Blizzard Entertainment has had a number of games over the years that millions of PC gamers have been clamoring over, but have been relatively unheard of on the console market. Now, having had a chance to play the upcoming Diablo 3 on the PS3 at E3, console gamers have every reason to put down their controllers and start paying attention – PC gaming on the console market is coming, and Blizzard is bringing it.
Diablo 3, the game that set fire to the PC market a while back which will be coming the PS3 and the PS4, feels like it was built directly for a controller, because it was ‘built to feel native on the PlayStation’. Parts of the game were ‘built from the ground up’, so that console gamers would get more of a direct experience, instead of the indirect control scheme found on the original. Players are no longer pointing and clicking to attack, combat feels exactly like it should with a DualShock and has even been improved with the addition of an incredibly useful roll mechanic. This is a game that has been in development for years, not a quick port.
“Diablo 3” was initially released on May 15 of last year, ending a roughly 12-year gap between itself and the previous release, “Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction.” “Diablo 3” suffered from severe playability and account security issues at launch, with many players unable to log in and others having their accounts compromised and the contents of those accounts stolen. Blizzard has taken steps to fix account security issues, including the implementation of optional two-factor authentication. Doing so alleviated a significant amount of the security issues, though that’s not to say that “Diablo 3” is a flawless experience, even more than a year later.
Most recently, “Diablo 3” suffered from a gold counterfeiting bug that allowed players to duplicate obscene amounts of gold. Some players reported that several people exploited the bug to enrich themselves to the tune of billions, thereby crashing the in-game economy and severely devaluing gold in the process.