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The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

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Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#41

Post by ShabbosGoy »

hitekker wrote: post #27
nilkn wrote: post #13

I'd really enjoy seeing a modern ARPG that is legitimately unsettling and dark in the way that Diablo was (and D2, to a slightly lesser extent). We've got D3, which has really fun gameplay but feels commercialized and looks like WoW, and we've got PoE, which has a lot of really brilliant ideas and has a darker theme but at no point is ever actually unsettling.

I agree that D3 was a let-down. Story, graphics and all lacked the spirit, and thereby, the greatness of Diablo 1 and Diablo 2.

Path of Exile is, IMO, the true successor to D1 and D2.

Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#42

Post by amsilprotag »

AndrewOMartin wrote: post #20
AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #9

Worth noting to those who haven't read the pitch: the original design for Diablo was turn-based . The hexagonal movement system was causing a huge headache for the programmers, however, and eventually they decided to make it real-time. The now-defunct Gametrailers did an amazing retrospective on the Diablo series at some point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83bFa9qL8XQ EDIT: I also thought some of the side illustra…

Allow me to quote Diablo developer David Brevik describing when he finally yielded to demands and hacked together a "real time" version of his turn-based Diablo, by making turns elapse the rate of 20 turns a second. 'I remember taking the mouse, and I clicked on the mouse, and the warrior walked over and and smacked the skeleton down, and I was like "Oh my god! That was awesome!".' 'And the sun shone through the wind…

If you're interested in Blizzard history, there's a 4-hour interview with Rob Pardo hosted by Civ 4 lead and Offworld Trading Company creator Soren Johnson. Pardo also recounts the beginnings of Diablo in part one around ~1:27:00, although he wasn't involved in the project at that time.

Starcraft, WoW, and Hearthstone are also discussed. Warning: audio quality is not great.

https://www.idlethumbs.net/designernotes/episodes/rob-pardo-...

https://www.idlethumbs.net/designernotes/episodes/rob-pardo-...

Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#43

Post by nvarsj »

Humdeee wrote: post #10

Fond memories of this as a kid. I remember after playing it for a while with friends and coming across BoBaFett's trainer and DooM-Gaze's (sic?) trainer enabling god-mode, fast spellcast, maxed stats, Godly Plate of the Whale armor, King's Sword of Haste, dropping elixirs all over town around Deckard Cain, etc. I was legitimately scared at my age to step into the cracks of hell to go after Diablo when they opened beh…

I was in high school when Diablo came out and it was epic. Me and several of my friends played many late night sessions for months. We were exhausted at school, but we had a blast and I wouldn't trade those nights for anything - so much fun.

Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#44

Post by hsljekskfh »

amsilprotag wrote: post #42
AndrewOMartin wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Allow me to quote Diablo developer David Brevik describing when he finally yielded to demands and hacked together a "real time" version of his turn-based Diablo, by making turns elapse the rate of 20 turns a second. 'I remember taking the mouse, and I clicked on the mouse, and the warrior walked over and and smacked the skeleton down, and I was like "Oh my god! That was awesome!".' 'And the sun shone through the wind…

If you're interested in Blizzard history, there's a 4-hour interview with Rob Pardo hosted by Civ 4 lead and Offworld Trading Company creator Soren Johnson. Pardo also recounts the beginnings of Diablo in part one around ~1:27:00, although he wasn't involved in the project at that time. Starcraft, WoW, and Hearthstone are also discussed. Warning: audio quality is not great. https://www.idlethumbs.net/designernotes/ep…

on that note, i read a book on blizzard's history "stay awhile and listen" that was not worth it. maybe it was because i read it right after masters of doom, but it felt like they were afraid to say anything negative, and as a result it's boring and also very hard to learn from whatever failures and successes they had.

Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#46

Post by 72mena »

If someone has experience with Game Development I'd like to know your comments on the timeline from the last page. The pitch mentions 1 developer and 2 junior-devs, and the timeline shows 11 months of work (4 of those are for testing). How does that timeline compare to current processes? Any other insights that can be shared from it? Thanks.

Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#47

Post by corysama »

Tokiin wrote: post #32
Reedx wrote: post #15

David Brevik released that just after the Diablo postmortem from GDC a couple years ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VscdPA6sUkc Worth watching for any fans of the original and if you want more context around that pitch. Lots of interesting tidbits about the origins of Diablo and Blizzard North. And an amusing moment during the Q&A: Someone in the audience went up and gave David some money to make up for pirating…

Related vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4D_bVgplit0 IGN Unfiltered episode with David about his origins and the creation of Diablo/Blizzard North.

FYI: We collect material like this over in https://www.reddit.com/r/TheMakingOfGames/

Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#48

Post by jsgo »

I miss this game moreso than probably any others in the series, maybe any game at all outside of perhaps Chrono Trigger. There were trainers and what not, but I remember after playing through it trying to create a "godmode" character proper (no trainer) by specifically hunting for tomes to increase spells. That was probably the thing that bummed me most about D2 and subsequently D3 in that leveling spells after you'd "maxed out" was still something you could grind in D1.

Vaguely related but mildly funny anecdote, I got into this game really late (basically, when it was cheap). I remember buying it from Wal-Mart and also buying one of the bigger bags of crispy M&Ms (Wikipedia says those came out in 1999 so I must have been even later than I remember). The game was incredibly good, but the first couple times playing it, I'm going through said bag of M&Ms because the game felt like a pretty intense movie at the time. Ever since that point, anytime I played that game, I'd crave crispy M&Ms, which went away after a while (though have since come back apparently).

Re: The original pitch for Diablo (1994) [pdf]

#50

Post by stevenwoo »

72mena wrote: post #46

If someone has experience with Game Development I'd like to know your comments on the timeline from the last page. The pitch mentions 1 developer and 2 junior-devs, and the timeline shows 11 months of work (4 of those are for testing). How does that timeline compare to current processes? Any other insights that can be shared from it? Thanks.

I did not work on this but you'll need to take in mind that this was a fixed resolution game with 2D sprites. There is no 3D art in the final product. Finally this was just the proposal, Blizzard bought Condor and published Diablo (1) and if you check the mobygames entry (which is usually a pretty accurate copy of the in game credits), it has a much more extensive list of software developers in the credits (three! people on the installer, though to be fair, I'm pretty sure all the guys were down at Blizzard South providing a lot of the low level libraries). IIRC the networking was also outside the scope of Blizzard North's expertise at the time and most of that part was done by Blizzard South via Battle.net. http://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/diablo/credits

edit: it also took them about twice as long including pre development time.

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