Let’s face it, single player RPGs are a dying breed. Even games like Diablo that have online game play are still a single player game at heart. Sure you can join a instance with a few other people to run through quests, farm for item drops or trade, but there is no persistant world. There is nothing that binds players together except for the BattleNet chat channels and it certainly is not a “Massive Multiplayer” game, emphasis on massive.
While it seems most RPGs are taking the MMO route there have been some within the last few years that remain as single player games. Fallout 3, Mass Effect, Kingdom Hearts series, Zelda, Final Fantasy to name a few. However others like Star Wars: Kotor have been announced as MMOs. The Elder Scroll series has also been rumored to make the jump to MMO as well as the next Fallout game. The Final Fantasy series went MMO back in 2002, although single player FF games continue to be made. Other RPGs such as Baldur’s Gate and Ultima just seems to have disappeared.
With the Diablo series only a very small percentage of players choose to play offline, the rest of us play online through Bnet. The way the game is currently setup Blizzard has to limit how many people join an instance. If you never played Diablo basically the more users that join an instance the more the monsters get scaled up in power and health. So if you have 100 people in one instance it would just become a mess. I’m a little rusty since I haven’t played D2 in a few yrs, but I think the limit was 10 or 12, I could be wrong.
The only thing stopping Diablo from becoming a MMO is a persistant world, all the other elements are already there. With the success Blizzard has had with WoW, I just don’t see them releasing Diablo 4 as another single player online RPG.
We all know Blizzard is already working on a new-gen MMO. Whether it’s going to be Starcraft, Diablo or a new IP is anyone guess, but I doubt we’ll be seeing a D3 and Diablo MMO that soon together. My money is still on a SC MMO.
On a side note, didn’t I do a nice job editing the D3 logo :)
I think you did. The single player RPG’s you mentioned, are about the only real single player RPG’s that can survive being just that. Most other ones have to have, imo, immense knowledge of how they work to actually survive. Games that have online capability, but not an MMO, don’t seem to work for very long if they want to make new games of that one. Hellgate:London died and closed the doors to there online servers in January, and it was similar to Diablo, but it didn’t quite make it.
Kind of sad to see them go. But its definitely true. The only time I will play Diablo 3 offline is on my laptop on the boat (I’m in the Navy). What are these rumors of a Fallout 3 style MMO? Fallout 3 has been my most enjoyed game (outside of MMO’s) in quite a few years. I have always thought that Oblivion and therefore Fallout 3 were like a single player MMO. In fact I use those games to describe the kind of world that most MMO’s have. They are the closest games to peopel who don’t understand what makes an MMO so different.
You dont see Diablo 3 and a Diablo MMO that close together but you see Starcraft 2 and a Starcraft MMO that close together? you’re not too smart
@ Ryan
Diablo3 is an RPG, I think it would be a little weird that right after they release D3 they would announce a Diablo MMO. If they were already working on a Diablo MMO, why wouldn’t they just skip D3 and put their resources into that.
On the other hand SC2 and a SC MMO are completely different games, so working on both at once make more sense imo.
Why would we need a Diablo MMO if you guys have World of Warcraft :/. Diablo Should stick single player and multiplayer like the second one. Im not saying the game is same as WoW is just they have some comparison. Wow is too cute and Diablo is too Horror and terror.
Warcraft 3 and World of Warcraft were being worked on at the same time and came out within a couple years of each other (WC3 in 2002 and WoW in 2004). This could be analogous to what’s happening now with D3 or SC2.
Regardless, there’s already been a few hints that the new MMO might be Diablo related: One of the devs recently said that they created a huge new world for D3 but players won’t be able to see most of it in the game. Another dev said the door will be left wide open for a sequel to D3, but it won’t be D4. That pretty much leaves only the MMO option. Even though Diablo and WoW are similar any many ways, I have a feeling they’ll probably make a Diablo MMO quite different from WoW (they’ve already said the new MMO will be nothing like WoW). Perhaps a lot more sandbox (like no classes or levels) with lots of player created content/environment interaction and more customizable characters and gameplay.
A SC related MMO seems like the more logical choice if they wanted to go in a totally new direction. Maybe one of the reasons they scrapped SC: Ghost was because it would be better off as a FPSMMO or something. Who knows?
I seem to remember a while back when Activision and Blizzard were merging, someone let slip that Blizzard had plans to make MMOs of all of their major IPs, which means Diablo and Starcraft MMOs at some point. Also, Blizzard just started hiring for yet another unannounced game that uses the WoW engine and is NOT the new MMO. I’m willing to bet they’re finally making a new IP as well as this new MMO.
I pretty much think MMOs are the worst thing that ever happened to RPG games. They just sap all the story line and character development out of the games and turn them into mindless grindfests full of Fedex quests. There are still great RPGs out there. Think about the Witcher. That was one of the best RPGs I’ve ever played and it was only single player. I’m not going to support MMOs.
Blizzard confirmed in an interview somewhere that the MMO they are working on is for a NEW IP. I don’t know where the link is, but I’m very confident I am remembering correctly and somewhere on the web is an interview where that question is answered.
Launching an RPG and an MMO of the same IP close together is not dumb at all, if you use one to spring board the other.
If six months after your hit release of an RPG, you release the MMORPG version and allow existing develped characters, to step out of the RPG and right into the MMORPG in an intermediate or advanced level rather than as a noob character, people would go nuts for it!
The game needs to have a sense of purpose beyond leveling and tree climbing for that to work, like warhammer online.
If any developer can transcend the ladder climb mentality it is blizzard. Starcraft, is just such a game.
While Starcraft does not develop a “character” you earn renoun and advance in levels, just translate the players Starcraft advancement an let them roll it into a choice of avatar based on their skill level.
They would be stuffing the ladder system in front of the existing purpose to make that an MMORPG.
The single player / two player version would be a combat tactics trainer for commanding groups in the MMORPG. That could make it an invaluable tool. Got to have em both and play em both to be a serious player! Because its all about skillz and strategyz.
Yeah, your completely wrong on everything. You know little to nothing about Diablo 2. Diablo 2 was made mostly for online play, especially pvp. Diablo 2 was far ahead of its competition with its amazing pvp system, which wasn’t gay turned base like “ALL” mmos. Turned based mmorpgs like WoW are just boring, 90% of the quests are hey go killed x number of y and collect this number of that. And the slow repetetive turn based combat engine is really boring. Diablo was real time, speedy, and you had mobs. And I am not talking about the gay mmo mobs where 3-8 monsters attack, I am talking like 30+ monsters. I think when Diablo 3 comes out, people are going to realise that MMOs just can’t cut it, when it comes to story lines, questing, pvp. Not only that they can’t put huge mobs in mmorpgs, or good physics or it will lag the piss out of the servers.
@everett
You are incorrect regarding the action/combat systems of most MMO’s; they, including WoW, are not “turn-based.” I used to play D2 all the time, and there have been multiple MMO’s that I have played in the past that have had faster action than D2. For example, Tabula Rasa and Age of Conan.
However, I believe that an MMO based off the Diablo IP would be much more enjoyable than WoW, or even an SC MMO. It’s also great to hear that Blizzard’s new MMO is based upon a new IP.
I could see a Diablo MMO doing very well. That is, if they kept the same dark, gothic artwork. That is a total must for Diablo. I liked the darker arts of Warcraft 1 and 2, and I have to say, the demons of WoW are just so queer looking.
LOL @ the queer daemons from WoW comment
Hm .. i don’t see why Blizzard would go for a SC MMO, the argument being exactly that of Diablo MMO, SC 2 is coming soon, right? As another argument i’d say the SC fan base isn’t as huge as that of Diablo and Diablo is by far a more mature game since it’s the third release we are looking forward to now, and SC being only the second in it’s series.
I find the next-gen MMO being developed by Blizzard is more likely to be a Diablo MMO than SC MMO. Being a developer myself, i know how much work it takes to build something like an MMO and calling it specifically next-gen, i think we can speculate that this MMO is not alike WoW, but a much much more detailed and polished world with a lot more to it. Blizzard has acquired some fancy physic engines like Havoc and are focusing intensely on dynamics in the Diablo 3 release, i think we’ll see this being heavily exploited in that next-gen MMO in the making. If so, i think the current development on it is simply a brand new engine written from the bottom up by Blizzard, making the foundations for a seriously huge, detailed and dynamic MMO, likely set in the Diablo universe, but could potentially be a substitutive version of WoW, since they are running on the third expansion at this time, i cannot see this being set in the SC universe, there is simply to little in SC to make an MMO out of.
If its a dieing breed then why did Torchlight out sell Borderlands and Left 4 Dead 2 its first weak? Why does Dragon Age origins focus on its single player and still become a best-seller? Your an idiot. Fucking learn how to wright a blog.
@ all you retarded morons….
there is one thing you all seem to overlook.
Blizzard, as a corporation, doesn’t really care if you like the idea, or if you think it looks gay. they know they’re products will sell millions regardless. Futhermore, they know that no matter how much you deny it on here…each and everyone of you will be all to willing to pay out the ass for it.
I Like single player RPG games alot better