Hi Diablo fans

January Fratzer, an editor friend of mine on Looki.de conducted in collaboration with Diablogamer.com an interview with Jay Wilson, lead designer Diablo3.

Since many other sites sometimes completely trivial things have asked, I am quite happy with the result. The questions come mostly from our community, but unfortunately we could not for lack of time to bring everything under.

The selection of the questions later, Jan has taken over, after I had given him a nice compilation of your suggestions.

Read for yourself and discuss with us in the forum with:

Jan: Hi Jay! Thank you for taking the time. Could you introduce yourself first of all our readers?

Jay Wilson: Hi! My name is Jay Wilson and I am the lead designer of Diablo 3

Jan: The Diablo series is a true classic. Can you describe to our readers want, what exactly makes up the number in your eyes and how to expand their Diablo with the third part now?

Jay Wilson: Well, when we started working on Diablo 3, we wanted to build on the important aspects of its predecessor. The focus was on the accessibility of the title. Therefore, we decided to retain the isometric perspective and the related gameplay. Even the setting, the myriad of items and the co-operative play was very important.

All these elements are crucial for a game like Diablo. Naturally, the fighting can be very satisfying. If you struggle with an ax or a stick on the monster strikes, it must feel just fine. To achieve this, we placed great emphasis on the animations and sound effects. Thus, we tried to keep the players in the long term in a good mood.

Jan: How are you trying now to the third part of the gameplay to improve and which part was the challe serious for you as the lead designer of the game?

Jay Wilson: I think the two are the most challenging aspects of both the randomness of the battles and cooperative games. We design individual campaigns always ways to make them accessible to multiple players in Coop mode. If, therefore, a second in the running game, we raise not only the difficulty of the fights, that means more, however, that the actual quests need to be adjusted at any time the number of players. In view of the randomness, we are also always a major challenge. Due to the fact that the fights are never given in Diablo 3, but will always be generated, we must ensure that the design Aufeindertreffen with opponents so that they are neither too easy nor too difficult. Furthermore, it is as a designer for the items, which are their way, often before a difficult decision.

Jan: PvP (player versus player) plays in the Diablo 2 community a crucial role. Which PvP features are planned for Diablo 3? Perhaps the title is indeed in its way, for example the World Cyber ​​Games?

Jay Wilson: We definitely want to add a dedicated PvP modes, but we have not yet been determined in this regard. Currently we are still testing what aspects in this regard will find their way into the game. Clearly we are aware of the fact that players are dueling in Diablo 2, which is funny in and of itself, because PvP in Diablo 2 was never intended as a real mode.

On the one hand we want to PvP with the third part, promote and provide support, on the other hand we will try to go a few elements to it out of the way, suffered by the co-op mode of play would.

In Diablo 2, it was the event that the player through the PvP possibilities you had not had the urge to play with each other. Of course that was never our intention. What we are trying now, is to promote the cooperative aspect of the game, by separating the PvP mode of the cooperative. How will this look like exactly, but I can not say yet. But suffice to say that Diablo players who love PvP and will find that Diablo 3 PvP support is better than other games have been. Our main focus is definitely on but the co-op.
Jan: It was already mentioned that the control should be simplified in D3. So shall the full game be playable with the mouse. How exactly should we imagine that?

Jay Wilson: Yes, Diablo 3, we are continuing the tradition of making the full game playable with the mouse. This is not to say that you are not using the keyboard. In fact, we have implemented several new features with respect to the control. This allows the individual skills change with either Tab or the mouse wheel. Next, we have integrated a Hotbar, which allows the player to use four skills. For this reason we have decided also to remove the occupancy of the F-keys. The Hotbar will find an icon of luxury a lot of friends because we are sure.

Jan: Like Diablo 2, will be the third part again divided into acts. As the players have the size relationship between a Diablo 2 - Diablo 3, and act to introduce, and how long will you play some part in the story of an act? How many acts will probably be?

Jay Wilson: Yes, although one of us at the beginning of the development of Diablo 3 was not planned to divide the play into acts, it has over time with "natural" felt it to do, so we figured, why we should fight it. However, we can not say exactly whether the proportions of the Act differ from those of Diablo 2. We strive at least to a similar season as in Diablo 2.

Jan: Is there already be seen whether it will offer the player Diablo 3 different storylines, or an alternate ending?

Jay Wilson: I would not go so far as to say that we aim at an alternate ending, we try to give the player the impression, however, with his actions to influence the world. Strands of it, however, in all probability, not give.

Jan: Free trade was one of the items with large differences in WoW. Will it still be possible to replace all items free? Players must adapt to a compromise between the two systems in order to prevent such trading quest rewards?

Jay Wilson: We actually discussed within the team about it. My personal opinion is that a game based on Diablo trade, while WoW is a game based on raids. Who wants to grab the best items in Diablo, trading with other players. If we restrict the action of Diablo 3, we would miss the heart of the game while a stake. The free action is, in my view, constitute a vital part of the game and therefore we will restrict trade too great.

Jan: For many players, the limitations in terms of the inventory in Diablo 2 is a thorn in the side. To what extent have planned before, to improve the game in this regard?

Jay Wilson: The inventory situation is similar to the speed - the player can not get enough of both. In principle, one can say that no matter how much space is available it is the players always want more. I admit that the restrictions on the inventory in Diablo 2 were too large. We definitely have the intention of the players in Diablo 3 provide you with more space in your inventory.

Jan: The Diablo series was never known to have high hardware requirements for their time. How does it work in this regard in Diablo 3? Ranging from an actual computer to be able to play Diablo 3 at the liquid release?

Jay Wilson: Well, the release is still far away, so that we can not say much, the conditions can, however, we are, as in all other Blizzard titles, everything to make our product runs on as many systems as possible, properly . Players who flirt for Diablo 3 with a new PC, I would advise to wait until the actual release of the game and then to buy one for the average computer time. On this the game will run with excellent security.

Jan: For some time, physics is an important component of computer games. Blizzard has to jump on the train and Diablo 3, for example, using the Euphoria engine to help even more realism?

Jay Wilson: In Diablo 3, we use the Havok physics engine. However, we are very careful in this respect, after all, we want the game on as many PC running fast. The situation is similar even in our graphics engine. Our technology enables current techniques such as normal maps, per-pixel shading, reflections and more. We currently use only a fraction of the whole method. Before implementing anything in the game, we ask ourselves whether this performance will suffer greatly, or not. For this reason, we focus more on the artistic design of the game, as on modern graphics technology. This sees the game very well and still runs very, very quickly.

Jan: Diablo 3 will be released for the PC. It is an exclusive title, or console gamers can hope for?

Jay Wilson: Currently we have planned in this respect, nothing concrete yet, but we do not look at Blizzard as a developer of PC games, but as a pure game developers.

The games that we develop and function on the PC, but a bit better than on consoles. WoW is a good example. We do our best to make our games as much as possible and have therefore usually no time to come to terms with the various control methods and adaptations of different platforms.

Of all the games we have developed so far, but Diablo is the title that would still put most easily dar. It would indeed be some small problems in a reaction, but this should not pose great challenges for us. Currently we focus clearly on the PC version. I can not say whether there will be one day a console version, only that we are not currently working on it.

Jan: Thank you for the interview!

Source: http://www.looki.de/games/gc_08_interview_mit_jay_wilson_spezial_a3657_1.html

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