14 DAY TRIAL // Diablo 3: Ultimate Evil Edition is coming to consoles both old and new on August 19, and a recent interview with two of its developers sheds a little more light on the title's upcoming features.
Blizzard's Matthew Berger and Julia Humphreys talk about some of the new content, the Apprentice mode that allows players of different levels to enjoy the same content together, about the changes made to in-game destruction and massacre in order to offer a more engaged gameplay experience, and then discuss the Nemesis system.
"Multiplayer is one of the best features of Diablo III. We think it's the best way to play Diablo III; with your friends, and of course on the console version we have same-screen co-op, so all of you on the couch, you can kick back and we think this is a unique way to play it," Julia Humphreys, senior producer on Diablo III: Reaper of Souls Ultimate Evil Edition, tells Ausgamers.
The Nemesis feature allows in-game monsters to level up upon killing players, and then infiltrate other players' games, labeled as Nemeses. Gamers can then take them down and avenge their friends, a unique feature that seems loaded with potential.
"This was… I'm not gonna say contentious, but I had this inner turmoil about this myself because, you know, wouldn't it be cool if this monster became unbeatable and just went from game to game; player to player. And then, about a fifth of a second later I was, like, that sounds like a horrible experience. So after a monster has killed his sixth player (after five kills he's fully levelled up) that monster retires. We were also flirting with the idea of maybe having him impact you differently in Hardcore [but] we decided that there won't be Nemesis monsters in Hardcore," Matthew Berger, senior level designer at Blizzard, reveals.
Diablo 3 vanilla is already available on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, and its next-gen debut will also mark the addition of the action role-playing game's first expansion, Reaper of Souls, which came out for PC in March.
The expansion delivers an entire new act for players to explore, complete with taking down Malthael, the Angel of Death itself, and offers players the chance to experience the game with an all-new class, the mighty Crusader.
Diablo 3: Ultimate Evil Edition comes out on August 19, for the Xbox 360 and Xbox One consoles from Microsoft, and the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 computer entertainment systems from Sony.