iOS Game - Diablo Immortal (2022) [+]
Jun 06 2022
Diablo Immortal is a new free to play MMO RPG apparently set between the events of Diablo II and Diablo III. You play one of six adventuring classes (of either gender) and the campaign has you going around recovering shards of the World Stone.
In terms of story, looks and gameplay it is very much like Diablo II and III with a fairly standard fantasy storyline, isomorphic view and arcade-like combat. Besides the campaign there are bounty quests, hidden dungeons you can find, and challenge/rift dungeons in the main city. There is voice acting and it's pretty good for an RPG.
For equipment you collect random equipment pieces (of common, rare and legendary types) and equip them in one of about a dozen slots. Equipment can be upgraded in two or three ways and all upgrade types can be done on the same piece. Also upgrades can be transferred (for free?) when you replace the piece so there's no reason to not be upgrading. I think there are equipment sets.
Each class has several skills though you can only equip five, including a basic attack. You have runes that modify skills. Apparently you can also switch classes and the game tries to convert your equipment to about the same level for the new class. Combined with the easy equipment swapping and it seems like Blizzard is trying to remove the pain points of MMO RPGs.
You can form ad-hoc parties to do quests and you get better rewards. You can join a clan (of up to 500 people?). High level quests can take 48 players.
I played this with a controller and sometimes without. With a controller it's joystick to move, buttons to do actions, triggers to activate skills, button-pad to choose some menu choices. Once you get to the equipment screen (and other screens) you have a cursor and use the joystick to move it, which is more cumbersome than tapping.
Touch controls are actually pretty good. Left thumb anywhere for virtual joystick. On-screen skill button which you press with your right thumb. And actually the on-screen skill buttons remain on-screen even with a joystick. It's mostly auto-aim so you don't need a right joystick (virtual or real).
One thing is that I play on my iPad and it feels cramped. Besides the on-screen buttons on the lower right there is a small map on the upper right, quest/bounty objectives on the left, your character picture and health on the upper left, and a small chat window on the bottom center. It really feels like I'm not quite seeing everything and because the camera is a bit close I'm frequently running into monsters and they're right there. A little unfortunate since I'm playing a ranged class but I don't think it has hurt me. Still, Diablo II and III have a lot more area showing in the screen.
Even though this is a well done MMO RPG after a few days I think I'm done. The cramped gameplay kind of bothers me. The MMO RPG attributes don't really bother me and it doesn't seem like you need to buy coins and such if you're willing to grind a bit (not a lot of grinding like most games). Although I guess the daily rewards and month-long events do bother me since it's like you have to play every day to get your free perks.
But really the storyline is kind of boring, sort of a more detailed version of Diablo II and having Deckard Cain around really doesn't help. I guess it's a familiar world for Diablo fans but I've played it already and I want something more original.
(Not necessarily a disadvantage but it is a big game. I think I have all the assets downloaded and it's 12-1/2 GB. It did download in the background as I played and I only had to wait once when I wanted to use cosmetics.)
In terms of story, looks and gameplay it is very much like Diablo II and III with a fairly standard fantasy storyline, isomorphic view and arcade-like combat. Besides the campaign there are bounty quests, hidden dungeons you can find, and challenge/rift dungeons in the main city. There is voice acting and it's pretty good for an RPG.
For equipment you collect random equipment pieces (of common, rare and legendary types) and equip them in one of about a dozen slots. Equipment can be upgraded in two or three ways and all upgrade types can be done on the same piece. Also upgrades can be transferred (for free?) when you replace the piece so there's no reason to not be upgrading. I think there are equipment sets.
Each class has several skills though you can only equip five, including a basic attack. You have runes that modify skills. Apparently you can also switch classes and the game tries to convert your equipment to about the same level for the new class. Combined with the easy equipment swapping and it seems like Blizzard is trying to remove the pain points of MMO RPGs.
You can form ad-hoc parties to do quests and you get better rewards. You can join a clan (of up to 500 people?). High level quests can take 48 players.
I played this with a controller and sometimes without. With a controller it's joystick to move, buttons to do actions, triggers to activate skills, button-pad to choose some menu choices. Once you get to the equipment screen (and other screens) you have a cursor and use the joystick to move it, which is more cumbersome than tapping.
Touch controls are actually pretty good. Left thumb anywhere for virtual joystick. On-screen skill button which you press with your right thumb. And actually the on-screen skill buttons remain on-screen even with a joystick. It's mostly auto-aim so you don't need a right joystick (virtual or real).
One thing is that I play on my iPad and it feels cramped. Besides the on-screen buttons on the lower right there is a small map on the upper right, quest/bounty objectives on the left, your character picture and health on the upper left, and a small chat window on the bottom center. It really feels like I'm not quite seeing everything and because the camera is a bit close I'm frequently running into monsters and they're right there. A little unfortunate since I'm playing a ranged class but I don't think it has hurt me. Still, Diablo II and III have a lot more area showing in the screen.
Even though this is a well done MMO RPG after a few days I think I'm done. The cramped gameplay kind of bothers me. The MMO RPG attributes don't really bother me and it doesn't seem like you need to buy coins and such if you're willing to grind a bit (not a lot of grinding like most games). Although I guess the daily rewards and month-long events do bother me since it's like you have to play every day to get your free perks.
But really the storyline is kind of boring, sort of a more detailed version of Diablo II and having Deckard Cain around really doesn't help. I guess it's a familiar world for Diablo fans but I've played it already and I want something more original.
(Not necessarily a disadvantage but it is a big game. I think I have all the assets downloaded and it's 12-1/2 GB. It did download in the background as I played and I only had to wait once when I wanted to use cosmetics.)