Diablo Immortal is POE killer

Two very different worlds.

Diablo be like: money money money give me more money.
Gamer: How bout update now?
Diablo: No more updates but we still want your money.


POE be like: content content more content until your brain explodes, now we need your money.
Gamer: There's too much going on now, too much contents, too much loot, too much of everything.
POE: Here's more contents. There's no stopping us whether you're paying or not and we're headed to POE 2 soon, prepare for MAWWR contents.

Diablo: don't know, don't care just need Mawwr Money.
POE: ...working on new contents.

Content is such a vapid concept though. It's the embodiment of 'quantity over quality'.

I recently read a savage take on what Disney has done to both Marvel and Star Wars, turning them into 'content delivery systems' and I realised, shit, it's so true. Do I enjoy it for what it is? Sure, it's calibrated to be entertaining with a precision a rocket surgeon might envy and I'm merely human. But in hindsight, you can tilt your head just a little and see all the gears spinning, all the machinery working to deliver...content.

As for 'content creator'...what does that even mean?

And then there's another elephant in the room: does a casino need new 'content'? I haven't been in one for years but I imagine the games are largely the same as they've always been. Maybe some new tech with the poker machines. So if Blizzard are like 'give us money' and can get away with it without wasting resources making more 'content', of course they will. GGG, on the other hand, have entered a devil's pact with the fallacy that 'content' in and of itself is worth supporting irrespective of that content's value or quality. It's a pact that pays off regularly so again, who can blame them for placing their faith in it?

But I think neither approach leads to good game design. One just bypasses the illusion of value and goes straight for the wallet.

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As for 'content creator'...what does that even mean?

Literally just means YouTube channel owner AFAIK. I don't think I've ever heard it to refer to a streamer (unless they were also a YouTube channel owner). Not sure the term applies to TikTok video creators.

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Content is such a vapid concept though. It's the embodiment of 'quantity over quality'.

Not enough quantity of content can be bad as well. The very little permanent non-event endgame content in Genshin Impact is one of the game's biggest flaws, for example. Pokemon is probably another, I've seen a common complaint that newer games don't have as much of a post-game as earlier ones.

I'm of the opinion that PoE is pretty bloated and trimming some of the older, more outdated content (and maybe putting the rewards somewhere else) wouldn't hurt the game, but... at least it doesn't have the problem of not having anything to do.

I was being somewhat facetious, but...eh, here you go.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_creation

Hint: it's a LOT more complicated than 'youtube channel owner'.

I never liked how people just came up with the term "content" and started judging various games by it, particularly MMORPGs. It completely skewed how a game is perceived. Couldn't care less how much "content" a game has, most are large enough, yet it's the primary thing by which a game is evaluated. A game that is "finished" is perceived to not have "enough content". It's indicative of people being very attached to the game and wanting to continually live in it. A new player joining any of these is met, in fact, with way too much. It's just that some people park on one game and never leave, and those people are the loudest. And now developers learned to monetize that.

Of course, elongation of "content" by means of making things take forever, be grindy, or be very RNG, is the logical outcome of people overvaluing "content", because content is just "a carrot". In the end you have to tweak it such that a chunk of it is out of practical reach for most people people, because otherwise someone might "finish" it and we do not have enough self-reflection apparently to look at that fact without horror.

That's what people want so that's what people get.

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Revenchule wrote:

That's what people want so that's what people get.

Yes. In the MMO, ARPG and MMO(A)RPG genres, people want to grind. They play the games to progress. Once that grind and the progression is done, the game/character is done. And as long as this grind/progression is fun, the longer it lasts, the more fun you have.

That's where "content" comes in as a positive, at least for these players. They don't necessarily want the grind/progression to end, because that IS the game - that IS the fun.

And in a game with trading and an economy, more content is often better, depending on how you implement it. The new atlas passive tree in PoE lets you pick and choose what content you want to engage with, and what content not to. You don't HAVE to delve to progress, because everything dropping in delve, can be bought. But you CAN delve to progress if you want to, letting you sell what drops there to non-delvers.

A lot of gamers nowadays, are looking for a game to sink their souls into. I have stretches where I too sink my soul into PoE - because it lets me do that based on the amount of content. It depends on my work, of course, but as a teacher in a social democracy, we have a lot of breaks, holidays and vacations. Luckily, my better half also has stuff she likes to sink her soul into from time to time.

the prime example here is diablo 3. its a fun game to play, the skill system works and theres variation in how some of the skills can be played, combat feels good, moment to moment its one of the best arpgs ever made, maybe THE best.


but you start a new season, play for 2 days, maybe 3, ur done. its so fucking boring, because theres nowhere near enough content. the item system, the endgame systems, theyre pathetic. rifts and grifts are actually a fun mechanic, maybe a better outline than maps, but just so under developed and completely lacking any supporting content to create a loop of gameplay where you bounce around between activities.


its a shit game, in a lot of ways its a good game, but the overall take is that its garbage, and thats almost entirely down to a lack of content. its a real shame tbh.

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鬼殺し wrote:

Hint: it's a LOT more complicated than 'youtube channel owner'.

I mean it can be, but it doesn't have to be its a pretty wide umbrella, some content creators spend 10 hours a day creating and editing whatever content they are putting out on 11 platforms, some fart to somebody elses music and put it on TikTok they both go under content creator.

So broad rather than complicated.

The Maxroll content creators have quit Diablo Immortal and dumped on Blizzard. I watched one of the videos and the creator acknowledged that their team's combined feedback from the alpha and beta likely led Blizzard to make the game more F2P unfriendly, rather than make the game better. No additional (non-store) content or positive changes were made to the game in the year before release other than a few exp and skill balance changes. All that took place was whale maximization efforts. The creator said they plan to hide the guides they have on the site because they don't want to sully their website or encourage Blizzard's bad behavior.

And Blizzard has been completely radio silent because they want to limp along to the China release without blowing up any more land mines.

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Chavolatra wrote:

Melee is really good, no path of harry potter.

I know melee has been bad in the past few leagues, but praising the literal hottest steaming pile of shit ever created by Blizzard is a low blow.