Diablo 3 loses companion pets and 'Scrolls of Reforging'
Diablo 3 has already seen sweeping changes throughout its life in beta, but Blizzard isn't shy about making more changes in its quest to perfect the next game in its famed series.
Diablo III has already seen sweeping changes throughout its life in beta, but Blizzard isn't shy about making more changes in its quest to perfect the next game in its famed series.
New changes coming to the current version of the game were announced earlier today, which cut companion scrolls and scrolls of reforging. The companion scrolls would summon an adorable minion that would run around and loot gold in your name. According to Blizzard community manager Nethaera, the creature's 'adorableness' was only part of the problem: "The companion pets felt like they were mandatory to maximize play efficiency and some of the pets were too cutesy for the gritty, dark world of Sanctuary."
Citing the Scrolls of Reforging as "underdeveloped," Blizzard also decided to kill the parchment, which allowed players to change the properties of an item.
"Neither of those are issues we felt like we could solve without a lot of additional work, and we’re trying to close in on a solid release date for the game, not move further away," Nathaera said.
While these elements were removed because they didn't mesh with the quality level Blizzard was looking to hit, they could return later. Blizzard says that they think companion pets could be, both mechanically and visually, turned into a "much cooler system" while making the intention of the reforging more "meaningful."
[via PC Gamer]
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Xav de Matos posted a new article, Diablo 3 loses companion pets and scrolls of reforging.
Diablo 3 has already seen sweeping changes throughout its life in beta, but Blizzard isn't shy about making more changes in its quest to perfect the next game in its famed series.-
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Holy shit... I've been away for a little bit... and Xav is leaving?! Wow that sucks.
Seriously Xav, you're the man. I've really enjoyed your articles and posts and your comments on Weekend Confirmed. You will be sorely missed.
I also thank you for the Shacknews t-shirt you gave me at PAX East. Yes, I am one of those two creepy Shackers who cornered you outside of that panel and threatened your life for a t-shirt! :)
Best of luck wherever you go (actually.. I'm going to do some searching and figure out exactly where that is).
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He is going back to Joystiq.
http://xavdematoscom.ipage.com/?p=145
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It's often been said in the course of game development that the best games that reached the point where nothing else could be cut.
i.e. Cutting isn't always bad, if it means they're focusing on what really makes the game excellent.Sucks to lose "cool features", but I'd rather have the awesome features, polished to a fine mirror finish.
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I dunno, kinda sounds EXACTLY like that
Neither of those are issues we felt like we could solve without a lot of additional work, and we’re trying to close in on a solid release date for the game, not move further away. When weighing these systems against releasing the game, we decided to cut these scrolls and stay on track for the game’s release.
http://us.battle.net/d3/en/forum/topic/3967947023
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I love how Blizzard can take a step back and look at big parts of their games and just go 'oh that just doesnt work, lets replace it'. Maybe I'm reading too much into it from following years of WoW development, but I think It shows vision and focus with a (fairly) uncompromising critical eye. It must be quite hard to facilitate this culturally in the apparent scale of their projects. Even if it was something that just wasn't to my taste (MoP pokemon), I can respect that.
Look at all that's going on in WoW:MoP and just losing some pet isn't a big deal.
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Since when is this new for Blizzard? They've dropped whole games they felt would not meet their standard of quality -- lest we forget SC: Ghost and Warcraft Adventures.
Also, Warcraft 3 + TFT and WoW changed drastically during beta even close to release. I didn't follow SC2 beta progress as closely so I can't comment on that one. They aren't afraid to change even core stats and drop features leading up to release.
I doubt Activision has much to do with this. -
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