When a franchise only releases a mainline title once every decade or so, expectations are understandably high. Fortunately, a short while later Blizzard corrected many of their mistakes, and Diablo 3 has since become a tremendous ARPG for the past several years. Many also took issue with the more artistic, “lighter” style when compared to Diablo and Diablo 2. The server issues were atrocious, the Auction House was an affront to all things ARPG, and the loot design was shockingly short-sided. In 2012, I built a new PC just for Diablo 3’s launch and, as many may recall, was horrified over the next several days as the realization set in that Blizzard had fumbled it. Expectations for Diablo 3 over a decade later, then, were extremely high. Still championed today, it’s widely-considered the greatest ARPG ever developed. I spent countless nights sitting in my room late at night battling the hordes of hell.ĭiablo 2 was, quite simply, a revelation. Having grown up playing RPGs of all sorts while enjoying mapping out characters and min/maxing, Diablo struck just the right nerve for me. Back in 1997, when the original Diablo launched, I had just secured a monster Compaq powered by a 166mhz Pentium processor, and I was exploring all that PC gaming had to offer. Diablo is a franchise that holds a lot of meaning to me.

Diablo iv by three they come