Diablo 3

For all you humans out there, you've probably heard about the craze over this strange game called Diablo 3. I have a copy with me, and played it for a couple days now. Overall I'd say that I'm fairly disappointed with the gameplay, in that it's been rather simplified to the extent that strategizing one's build is mostly out of the hands of the player. Previously, one could choose to min/max the attributes and pick from a range of skills, but in the interest of accessibility it seems that most of the skills are simplified to the extent that spamming seems to be the only realistic way to play the game. Take away the strategy bit and a whole lot of the game's longevity is lost. I've been exploring the auction house lately, and it struck me just how hard it was to find an item there. The search would not provide any meaningful hints of how many entries were found, how many are out there or any form of history. Simply put, it lacks the basic functions that make an auction useful, and that inhibits the move towards price equilibrium in an auction. So far, I've found that anchoring works really well with the people, in that the resale price of the item is actually influencing the auction base price. Overall, I've been having fun playing the market there, arguably more fun than the game itself. Perhaps I've become jaded after gaming for nearly 20 years now, but I seek challenges and perhaps a bit more depth to the gameplay than I previously did. D3 has not delivered that for me. That is not to knock the game for what it does, but that I've found myself becoming quite tired of it after playing for mere days, coming to realize that I am simply running the hamster wheel of rolling ever better items ad nauseam even while repeating the same story over and over. Perhaps this is fun for some players, but it has ceased to be fun for me unfortunately.