I played DII for a long time, on and off, and eventually raised a sorceress up to level 80 something after about two years. Like any game, it grew stale and I moved on to other things. I think I would have given the game a four star out of five (with the expansion). It was innovative for the time, I enjoyed leveling up my toon, and it was fun. It wasn't the type of game that could keep me glued to the screen for hours and hours, but an hour here, a level there, and for what it was I enjoyed it.
Then comes this game. I guess I was expecting something.. more? I refused to play the beta, since I think it can detract from the fun of launch and trying a new game. I anticipated a similar type of experience to DII, however I thought they would obviously refine and update the experience. I have leveled my main toon up to mid 20s, and here is how I feel the game stacks up:
1) Its the same game fundamentally as DII. The graphics vastly better, but you are still locked in to an overhead view with high resolutions surroundings. I was looking for options to change the camera, zoom out, do anything... but they never added any of that. The environments look good, but its the same as DII - you go out into a randomly generated plane, scattered with the odd monster lair, groups of mobs, fog of war, and teleporters back to town. You have acts and bosses and lots of loot to choose from. Its primarily the same thing.
2) They did away with the talent trees and replaced them with abilities you get as you level. You assign an attack per button on your mouse and then get others you can use on 1-4 on your keyboard. The good thing is you get access eventually to all the abilities and can choose on the fly which ones you want. No more placing points into trees where you get 2% more damage for frost spells or getting stuck picking abilities that you later regretted. You also don't place any ability points - its all on autolevel. The thing is... I liked the old system. My build was mine, and I looked forward to that level to place a point, or in three levels will get this ability, etc. I could map out how I wanted to make my toon. Now its all automatic and the only choice I have on my dude is whether its a she or a he, the name, and what ability I want to use for whatever fight. Its much more like a common action game with very watered down RPG elements than an action RPG.
3) Same old grind with your attacks. I tend to use the same attacks... over and over and over and over. For me it has gotten stale much faster than I thought it would. I think that is because its basically DII with enhanced graphics and a crappy leveling system and DII came out 10 years ago. I played that game to death, and I guess I just expected something more. The story is very low key and there really isn't much else there. Its fun to smash mobs over and over or blow them up or what not, but thats all this game really is. It was more enjoyable 10 years ago because it was relatively new then. Now it seems almost a step backwards.
4) The Server. Holy smokes I was blown away by this and is the sole reason why this game gets 2 stars instead of 3 for being just OK. You have to log onto a server to play this game. I understand blizz wants to data mine whatever you do online, and obviously protect their product from piracy, but I honestly don't understand why they went this route. Some people say they wanted to go the multiplayer route more with DIII. The problem with that is the multiplayer is going into public games and pressing two buttons with a 1-2 other people. Its ok I guess for about 3 minutes... but then I just left and played my own game. Others say they wanted to use the online auction house. A decent idea, but I really don't know how many people will find that all that attractive. You get loot so fast, and level up, and get better loot that before you know it that rare item you got two days ago is now junk. Why spend money on those items when in a day or two you will not need it? But it still boils down to having to log on. And I still have to wait sometimes to get on because the server is full. For what in my book is a single player game. Then I get on... and you get the server restart in 15 minutes BS.. or the game is laggy as heck and your toon jumps all over and it glitches out. If your like me and just want to turn it on and blast the snot outa baddies for about ~ 30 minutes (until it gets boring), then the whole server thing is just an incredibly over the top DRM system. I thought maybe the chat thing was something that would make it worthwhile and was treated to Superbubbaz and Cooldoodz23 performing 12 year old wow like trade chat - that was definitely not a positive addition. I don't see anything they added here thats a bonus and not a detractor. If a DRM subtracts from the pleasure you get out of the product they put out - that god awful mess for HofMM6 is a good example, then the DRM is a failure. This isn't as bad as that, but its close.
So overall its a two star game for me. Logged on tonight... went about 5 minutes and just logged out and wrote this review. Its only a few days old and I feel like I've been playing it for 4 months. Too bad I guess, I was hoping they would do much more with this game.