Diablo 3 on console (PS3)

Some people who don’t know me well were giving my partner the confused looks when he said he got me Diablo 3 on console for my birthday last week. The question usually is along the line of “You got her a present for yourself?” LOL. I have been a long time fan of the Diablo games, and was very excited when I found out that it was coming on console as I don’t have a computer that can run it. I remembered when Diablo 3 first came out I replayed Diablo 2 because I was feeling a little jealous of those who were already playing (yeah, I know it doesn’t make sense). But it doesn’t matter now, I can play now too!

So here’s what I think:

FYI, I play Demon Hunter (I’ve always been a range fighter on this kind of games, having played Rogue and Amazon in the first 2 Diablo games), and I haven’t gotten very far, only just got to level 14 since I have only been playing for a short period of time at a hit (not to mention it was a couple of days after I got it before I finally gave it a brief play due to the lack of free time).

Gameplay:

I was concerned that I’d hate the game because I have been so spoiled by the PC versions of this kind of games, and having been used to using a mouse to aim and shoot, and I’ve established a rhythm. But then I thought back to the days of Diablo 1 and remembered I played my first Diablo game on a Playstation before getting the PC version, and got hooked on it since.

The gameplay is smooth to my opinion, I love the evade move, and I got accustomed to using the buttons to use the skills pretty quickly. It was easy to get used to and remember, although I’ve missfired a few times earlier on in D3 because of button mix up (I’ve gotten used to first and third person shooting games).

The targeting systems took me awhile to get used to, but I finally got it, though it became a pain when dealing with hordes of monsters from all around, since a thumb wiggling the joystick is slightly harder to manage than index finger and your whole wrist being used to click frantically and move to pick a target, but there is a lock target function which can be useful at times.

Inventory:
I like how the inventory and stash works. The radial menu works well and felt natural to console environment. You can have up to 60 items in your inventory without having to play “tetris” on how to fit them in, and you can fit 20 items in your stash to start with (you can upgrade to get more space). It works well, and the categorization makes it a lot easier to navigate an sort. However, I do wish I could order it the way I’d like it to be.

Skills:
I actually like the skill “tree” in Diablo 3 despite some people I know who prefer the older version. But, i do wish it gives me more info than just the description. Perhaps skill damage points (if applicable) would be helpful.

Monsters:
From what I’ve faced so far, like the other Diablo games, Diablo 3 has various monsters in an area and they have enough variation to keep the game interesting.

Overall:
As a whole, I am very happy with the game, and I can see myself spending a lot of hours into it.

I haven’t tried multiplayer so I can’t comment on it, but I have to say that I’m never keen on multiplayer unless it’s with people I know, and even then it’s normally for special occasions only. I guess it was partially because my very first multiplayer experience as a newbie was not pleasant, perhaps it was just the wrong crowd, but it pretty much put me off playing multiplayer with random people online.

Anyway… So far I am thoroughly enjoying the game, and unfortunately I can’t say much more about it yet as I haven’t gotten very far with it. I hope others enjoy it as much as I do.

Conclusion: it was an awesome birthday present! :D