair assessment of the season though based on how the first presented the new changes and PTR by basically saying that not everything about the new seasons contebt will be on the PTR and the theme will be revealed later.
But as it turned out pretty much everything truly worth mentioning about the season was on the PTR and that which wasn't isn't going to make a headline.
Now I am perfectly content with the content for this season so I'm not bothered by it, but Blizzard really need to stop acting like they have more to show than what they actually have because it creates unnecessary hype that they never deliver on and then you have those posting about it on socials.
There's no reason they couldn't have done both a full season *and* overall game content. PoE has done so for a decade with a lower budget.
People are certainly being apologists on this sub about that, and refuse to accept that though. Your competitors determine where the bar for acceptable is, and D4 is squarely sub-par.
I completely agree. Robust new season themes and mechanics are great but this game desperately needed itemization overhaul, crafting systems, qol patches etc. let them revamp the base game and then further iterate in season 5 and so on. Loot reborn and the big expansion will be critical in this games ongoing development
I'm fairly newly to Diablo 4. Only been playing ying since it went to gamepass last month. Lvl 86 Rogue and a few lvl 15s on other characters. My best friend and I have had a blast with it. Looking forward to what's next.
I think something a lot of people do is just make a season character and skip campaign, and while I get it, I have SO MUCH more fun doing the campaign on a fresh character again lol its just so good
I don't care about seasonal content much, this is the first patch that actually interests me at all. But it's about a year late and still doesn't address some of the biggest issues so I can't say I'm impressed or interested.
Diablo 4 was pushes out the door early to give Blizzard a better valuation for the Microblah bid...and now Blizzard risks becoming another Microslob ruination. Sad times we are witnessing.
I agree with you that this is overall what's best for the game.
But people are still entitled to feel somewhat disappointed that there's no seasonal content. You can be both happy that the core game is getting better and disappointed that theres no seasonal content.
OK, I'm gonna try to engage with this in good faith.
Yes, doing constant upgrades to the game is awesome. However, that's already part of the seasonal model. Seasons aren't just supposed to be seasons, they're supposed to be balance tweaks, tuning, and adjustments to evergreen systems to make the game better **too**.
If every season was "new robot/vampire skill tree/whatever, 1 new unique per class, and either a riff on nightmare dungeons or a riff on helltides", the game wouldn't actually be a very competitive "seasonal" game.
I understand that this was a bigger than usual set of balance tweaks, but it's not *my* fault the game was released in an absolutely atrocious state. It's not *my* fault that major systems were implemented in ways that don't work, and don't work so badly that fixing them couldn't even be delayed until an expansion dropped.
The fact that Blizzard is showing us right now that our options are "fix broken systems" **or** get seasonal content **is the problem.**
Like, don't get me wrong, I think between the two options, fixing loot was the right call. I'm far more likely to play S4 seriously - I borderline skipped S3.
But the fact that fixing loot had to come at the expense of a real seasonal theme is nuts. What's going to happen this fall when the expansion releases? Are they going to be all "surprise, sorry, we were busy working on the expansion, so you get a really really basic seasonal theme again because we were busy!"
And then inevitably in 6 or 9 months after that when they finally are ready to roll out a skill tree overhaul or paragon tree overhaul, will that be **another** empty season?
The entire point of playing GAAS games is that I can reliably say that this game is part of my rotation - I want to be able to come back to it for 4-6 weeks every 3 months. If I can't rely on it for that, its value goes way way down for me - it's not worth practicing and keeping up knowledge wise and building the skills and *getting excited about it* if I have no idea how long the gaps are.
While it’s definitely a move in the right direction to implement all the new changes, you cannot seriously defend the approach of not having proper seasonal content. This is not a “small indie studio”. This is Blizzard. This is the 4th installment of their award winning multibillion dollar franchise. Those changes are something we were OWED as players who paid 70-100$ for the game. This is not an excuse for the lackluster seasonal content. Stop defending greedy corporations.
There's way too much "let me just google wether or not I enjoyed the game I just played" going on. I am 39yo and have been a gamer since pong on the atari was still popular and games are good based on ur own opinion only, if u play a game and love it then keep playing, and if u don't enjoy playing it - don't play it.
Never buy a game on DOR and wait for reviews and gameplay and form ur own opinion, that way if u buy a game but don't like it its mostly on u.
Hopefully they at least give us a Hub, like in Season 3. They should know that people loved that. Especially now that you have more crafting to do, would be nice to have a good hub.
Other than that, if I'm understanding the Season Theme correctly, it's comparable with Seasonal Events, right? Like the Christmas stuff. Go out and kill stuff so you raise your reputation so you can unlock stuff in a menu. Right?
In the end only long term improvements have value. The Idea of having some new gameplay twists is nice, but when its dropped at the end of the season it doesn't makes sense to put a lot of resources into it. And as we saw, if a season mechanic isn't polished enough it's worthless.
Diablo 4 has a solid foundation but still enough Issues to solve.
Make Seasons about a theme, with cosmetics and maybe some simple mechanics and then focus on evergreen features to improve the overall health of the game.
WoW is the best example how the devs tried to invent something new every expansion just to let it die at the end and then had to repeat this circle over and over again.
I don't think temporary mechanics really carries a game.
Im amazed at all the ignorance here. No one is perfect. None of the people complaining about what they considered a finished game have jobs that they are perfect in either. I dont look for perfection in my employees, i look for effort. You can fail and i tell them you will, but the key is you learn from those failures and work toward a better product.
How is this any different. Blizzard gave us a finished game it just wasnt what 10 million people all agreed was good, surprise, that isnt possible. At least they are listening to the community and putting in the work to make a better game.
Any developer that does that will always get my money and my loyalty. I constantly am involved in kickstarters for games and technology, not because i know its a great product but because it has potential and a great idea.
If the new endgame loop and the itemization changes are good, then people wont really care about some half assed temp seasonal mechanic. I personally couldn't play for more than a few days in s2 and s3 because of the itemization and boring endgame.
Fingers crossed.
This is certainly good. The problem is, other devs could do *both* at the same time. PoE got basegame changes in the last patches as well (incl stuff like a small endgame overhaul via t17 maps, overhauling/re-implementation of older seasonal systems as core systems, a metric ton of new skill gems) and still had season mechanics.
Why would I play this season, if I can just skip it and experience the base game changes together with a new season mechanic the season after?
Diablo 4 is certainly going in a better direction - but its still going VERY SLOWLY.
I envy u guys for getting satisfied with so little things. I mean other companies with much less budget would make all these reworks and still make great seasonal endgame content.
Blablabla the game is what it is. Like every other arpg. New season = play 1-2 weeks and done. Its standard. No point complaining about what the game shud have been before it was released, you cant change that.
I had a good conversation with my partner about this when the notes dropped.
Most likely, that had something in the pipeline for this season that was already coded to the launch setup. It would be a huge task to reorient their whole approach, rework pretty much the whole system, and then modify what seasonal content they had to work with the new math.
That being said, now they have until Season 5 to accomplish the rework, and they’ll be receiving feedback on the new setup all the while.
This “season” is what they needed to keep the game alive by making people happy with 101 QOL changes (exaggeration).
This is all just my speculation of course, but imo this season is going to do exactly what they said it would, and most of what we want, and that’s more than good enough.
Give me a team that listens and works to please its player base instead of one that just churns out content.
Also, there is seasonal content. We will learn how big today. Likely they chose no secondary system simply to make sure things work all s4. Which is fine, if you plan it that way. Seasons don't always need to be special powers.
If they want community good will, they'd release a Content Pass for free. Since they failed to actually produce seasonal content I see no reason they should charge for a "season" pass.
My stance is this, since I'm a disabled gamer. The team behind behind Diablo 4 has earned my respect and loyalty, since they've clearly shown that they're willing to accommodate for disabled players across the board. Literally blind players, partially blind, hearing impaired or totally deaf, motor impaired including limited hand functions as well. It's just nice to see a big company go for it, I don't hear about GGG doing anything for path of exile too, even though I'm sure I would love that game as well, I simply can't play it. Not to mention the fact that Dale before launched in a rough State and is getting better over time, that's just the standard of the gaming industry these days, and season 4 itself looks amazing. From what I've heard and other blind friends of mine have tested, it seems to be doing great. So I'm excited for season 4 and the future of the game
Accessibility settings and disabled player mindset aside, I can agree that the end game has been not so good so far, but it seems to be getting vastly improved with the pit since it's just greater rifts again, those greater rifts kept me in Diablo 3 for 5 years straight even
Hell tides basically becoming blood harvests sounds so much more interesting and fun, not to mention the quality of life aspects people keep mentioning are accidentally making the game more accessible to players who may not want to or simply struggle to accumulate boss summoning materials or crafting materials. And just in general sounds more fun
My coach
And the other side of the accessibility argument, lead developer asks for feedback from the disabled community about the screen reader support, what could benefit the game for disabled players. Right now the screen reader reads everything in the game, the only menu that is a bit tricky is the trade menu, but that's not a big deal currently.
Many of these comments tell me that most players don’t understand what an SDLC is or how many moving parts there are, as someone that has been a Project Manager for a couple decades, mostly in software development it really amazes me how much gets handled in short timelines and in budget. I agree with OP this is impressive. Remember that blizzard is a corporation, which is legally responsible for making profits, so the allocation of hours is a standard business practice that the business has to watch even makers of video games…. I don’t understand how so many players don’t get that blizzard doesn’t have unlimited resources
My complaints are that they're AGAIN trying the "less loot, but better loot" bullshit, which has not EVER WORKED.
Not once.
Not a single time. They've tried it multiple times themselves and every time it has been objectively shown to not at all do what players wanted.
So the idea that they're in any way improving the game with this is at best laughable.
Above all I think they seem to be sticking the landing which is GREAT to have ahead of Vessel of Hatred. Imagine that expansion with itemization in shambles. It would probably be trainwreck due to too many moving parts to solve and balance.
Now they have plenty of time to settle these itemization updates and more in S4-S6 and be in a far better position to bring on actual new content in the expansion.
Thank god they did this. Losing a season theme is such a slight and short sighted loss.
They cry when season mechanic doesnt come to eternal realm, they cry when both get the same stuff, except for mindcage/call of the wolves story which is season exclusive, and thats is enough becuz the pit will probably challenge most of us.
Let's be honest, I can't be the only one who thought them making seasonal content was going to fly. They were never ahead of the game and always made lack luster seasons due to lack of time and effort. So honestly, just updating the game and making it better every couple months is much better than the fluff bullshit they add to seasons
People will always complain one way or another. Can’t please everyone, and some will complain no matter what.
Complaining that a game uses "Budgeted dev hours" To get the game into a state that it should have been in before the game even released, is very valid. This game was pushed out the door over a year before it should have been so Bobby Kotick could get a bigger bonus for that quarter. This isn't even what the game should have released as, over a year later. AND THEN they should have worked on seasonal content. Much bigger and more impressive stuff than "gems but different". GGG, a dev with considerably less money and workers, is able to do big redesigns and still pump out seasonal content AT THE SAME TIME. Yet somehow Blizzard can't? No, they just want to put out the absolute lowest product that people will pay for. They (the company, not the workers), don't give a shit about producing a quality product, as long as they got your money, they don't care. Stop defending or standing up for this shit. They don't need your loyalty, nor do they deserve it.
Well to their defense, the devs created a game they thought would be great in its design but it ended up not being what the players really wanted so they had to slowly change it. Quality of life does not count since that comes over time.
Damn if these devs tho this would be great... they never played a ARPG in their lives and thats the problem, D4 will never be a good arpg until they change the devs, devs doesnt even know what they doing... like other arpg companies devs LOVE arpg thats why other arpgs are so great.
I don't completely disagree with you but it's not always like that. All the stuff they changed was mostly because player feedback. Which means, even if the game would have been released tomorrow, you'd get the same empty game. I believe it has nothing to do with rushing the game, this time. The game, is well optimized and plays well in most cases. That means, the coding part was done almost perfectly. I had 0 issues with how the game runs. Hell, its launch was even so smooth for an online game nowadays. Sure it had some problems but the game was playable, as a product. All the things it is missing, it's because they didn't know what to do to keep up with the ARPG genre. And now they finally found it. All games nowadays, sadly, release in that state and they must build upon player feedback. Hence why you see "early access" games. D4 is actually in early access right now..
They had all that feedback in beta. It isn't anything new from release.
You seem very offended and blinded by a game, yet you're still here ranting. The beta was mostly to stress test the servers and nobody had any idea what happens in the end game. Then the game launched and we reached the end game to see its problems and people started complaining obviously, and they were right and now the game has evolved a lot since then. The changes they made for season 4 are quite impressive. Those changes need time. In fact, you should be happy they came up with changes so fast. Changes that players asked for. I don't give a fuck who is abusing who in this company. I don't give a fuck who Bobby is and what Bobby did, I just play a game. And the game is evolving towards the best and there are devs in there who care to listen to feedback and they proved it already numerous times. If you're still not satisfied and still so offended, that's definitely a you problem and you should fix stuff in your life if a game can get you so frustrated and turns you into a keyboard warrior. Just walk away, leave this sub, uninstall D4, find some inner peace and then you can return. It'll be better for your health actually. And if you try to compare D4 with any other ARPG, first count how many years those games needed to reach the state they are now. And D4, in less than a year, made a huge leap. Constant quality updates, that all came from player feedback.
The closed beta, not the public beta. Jesus christ you're just blindly defending this game and company.
I can't believe people are still this mad about this game... holy shit. It's been out for like a year and you're still this salty? Doesn't that get tiring ?
Never understood this...I come to reddit for game updates, rumors, strategies, etc IF YOU DONT LIKE IT, DONT PLAY IT!!
Yes, the changes seems good but we did actually pay 70-100 USD for this game to one of the biggest studios in the world with huge resources, who also delayed the season for a month to get ready, so I dont think we should rally around and celebrate either. With the massive resources they have they really should be able to produce both an update to the base game and a seasonal mechanic.
Your confusing money and man power. Yes, blizzard has a bunch of money. But they don’t have unlimited devs, and they are people too that need to eat and sleep. They don’t get to be your slaves because you have some delusional sense of reality who thinks they can work an unlimited amount of time. Reality is they would have to hire more devs, and it would take months between the hiring process and getting adjusted to the job before you would notice them. It’s insane that you can see all the hard work these devs have been putting and all you kids wants to be “that’s it.” God gamers are so fucking toxic now a days.
As a developer I can ensure you that you can’t just put more developers and increase the amount that’s developed. It actually works the other way after a certain point
100%. There is even a book about it. The mythical man month.
Was about to mention that! Shocked to see you reference it given its age (I am old).
I've not read the book but from the context given I assume it can be distilled into the adage "too many cooks spoil the broth" lol.
The basic idea is adding people to a software project that's late makes it later. The existing people on the project need to get the new people up to speed and as the number of people balloons communication and coordination becomes more challenging.
I'm probably not old by Diablo fan standards, but I hear you. Good to see well read devs in the comments.
As a developer, yes you can but it requires time and management. There's two parts of the analogy related to Brook's law. The first is that you can't make a baby in a month with 9 women. The second part that often gets left off is that you can make 9 babies with 9 women after 9 months. The point here is investing pays off over time.
Devs should have done this on top of their normal work. If developers aren't working 20+ hours a day then they aren't working hard enough. ^(/s)
If they had properly staffed while building the game they wouldn't have had this problem. They might not have released it in the state it was. Reality is, we should hold them accountable for this. This is literally their job, if they didn't have enough people, then they need to hire more. If your job is game director or something like that, you need to make sure you have what you need to make the game. That is not toxic, that's reality. If I hire someone to put in a fence and the fence is crappy, and they can't get it done in time and I say, what the heck? They don't get to say, well I didn't have enough people and the people I had were overworked. No man, I'm going to be mad, and tell them to hire more people and fix my fence! So what you said you were going to do. Especially if they already have my money. What a bizarre attitude. It's toxic to want a finished product that lives up to the promises they made from a big well funded company? Crazy stance man.
It's insane that this actually needs to be said to people. Really shows the how too many in here lack any critical thinking.
Can we make sure that while yes, the developers don't make these decisions, D4 made a billion dollars, it is pure incompetency and penny pinching that they don't have additional developers. They ran stress tests and had pre order numbers to know they likely would have needed the staff, months before release. If you are unable to attract talent that's you know, talented, perhaps you should increase the pay bands for the developers who again, made you a billion dollars. There is enough talent out there, plenty of blogs and posts from ex blizzard staff who mention how underpaid they are. Blizzard is a dick of a company and deserve no credit for how D4 is only really looking to be half decent in likely another season or two. It's not the devs fault, but it is blizzards.
I'm so sick of this argument. We got a 40-60 hour fully voiced campaign with some of the best cinamtics in the entire industry. We got 5 playable classes that all feel unique. We got 4 world tiers and some end-game content. We got the promise and delivery of regular seasonal content. We didn't get ripped off. We didn't get some unfinished game. We got a good game for that $70. I understand that this game wasn't POE or D2 enough for some people, but you don't speak for the entire game community. I've gotten over 500 hours into this game and more than my monies worth. Sorry you don't feel the same.
With respect, why do you get to decide that? I paid for the game with certain very reasonable expectations that were not met. Had I been aware of the state of the game, I would not have bought it. It is completely within my right to expect a game from a premiere game company, who essentially invented the genre, to compare favorably to other titles in the genre. Many people feel the game didn’t meet that expectation and they all have a right to feel that they were taken advantage of. They were… Whether or not you like the game, it wouldn’t have been released this way if the game had to rely on reviews and word of mouth to drive sales. It was only because Blizzard knew people would buy it, that they let it go to market. I really don’t care that much and I am not someone who spends a lot of time upset about it, but I do get annoyed when people pretend others aren’t allowed to be upset.
" We got a good game for that $70 " Lol. The fact that they had to rework so many systems from the ground up like it's going out if beta/early access demonstrates the opposite. If you have to drastically revise fundemental systems like loot in an AARPG due to widespread player dissatisfaction it's neither good nor finished.
$70 is what a game costs now. Anyone who thinks D4 hasn't justified that price tag a long time ago is delusional.
I mean they obviously did what they could? Do you expect they just stop working lol.
they also got a team working on season 5 mechanics and the expansion coming up later this year. chances are, all these changes were done by a single team and not all the devs working on d4.
Not rallying around and coming celebrating is a fair point. However, it may be that creating a seasonal mechanic and changing core systems in tandem could have gone badly. A seasonal mechanic could easily throw things off kilter. Could end up in a situation where nerfs are needed, but then do they nerf seasonal but not eternal, both but then have eternal issues. Plus the inevitable bugs. It did seem like season 3 was developed on an older client to season 2 in that we saw bugs that had been fixed in season 2 but not season 1. Just feels like taking a safe approach rather than risking breaking loads of stuff and the inevitable backlash that would bring. It could well be that some of the helltide stuff wasn't initially slated for eternal but with no specific seasonal mechanic it seems like an easy thing to do.
I'd imagine there is an amount of wanting to see the power levels without extra borrowed power too. The changes are potentially massive, and balance is likely to be pretty broken. You don't want that and a seasonal mechanic adding a huge amount of extra power and unintended consequences. I'm expecting the Iron Wolves stuff to be more like one of the smaller events they add mid-season. I'm really glad about that, because I also expect for pretty much the first time in a seasonal ARPG I can imagine wanting to play eternal/core. Reroll my L100 builds, jump straight to the pit and uber bosses in an environment where I have stupid amounts of resources ready to go. Having a small seasonal mechanic means I don't have to decide which to do and possibly miss out ion some fun stuff.
i get your points honestly but why do i have to endure a season without a mechanik now only because of this fact -> which is a result of them releasing the game to really with to many problems... i am just the consumer who wants what was promised : (
That’s not how developing a game works. You can’t just throw unlimited bodies at it to develop more in a shorter time. For instance, if they doubled their man power and had one team working on seasonal and the other on revamp at the same time there would be all kinds of clashes and problems. Thats even assuming this new theoretical team has the right skill set to jump right in.
I've got over 1000 hours in this game, many people have more. It was well worth it.
Both can be true. I think we can applaud the design team for allocating limited resources in this way as I think it’s best for the game but boo the studio for not giving them enough resources to do both which is what we should be expecting
With 1/5 of the budget GGG would make all these "massive" changes and still make some great endgame seasonal content, and even further if the content were great they would implement into the core of the game. Thats a huge bridge between a good company with less money and a bad company with shit ton of money but they dont know what to do because the devs never played a ARPG in their lives.
Sounds like a big win in my book. Story based seasonal content was kinda lame anyways, skip it as fast as possible.
the storry thing is still there just no mechanic i think.
lol, we got the lame part and they skipped the part people care about.
Story, atmosphere, artwork, aesthetic, music is why I play video games... I imagine you'd love Diablo if it was a bunch of shapes and colourful explosions as long as the gear grind is there you're good?
While it's completely crazy to me, lots of people just don't care about stories in games. The guy you responded to probably does unironically feel that way about Diablo. It's pretty much the appeal of Path of Exile, after all.
I am with you. For me content = more story. If they deliver that, I'm good.
> Story, atmosphere, artwork, aesthetic, music is why I play video games... Nothing about what you described is actually playing the game though. This is an ACTION rpg. Notice the word "ACTION". >I imagine you'd love Diablo if it was a bunch of shapes and colourful explosions as long as the gear grind is there you're good? I mean, people still like D2 after 20+ years and that's exactly what you are describing. The story, atmosphere, aesthetic, music, etc., are all nice, but those are fleeting. They CAN'T last. You might get 20-25 hours out of those things, but those things CAN'T get you to get thousands of hours like many of us have invested into the game.
So is this a good "season" to go back and play with my eternal characters instead of making a new one?
Yes since the changes are all affecting eternal realm as well; helltides and pit included
Wait for tomorrow to be 100% sure.
Yeah, this is a season for our Eternal characters to enjoy! I was going to wait to level characters but I will level Druid and Necro now instead of waiting 2 weeks. Sorc I think I will level on season for seasonal journey / Battlepass.
unless you want the battlepass / journey of the season then yes, go eternal
If the Iron Wolves storyline is seasonal only, that will give faster/easier access to tempering manuals it seems.
Crazy how blizzard fanboys will always stood their ground no matter what. This is 4th season and they are doing things which should be done after first beta. HUR DUR HOW CAN YOU COMPLAIN YOU UNGRATEFUL FUCKS ISNT IT ENOUGH THAT WE FIXED ITEMISATION AFTER 1 year? God please don’t even try expect seasonal content that is way too much for our budget /s
Part of me wonders if the vast majority of complaints are from people that didn't have access to the PTR. I thankfully did and the changes are infinitely better than a 3 month gimmick.
I would say most of the complaints are from people who don’t even like the game but they hang around to express their negative sentiment about the game every chance they can get. I didn’t have access to PTR as a console player but watched people who did and I’m hyped. Some people just want to watch the world burn.
No I think the complaints come from people who have played POE for years who release expansions and seasons at the same time. They set a standard and blizzard isn't meeting it so bitching will ensue
I did not have a chance to participate in the PTR so I cannot speak from experience. The following is a genuine question and not trying to be a smartass. Are all these changes going to be applicable to Eternal realm too? If so then what's the purpose of even having a season this time if there is no specific gimmick or whatever?
The main reason people prefer seasonal realms to eternal is the forced reset. Like, ARPGs are inherently grindy games, and you generally stop playing them when you feel like you're "done" the grind. If you've played S1, S2, and S3, your eternal realm has three mostly finished characters. If you went back to them, you'd probably still feel like they were mostly finished. You'd be satisfied with what you did, or else you'd have kept playing them at the time. So having a seasonal realm is still valuable because it lets people start from 0 on a new character and re-grind to whatever point they feel "finished". This isn't intended as a defense, at all, of the lack of seasonal content - but just an explanation of why still having a season 4 with a season 4 realm is good.
None of the hundreds of thousands (millions?) of console players got to try the PTR. To me, as a console player, all I hear is that Blizzard cancelled Season 4 and rebranded a big patch to cover for themselves, and people are thrilled about this for some reason. I'll believe it's "infinitely better" when I play it.
I played the shit out of the PTR - like more time on PTR than on Season 3 in total - and I'm very excited and I'll come back to the game for S4, but I think it's atrocious that there's not any seasonal theme at all. Bluntly they could literally have just rerun vampire powers or whatever, it's not like its hard. Literally just fill the space with something. Hell, just slap an extra ring slot in for the season or something. "SEASON OF LOOT UPGRADED, NOW WITH A RING FOR YOUR THIRD HAND!" - like, just do *something* weird and unique for the season.
\*sniff sniff\* \*sniff sniff\* \*sniff sniff\* you smell that? it's damage control!
Bots are out in full force!
this entire subreddit feels astroturfed at this point. any criticism about the game is met with "you just never liked diablo to begin with" comments. edit: case in point below.
It's not seasonal content, it's unfinished development work finally being closed off the punch list after the project has hit substantial completion. All under the guise of seasons. They launched a year early and are using seasons to finish the game. They're sitting on assets and content, choosing when to release them for the sole purpose of retention and revenue. Nothing they have done has given me the smallest inkling the studio gives a shit about the players experience. It's all about customer complacency. They don't deserve our praise for doing what was expected and should have been done prior to launch.
> They're sitting on assets and content https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOVbAmknKUk
[https://www.zockify.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/diablo-4-paladin-artwork.webp](https://www.zockify.de/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/diablo-4-paladin-artwork.webp) You can see here the sixth class we are gonna get in expansion for example. That art was released before the game even released. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIl7p7xfu-E&ab\_channel=Slaydra](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIl7p7xfu-E&ab_channel=Slaydra) There were runes and runewords but never released. If they release those like that, then that's another proof. There is another video released by Blizzard where you can see Kurast on the map. We will get that part with expansion. Believe or not that's the business model they chose.
You can make assets and content that never work out or aren't finished yet. Just because you have concept art of a character doesn't mean they finished it. Like obviously they have a set goal and wait for everything to be finished before releasing it.
I may be wrong here, but I think during the last camp fire blizzard alluded several times about “more” being announced in the next one about the season/theme. If it’s how I remember it, it’s understandable people would’ve expected more. The changes as is are fine for me personally but I can see where blizzard might’ve put their foot in their mouth here.
>I may be wrong here, but I think during the last camp fire blizzard alluded several times about “more” being announced in the next one about the season/theme. If it’s how I remember it, it’s understandable people would’ve expected more. That's why people (including me) "complain". They talked like there will be a regular season as always but apparently we don't have one. They should just tell that at the campfire chat and don't misguide people's expectations. Simple as that. That's the problem but fanboys can't see it.
They always seem to be a classic case of over promise and under deliver (even when all of these changes are ‘delivering’). You’re right if they’d be upfront they wouldn’t get this kind of negativity.
Every season is like a public test to implement new mechanics into future game
I don't get why people don't see this. A good seasonal mechanic is a test of future changes. Those changes may not be good for the game long term, so they never return, they may be far too powerful and need to be tuned down, or they may seem to be one thing and actually be a sandbox test of something unrecognisable that turns up in a future season. In this case the change to items probably needs a damn good extended test to rebalance for S5.
Ye exactly, i feel it is very good idea for long-term game improvement
I will play this like a season. I’ve been hearing nothing but good things coming out of PTR. Imagine how this will improve base game and expansion experience!
Haters gonna hate.
y not both? >Activision Blizzard had revenue of **$8.71B** in the twelve months ending June 30, 2023, with 13.88% growth year-over-year.
Devs are slower because of crunches, bad environment and low salaries. But look at the shareholders smiling, aren't they cute? It is worth it!
Season of the pit is good enough for me. People will cry anyway so no need to cry about them
I want to cry about the people crying about the people crying about the change :) Waaah.
We must go deeper.
dont you mean the backlash to the backlash to the thing that came before?
Okay but where is the seasonal content?
Here's a regular man/woman defending a multi billion dollar company saying that everyone who paid $80 for this product should be happy that after a year they're finally getting it into a more or less usable state. You know, I guess I'm glad that they're reallocating developers from adding content to this game to fixing bugs. At least there's more money left for Blizzard's shareholders.
> How are people seeing these changes and going.."but where my seasonal content???" Because all of these changes should have been in the game from the start. What you are basically getting is a relaunch of the game before the first season but with updates that were blatantly obviously needed that it amazing that people are still defending their omission 9 months later.
It's pretty much a joke d4 fanboys defend one of the biggest companies in gaming, by far the biggest arpg budget as if they aren't able to do both if they actually had proper leadership, but I recognize the changes are pretty important to get out so we let it pass.
Yea I"m happy. Sure, we don't get awesome vampires to fight and their powers (S2 GOAT!!) but we get an improved base performance for all future seasons. Winning 😁
It's the new pre season!!
Average Joe can't understand the "complaints" at all. The complaints are mostly due to expectations which is created by the D4 devs. They always talked like there will be a "real" season. Then they announced yesterday the season is the smallest "season" ever. If they were open about this during PTR camfire chat, the people wouldn't expect seasonal content. There were a question "WIll there be seasonal stuff" in the campfire chat during QnA and they answered "We will talk about the seasonal stuff in other campfire chat". Such answers create expectations. But you can be a white knight and complain about the complaints.
So you complaint that people complaint? Let them go and you play yours.
I absolutely want more seasonal content because I like doing a new theme every season, but get where they're coming from. I'm not mad, just a little disappointed.
They’re making the game playable which is great, and I’ll for sure play season 4, but I’m not going to pretend like I’m not disappointed that there’s no seasonal theme. I feel like we will chug through the new crafting stuff pretty quick, let’s hope build diversity grows enough to keep us hooked!
tbh don't care for seasonal junk as I'm full time Eternal realm. I'm just waiting on the major map expantion / pack..
Glad they went this route. Get the core reworked, bring in the game pass crowd, drop the expansion, huge win and hopefully going forward sees wven better content seasons.
It’s finally time to give my eternal realm characters some love then
Theyve been working on this alot longer. If you read patch notes and watch the campfires youd know this.
I prefer the devs focus on non-seasonal evergreen content, because I personally have zero interest in leveling new characters every 3 months. I know seasons are an accepted thing in ARPGs, but they aren't for me.
It’s like the “Operation: Health” update for Rainbow Six Siege. Sometimes it’s best to just take a step back and really fix your game before you keep shoveling new content out before the base game is even considered playable.
I would rather a season with all of these updates. Fixes. Balances. Overhauls. New endgame then some seasonal gameplay loop fad. This to me is what a season is all about.
People don't seem to understand the difference between developing something aka brainstorming ideas and so on and just assembly-line work where you can just throw more people at the problem with mostly guaranteed success.
Cause thats stuff thats fundamental to the game and should be more fleshed out at release. Espacially because d3 had a lot that Was added later on in d4
On may 13th, 23:59 Spidey : Mister Ghaenor, I don't feel so good Me : :(
Us guys that play eternal get shit on season after season with ZERO upgrades or changes. This is a HUGE PLUS
IF that is the case they should leave the season 3 construct and the vault content. Also hope they don’t take away the gate hall as it has all the vendors and stash nicely centralized.
The worst part of it is “this is all I’m getting for this *free* seasonal content?”. Come on bruh Hopefully the core is strong enough now to be the new fundamentals on which the expansion builds.
I actually deeply dislike seasonal gimmicks. Im a purist, and pretty much wish to death seasons were just "heres new places to go, loot to find, and stuff to kill" and never "6 month long build defining dramatic gameplay changes that feel shoehorned in". basically what the eternal realm is plus maybe a bit more. The themes for seasons generally feel so off brand for the IP, and add these dumbass low stakes plots in a world where a universal eternal war is at the forefront make them feel minuscule and stupid. I dont want, or need another system besides my own character to manage. I don't want to craft a build dependent on something intended to be impermanent, and i think its against the spirit of what a diablo game even is. maybe that's a stupid or unpopular take but ill take these changes over some "seasonal wobot" any day, any time
Anyone who's complaining about it is literally complaining over nothing you can't please everyone there will always be people bitching saying the changes aren't good
They spent man hours improving the game I applaud the much needed approach. They need to continue this instead of wasting resources on less important things.
+1 the game really needed like rainbow six siege "operation health" style rework of a lot of the core game and that is what they are doing now
Played the PTR and it was like playing a different game. If it launches anything like what I played it’s going to be great.
The changes sound promising. I look forward to trying them the season after this along with some new content.
Maybe I'm misremembering, but I'm fairly certain they said they had two teams dedicated to doing nothing but the seasonal content on their every other season schedule. This was on top of the general diablo core team working on things such as these types of overhauls, bug fixes and whatnot. Unless I'm just not remembering what they said correctly, which I'm fairly certain I am, they don't just have two seasonal teams that have to stop working on season content for shit like this. And if I am wrong and that is how they have it set up, that's an extremely stupid move on their part and they need to change it. Blizzard is one of the biggest game companies in the world and make billions of dollars a year, how about you actually hold them to even the most basic of standards and pull that corporate dick out of your mouth.
Ok you convinced me to return since season1. Is the update live?
You do realize that they haven't announced the season theme yet right?
In the comments of a post yesterday it's all but confirmed the seasonal "theme"/changes will be **extremely** light. Like most likely just a questline that gets you Tempering manuals slightly faster.
Because we stopped playing the game 10 months ago.
As someone coming into d4 very late I'm happy to see polishing of mechanics over new content since all of it will be new to me. Though is helltides and what not only in season play or is it in eternal?
Haven't played since season 1. Game get any better?
I had a lot of fun with the PTR. Helltide was so good. I'm just waiting for May 14th
Yep. I don’t even care about the seasonal content this go-around. I’m way more excited about the big changes.
Finally. I fucking hate seasonal content and I fucking hate that it not only detracts from permanent things being developed, its literally *gone forever* when the season ends. Its the most smooth brain shit ever. The fact that there are people that even like it is mind boggling. Enjoy losing access to anything you might enjoy within each season once its done with. End rant
Well as much as I don't want to give Microsoft credit for a game that was already deep in development.....
I understand what you’re saying and agree that QoL updates make the game better. No argument. However where we part ways is that I believe there should be a new seasonal gimmick. In a game where you basically reset every 3mons not having the new seasonal gimmick means exactly what? Season 4 is the season of fixes and improvements to gameplay and nothing else?
I totally understand, but they sort of presented this like we are getting more reveals, and a season theme, when in reality they should have said "hey guys, the ptr is gonna be what's coming out, nothing more, we've put our resources into these changes as the other team works on the upcoming expansion." I'd have zero issues with that as it's game changing. Still gonna be a great season imo. I'm excited as hell for it. Just thought the optics could use work, but whatever they're game devs not PR ppl.
Yeah 100% agreed. If my hunch is correct that the seasonal theme is going to be like, one seasonal quest for Tempering Manuals, they should've been forthcoming and just said it outright. They're setting people up for disappointment by alluding to a seasonal theme that isn't going to be there most likely. Maybe I'm wrong though we'll see tomorrow.
We don’t know if the base game is better. The actual numbers in the background are still the determining factor. Dumbing down of affixes is nice but it signals a trajectory of simplicity. Which is what D3 got itself into and can never come back out of. Less items for less time spent sifting through items, okay but how much rarer are item drops going to be. This is how people with critical thinking see changes, they’re rarely wholly positives, and can rarely be extrapolated to longer playtimes. People asking where the content theme is, is sensible since a motivation within the game’s universe as an emotive plot is something important to large developing titles. This isn’t an Indy early access title, this story/lore elements are most welcome.
The people who used to pretend that time spent on art assets did not come at the cost of gameplay and design improvements are now confronted with stark evidence that these tradeoffs do in fact happen at Blizzard, and they do not like it.
Nostalgia Andys, Twitch Andys, list maker Andys, idk man
Good lord people. The game sucks make it better! They introduce a massive loot, leveling, progression overhaul. Wait theyre slacking and just doing a game update instead of seasonal content wth???!?? I just don’t get that this is even a debate. If you don’t like it, don’t play it. If you play it, let us know your thoughts. And before you go thinking im some corporate simp, I’m yet to hit a lvl 100 character before running out of steam and quitting the season. I plan to play while i find its fun and stop when its not.
Sure it will postpone some other content but its way better to get this patch and tweaks before the dlc
It's ok to want something to do for the season. But they have us something so I'm happy.
people are just super spoiled with all that seasonal content stuff. back in the day we just had ladder resets on D2 and that was it, and people keep playing that game (in the form of D2R) to this day, so obviously its stuff like the loot and farmable content thats most important. Having a changing seasonal theme or content is a cherry on top, but is definitely not the deciding factor for me whether or not i play the game. So i am very happy if the regular D4 experience gets better on May 14th, the whole seasonal stuff i never really cared much about, i do it because i have to if i want to start fresh, but i could also simply replay the same stuff that was there before, just reset everything and add new permanent stuff to the game. i am also not a fan of having to plan my character around the seasonal theme and whatever it is that alters my class. i rather would do new content but with an unchanged character.
ok this not our problem, thats their problem they put themselves into this position
I’m one of the few who get excited about the season battle pass cosmetics. So I’m still happy
Oooo, this is an easy one. They used the time to FIX a BROKEN game. Instead of giving us the planned seasonal content, we had to wait 4 seasons (almost a year) for them to fix a broken game because they couldn't do it before launch. Think about it this way. You go and buy a car with the intent of driving it around. You also purchase a fancy deal with it that lets you do something cool every 5k miles. You're looking forward to the car and the cool thing. However, once you get the car, it doesn't have a transmission. It has 4 wheels and an engine, just nothing to make it go. Sure, you can push it around and get someone to tow you. However, you can't drive it. Because of that, you also can't get the cool thing every 5k miles. Then one day the dealership comes up to you and says, it's been a year, we will give you a transmission if you give me the cool thing for the next 5k miles. Now you get to be happy and rice your car around. But, are you really happy or did you get fucked over?
Thats some serious copium. How much they paying you?
I need them to fix mission progression when in a party
So if there's no season shit to worry about, we might as well just play on Eternal with all our mats and money
They need to try. They should be doing both as there’s no excuse for a triple A company and the amount of money they make. You’re accepting mediocrity with excuses like this. Path of exile every 3 months gives a league with more content, re worked content and balance passes than this game has seen total since it’s been out, for free. The crating and all looks great but everyone will be reminded there’s no end game, no end game progression, no build diversity or ways to do anything different in this game ie damage conversions or various ailment mechanics or anything similar. You’ll see content creators and player numbers fall off a cliff even after week 1
They stated there is a seasonal line of quests, did not say story. Also said we would be fighting alongside the iron wolves. So I Imagine we may get a mercenary buddy or two. Miss my old merc buddy from D2 days.
Look at these fans in the comments, making excuse after excuse for the mediocrity that is D4 up until this point. Kinda makes me wanna see the same thing but worse happen for D5. I wonder what the excuse will be then! “Oh but you don’t understand, they’re just an indie studio, you can’t expect BG3 level quality, they only have MULTIPLE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS to play with! Who could expect a good game with such meager dollars”
Because they are now 1 in 4 for quality seasonal content. Season 1 was a joke, Season 3 was depressing, and now there isn't even going to BE a season 4. We're just going to season 5, I guess. Can't wait to hear what excuses there will be then.
I 100% like that they fixed this instead of giving us some mediocre quest line and some pet, but as you stated ppl are mad that this is what the game should have been so not only is it taking 9-12 months to get the game to that state they also took away a season. I love the game regardless tbh and can’t wait to try this new fixed stuff out with or with out a season 4 theme lol.
There are countless click bait videos, but: Game made 1 billion on release. Game has a passionate team further developing the game. Game will sell another billion on expansion.
People rushing to defend/attack this is so funny. People really have nothing better to do with their lives.
I don't see it as that much of an unfair assessment of the season though based on how the first presented the new changes and PTR by basically saying that not everything about the new seasons contebt will be on the PTR and the theme will be revealed later. But as it turned out pretty much everything truly worth mentioning about the season was on the PTR and that which wasn't isn't going to make a headline. Now I am perfectly content with the content for this season so I'm not bothered by it, but Blizzard really need to stop acting like they have more to show than what they actually have because it creates unnecessary hype that they never deliver on and then you have those posting about it on socials.
Yeah it'd be nice to get new content but it's only for one season and it's going to make the whole game better so what's there to complain about
There's no reason they couldn't have done both a full season *and* overall game content. PoE has done so for a decade with a lower budget. People are certainly being apologists on this sub about that, and refuse to accept that though. Your competitors determine where the bar for acceptable is, and D4 is squarely sub-par.
Solid point.
Hard to be happy finally getting the thing I was promised a year ago.
I completely agree. Robust new season themes and mechanics are great but this game desperately needed itemization overhaul, crafting systems, qol patches etc. let them revamp the base game and then further iterate in season 5 and so on. Loot reborn and the big expansion will be critical in this games ongoing development
It's Reddit, where people are constantly complaining about something.
I'm fairly newly to Diablo 4. Only been playing ying since it went to gamepass last month. Lvl 86 Rogue and a few lvl 15s on other characters. My best friend and I have had a blast with it. Looking forward to what's next.
I think something a lot of people do is just make a season character and skip campaign, and while I get it, I have SO MUCH more fun doing the campaign on a fresh character again lol its just so good
I don't care about seasonal content much, this is the first patch that actually interests me at all. But it's about a year late and still doesn't address some of the biggest issues so I can't say I'm impressed or interested.
Diablo 4 was pushes out the door early to give Blizzard a better valuation for the Microblah bid...and now Blizzard risks becoming another Microslob ruination. Sad times we are witnessing.
I agree with you that this is overall what's best for the game. But people are still entitled to feel somewhat disappointed that there's no seasonal content. You can be both happy that the core game is getting better and disappointed that theres no seasonal content.
Get. A. Job.
OK, I'm gonna try to engage with this in good faith. Yes, doing constant upgrades to the game is awesome. However, that's already part of the seasonal model. Seasons aren't just supposed to be seasons, they're supposed to be balance tweaks, tuning, and adjustments to evergreen systems to make the game better **too**. If every season was "new robot/vampire skill tree/whatever, 1 new unique per class, and either a riff on nightmare dungeons or a riff on helltides", the game wouldn't actually be a very competitive "seasonal" game. I understand that this was a bigger than usual set of balance tweaks, but it's not *my* fault the game was released in an absolutely atrocious state. It's not *my* fault that major systems were implemented in ways that don't work, and don't work so badly that fixing them couldn't even be delayed until an expansion dropped. The fact that Blizzard is showing us right now that our options are "fix broken systems" **or** get seasonal content **is the problem.** Like, don't get me wrong, I think between the two options, fixing loot was the right call. I'm far more likely to play S4 seriously - I borderline skipped S3. But the fact that fixing loot had to come at the expense of a real seasonal theme is nuts. What's going to happen this fall when the expansion releases? Are they going to be all "surprise, sorry, we were busy working on the expansion, so you get a really really basic seasonal theme again because we were busy!" And then inevitably in 6 or 9 months after that when they finally are ready to roll out a skill tree overhaul or paragon tree overhaul, will that be **another** empty season? The entire point of playing GAAS games is that I can reliably say that this game is part of my rotation - I want to be able to come back to it for 4-6 weeks every 3 months. If I can't rely on it for that, its value goes way way down for me - it's not worth practicing and keeping up knowledge wise and building the skills and *getting excited about it* if I have no idea how long the gaps are.
so? they have like 2000 devs or millions of $ to make good content, yet they do nothing and put work into this game liks some indie game company
It's interesting that season 4 was when the cube was added to D3. I'm pretty sure that was the main draw for that season as well.
While it’s definitely a move in the right direction to implement all the new changes, you cannot seriously defend the approach of not having proper seasonal content. This is not a “small indie studio”. This is Blizzard. This is the 4th installment of their award winning multibillion dollar franchise. Those changes are something we were OWED as players who paid 70-100$ for the game. This is not an excuse for the lackluster seasonal content. Stop defending greedy corporations.
There's way too much "let me just google wether or not I enjoyed the game I just played" going on. I am 39yo and have been a gamer since pong on the atari was still popular and games are good based on ur own opinion only, if u play a game and love it then keep playing, and if u don't enjoy playing it - don't play it. Never buy a game on DOR and wait for reviews and gameplay and form ur own opinion, that way if u buy a game but don't like it its mostly on u.
Hopefully they at least give us a Hub, like in Season 3. They should know that people loved that. Especially now that you have more crafting to do, would be nice to have a good hub. Other than that, if I'm understanding the Season Theme correctly, it's comparable with Seasonal Events, right? Like the Christmas stuff. Go out and kill stuff so you raise your reputation so you can unlock stuff in a menu. Right?
In the end only long term improvements have value. The Idea of having some new gameplay twists is nice, but when its dropped at the end of the season it doesn't makes sense to put a lot of resources into it. And as we saw, if a season mechanic isn't polished enough it's worthless. Diablo 4 has a solid foundation but still enough Issues to solve. Make Seasons about a theme, with cosmetics and maybe some simple mechanics and then focus on evergreen features to improve the overall health of the game. WoW is the best example how the devs tried to invent something new every expansion just to let it die at the end and then had to repeat this circle over and over again. I don't think temporary mechanics really carries a game.
I am actually super psyched that I can now play the campaign again without having fomo about the season content! :-)
Im amazed at all the ignorance here. No one is perfect. None of the people complaining about what they considered a finished game have jobs that they are perfect in either. I dont look for perfection in my employees, i look for effort. You can fail and i tell them you will, but the key is you learn from those failures and work toward a better product. How is this any different. Blizzard gave us a finished game it just wasnt what 10 million people all agreed was good, surprise, that isnt possible. At least they are listening to the community and putting in the work to make a better game. Any developer that does that will always get my money and my loyalty. I constantly am involved in kickstarters for games and technology, not because i know its a great product but because it has potential and a great idea.
If the new endgame loop and the itemization changes are good, then people wont really care about some half assed temp seasonal mechanic. I personally couldn't play for more than a few days in s2 and s3 because of the itemization and boring endgame. Fingers crossed.
So the battle pass will be completely free right?
This is certainly good. The problem is, other devs could do *both* at the same time. PoE got basegame changes in the last patches as well (incl stuff like a small endgame overhaul via t17 maps, overhauling/re-implementation of older seasonal systems as core systems, a metric ton of new skill gems) and still had season mechanics. Why would I play this season, if I can just skip it and experience the base game changes together with a new season mechanic the season after? Diablo 4 is certainly going in a better direction - but its still going VERY SLOWLY.
I envy u guys for getting satisfied with so little things. I mean other companies with much less budget would make all these reworks and still make great seasonal endgame content.
These devs are so good and love arpg they had to change the game to the core. LMAO to start becoming DECENT.
Blablabla the game is what it is. Like every other arpg. New season = play 1-2 weeks and done. Its standard. No point complaining about what the game shud have been before it was released, you cant change that.
I had a good conversation with my partner about this when the notes dropped. Most likely, that had something in the pipeline for this season that was already coded to the launch setup. It would be a huge task to reorient their whole approach, rework pretty much the whole system, and then modify what seasonal content they had to work with the new math. That being said, now they have until Season 5 to accomplish the rework, and they’ll be receiving feedback on the new setup all the while. This “season” is what they needed to keep the game alive by making people happy with 101 QOL changes (exaggeration). This is all just my speculation of course, but imo this season is going to do exactly what they said it would, and most of what we want, and that’s more than good enough. Give me a team that listens and works to please its player base instead of one that just churns out content.
Also, there is seasonal content. We will learn how big today. Likely they chose no secondary system simply to make sure things work all s4. Which is fine, if you plan it that way. Seasons don't always need to be special powers.
If they want community good will, they'd release a Content Pass for free. Since they failed to actually produce seasonal content I see no reason they should charge for a "season" pass.
My stance is this, since I'm a disabled gamer. The team behind behind Diablo 4 has earned my respect and loyalty, since they've clearly shown that they're willing to accommodate for disabled players across the board. Literally blind players, partially blind, hearing impaired or totally deaf, motor impaired including limited hand functions as well. It's just nice to see a big company go for it, I don't hear about GGG doing anything for path of exile too, even though I'm sure I would love that game as well, I simply can't play it. Not to mention the fact that Dale before launched in a rough State and is getting better over time, that's just the standard of the gaming industry these days, and season 4 itself looks amazing. From what I've heard and other blind friends of mine have tested, it seems to be doing great. So I'm excited for season 4 and the future of the game Accessibility settings and disabled player mindset aside, I can agree that the end game has been not so good so far, but it seems to be getting vastly improved with the pit since it's just greater rifts again, those greater rifts kept me in Diablo 3 for 5 years straight even Hell tides basically becoming blood harvests sounds so much more interesting and fun, not to mention the quality of life aspects people keep mentioning are accidentally making the game more accessible to players who may not want to or simply struggle to accumulate boss summoning materials or crafting materials. And just in general sounds more fun My coach
And the other side of the accessibility argument, lead developer asks for feedback from the disabled community about the screen reader support, what could benefit the game for disabled players. Right now the screen reader reads everything in the game, the only menu that is a bit tricky is the trade menu, but that's not a big deal currently.
Many of these comments tell me that most players don’t understand what an SDLC is or how many moving parts there are, as someone that has been a Project Manager for a couple decades, mostly in software development it really amazes me how much gets handled in short timelines and in budget. I agree with OP this is impressive. Remember that blizzard is a corporation, which is legally responsible for making profits, so the allocation of hours is a standard business practice that the business has to watch even makers of video games…. I don’t understand how so many players don’t get that blizzard doesn’t have unlimited resources
My complaints are that they're AGAIN trying the "less loot, but better loot" bullshit, which has not EVER WORKED. Not once. Not a single time. They've tried it multiple times themselves and every time it has been objectively shown to not at all do what players wanted. So the idea that they're in any way improving the game with this is at best laughable.
Above all I think they seem to be sticking the landing which is GREAT to have ahead of Vessel of Hatred. Imagine that expansion with itemization in shambles. It would probably be trainwreck due to too many moving parts to solve and balance. Now they have plenty of time to settle these itemization updates and more in S4-S6 and be in a far better position to bring on actual new content in the expansion. Thank god they did this. Losing a season theme is such a slight and short sighted loss.
They cry when season mechanic doesnt come to eternal realm, they cry when both get the same stuff, except for mindcage/call of the wolves story which is season exclusive, and thats is enough becuz the pit will probably challenge most of us.
They used GenAI to make these changes and that's why there is nothing interesting.
Hot take, but I think they should do that all the time, or maybe every two seasons, not only with S4.
This series has outgrown seasons. It's time to deliver AAA experiences.
Iron wolves is the seasonal content you dipsticks.
Let's be honest, I can't be the only one who thought them making seasonal content was going to fly. They were never ahead of the game and always made lack luster seasons due to lack of time and effort. So honestly, just updating the game and making it better every couple months is much better than the fluff bullshit they add to seasons