George J. Heuer
Well, get out of your dilemma and get Daggerfall with its latest
patch of course. It is far more worthwhile. Of course, it does
depend a little on what you are looking for. In Diablo it is all hack
and slash. The quests are extremely shallow and in multi player mode
very few. You will be spending your entire time trying to find better
equipment and playing levels over and over again in the hopes of
finding better equipment. You will also be cheating at some point,
IMHO, for gold at least if nothing else.
Daggerfall is much more your typical RPG with its much more
elaborate quests that do not dry out or stop after you get so far
through the game. In Daggerfall you have much more character
interaction and inventory management to be concerned with. Daggerfall
is a much richer dungeon game then Diablo. That said and done if
adventuring is your interest get Daggerfall. If killing is your
interest get Diablo. If you would like to go adventuring with other
players over the Internet then neither game will work. You can play
Diablo in multi player mode via the Internet but you will only be
hacking and slashing to kill Diablo. Daggerfall does not have any
multi player mode. It really isn't any more complicated then that.
My only regret about Daggerfall (I have not played it yet) is that
Bethesda did such a god awful initial release of it, but I understand
now with patch 200 +? the game has settled down to being quite
enjoyable.
My regret about Diablo is the PeopleKilling (PKing) and
TownKilling and equipment and gold cheating that is so rampant. After
killing Diablo once in multiplayer and earning my red spot I tried to
advance further in nightmare mode. This proved to difficult and
frustrating for me as I could not find better equipment to stave off
the blows of the much stronger monsters. At this point trying to
continue without cheating was futile. In the end I hated Diablo very
much for getting so hooked on it and spending so darn much time.
There was no adventure value in it.
I have a feeling after reading all of this that you will KNOW
which one you would really like to get. And I truly would not be
surprised which. Both games seem to be going in opposite directions
now. Daggerfall is coming together as a much better game then it
started out as, while Diablo seems to fall apart more as cheating
permeates through it.
Must I add IMHO? Good luck.
* Susan * <Sus...@concentric.net>
Both games have demos. Download the demos and try them out yourself.
snip
> My only regret about Daggerfall (I have not played it yet) is that
> Bethesda did such a god awful initial release of it, but I understand
> now with patch 200 +? the game has settled down to being quite
> enjoyable.
I played and upgrade Daggerfall up to patch 195(194) and the game still
crashed very frequently when I was equipped with multiple custom made
magical items.
>
> At this point trying to
> continue without cheating was futile. In the end I hated Diablo very
> much for getting so hooked on it and spending so darn much time.
> There was no adventure value in it.
>
snip
> Daggerfall is coming together as a much better game then it
> started out as, while Diablo seems to fall apart more as cheating
> permeates through it.
>
> Must I add IMHO? Good luck.
>
> * Susan * <Sus...@concentric.net>
I only play Diablo on local networks and none of us have downloaded the
cheats. In my opinion Diablo is a very balanced game. What is the fun if
it *isn't* hard. When you encounter to hard resistance on
nightmare/caves you have to go back to normal/hell looking for stuff or
nightmare/cat looking for money, books and shrines. Then when you
finally manage nightmare/caves it feels like an acievement.
Playing Daggerfall though (besides the caves being ridiculously large,
illogical and boring) you get no sense of achievement. I never found a
cave that was to hard and if I returned to an already explored cave the
monsters were back matching my new level.
You mention cheating in Diablo. To do that you have to download special
software or spend *hours* trying to crack the game. In Daggerfall
cheating is built into the game design! You simply spend a few real
world hours casting spells in a hotel, do a few quest, fabricate some
magical items (each having 4 increased abilities and 4 player takes
damage in Holy Places) and suddenly you can make attack spells that
kills anything and combined defense spell that makes you virtually
invulnerable and the spells have *negative* cost. After that the game is
boring.
I personally can't stop myself from making a character as powerful as
possible within the rules of a game. In that perspective Diablo is a fun
game and Daggerfall isn't.
Of course Daggerfall has it's "roleplaying" perspective. I for example
originally decided to play a paladin. I spent an hour or two designing a
character and doing the first cave. When I met common people in town
trying to ask for great heroics the only things the program let me say
was "Any semihonest work around"....
Just my two-pence
Håkan
btw, if you have the time, you can download demos of each game, albion,
diablo, and daggerfall.
$0.02
--
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Dennis Voong, aka Yellow Four
email: katt...@pacbell.net
Computers and games stuff @
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Plains/9713/
I'd say more than a little. See below.
>In Diablo it is all hack
>and slash. The quests are extremely shallow and in multi player mode
>very few.
Hmmm, how do you like the FedEx quest in Daggerfall? There are more
than a few you know. My point, besides the main quest, the rest of
Daggerfall offers no more depth than what Diablo has to offer. Sure,
there are a few multi-part mini-quests, still these entails nothing
more than a sequence of dungeon excursion.
>You will be spending your entire time trying to find better
>equipment and playing levels over and over again in the hopes of
>finding better equipment. You will also be cheating at some point,
>IMHO, for gold at least if nothing else.
Gold? That's laughable. My mage and rogue drops tens of thousands of
gold every time they venture into the dungeon.
>Bethesda did such a god awful initial release of it, but I understand
>now with patch 200 +? the game has settled down to being quite
>enjoyable.
Let me put it this way, I played DF until patch 179, when patch 191
came out I stopped patching and hence stopped playing. Why? Sure the
game 'stabilizes' somewhat, but DF's lame excuse for a patch was
the last straw. There were a few famous bugs including binding
multiple souls to a magical item - the bugs involve a trick to
avoid negative attributes associates with binding the souls. DF's
solution? Allow only a single soul to be bound. Most importantly,
up until I stopped playing DF, Bethesda never fixed the clipping
and falling into the void problem. I don't know about you, but
Diablo's relatively bug-free release was more than a little bit
refreshing after laboring through hours of nervous play with DF.
> My regret about Diablo is the PeopleKilling (PKing) and
>TownKilling and equipment and gold cheating that is so rampant.
Townkill is a problem, I admit. There are ways to work around it.
One of them is joining a guild. I belong to one of them and I
have never been happier. You get to play weeks after weeks with
someone you can trust. Diablo is a cooperative game. It's nice
to get to know the other players' styles before you play with
them.
>After killing Diablo once in multiplayer and earning my red spot I tried to
>advance further in nightmare mode. This proved to difficult and
>frustrating for me as I could not find better equipment to stave off
>the blows of the much stronger monsters.
My rogue has a hell of a problem playing in nightmare mode. Did I
quit playing her? Not in a million years. Sure she needs better
equipment, so, what I'm doing these days is running her in
normal/hell picking up treasures. So far, she found a saintly
Gothic plate, Obsidian ring of stars and other treasures. It's
not quite enough to get her through nightmare/hell alone. But
if I wish to kill Diablo, I can always get my buddy to help me
out.
You should realize that Diablo was designed to be a cooperative
game from the outset. The difficulty of the game is commensurate to
the fact that there are a few individuals in the party. Further more,
the strength of the game lies on the fact that no single class
of character is best for every situation. This is again, IMHO,
by design. It provides an incentive for people to join a band
so that they can leverage on the other players' strength.
>At this point trying to
>continue without cheating was futile. In the end I hated Diablo very
>much for getting so hooked on it and spending so darn much time.
>There was no adventure value in it.
See above. Make no mistake, this is not an adventure game. Play
Myst if you like an adventure game. If the mere mention of Myst
offends you, well, try Wizardry Nemesis.
> I have a feeling after reading all of this that you will KNOW
>which one you would really like to get. And I truly would not be
>surprised which. Both games seem to be going in opposite directions
>now. Daggerfall is coming together as a much better game then it
>started out as, while Diablo seems to fall apart more as cheating
>permeates through it.
I agree on your last point. Comparing Daggerfall and Diablo makes
little sense. However on the point about Diablo's cheating, I
disagree. I know of many honest Diablo players who never use
hacked items, dupe, or hack their stats. In DF, it's impossible
to play the game without using any of the mini-cheat. What would
you consider sitting in a tavern, repeatedly casting spell so
that the skill can be increased? Now, try playing DF without
using the cheat, see if you can advance the skill level legitimately.
Then there is the refusing quest from mage guild until you get
a guard duty. The point is, the multiplayer nature of Diablo makes
cheating particularly offensive, while the playing-it-in-your-own-
home nature of Daggerfall means using cheat is just a way to adjust
the game difficulty.
My punch line, if you dabble with CRPG, buy Diablo. It's the best
game I've played in my 10 years of gaming experience. If you
are a hardcore CRPG, buy Diablo as well. There is nothing wrong
with hack'n slash. Sure it doesn't offer a great story, but it's
fun to play and it's more addictive than anything I've seen.
You shouldn't choose between Diablo and DF, buy Diablo and play
it. I'm not saying you shouldn't buy DF. But IMHO, DF is an
option. If you think you can stand the bugs and you just love
hours of involved game play and rich story line, DF is a game
for you.
Later...
--
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K I R A T I L A I S A T H I T kir...@u.washington.edu
>I am in a delima which should I buy?
They are very different. Diablo has a online multiplayer option.
Without that, it is a rather restricted game. However, if you find
some people who who like to play with, there is the real interaction
that you can't get from playing versus a machine.
And of course, there are some running expenses too.
For playinga alone, Daggerfall seems the best choice. First of all,
it is incredibly huge. Just the first dungeon and the nearby town
could been sold as a stand-alone game, and there are hundreds of
dungeons and towns, from small hamlets to large cities. Also there
are several competing guilds and temples, each with its own blend
of fighting and magic. There are lots of different quests to perform,
lots of different weapons and armor, user-defined spells and potions
and magic items.
On the downside, NPCs are very cardboard. You'll be alone with your
fantasy, basically. Also the graphics is VGA instead of SVGA.
I've been playing Daggerfall since shortly after its release, and
suspect I'll be playing for some months yet. So to me it is good
value for money.
If you buy Daggerfall, be sure to get the latest patch, as the program
was pressed to CD in a rather unfinished state. (More like beta.)
I got a patch from my retailer, the newest was also downloadable from
www.bethsoft.com last I checked.
--
itl...@sn.no Yes! The one and only Magnus Itland.
The first signs of mental breakdown can be subtle,
such as for instance a slightly changed signature.
I also think Daggerfall is very good, but looking around on this
very newsgroup it seems fair to say that some people dislike it
strongly. I think Daggerfall is a "love or hate" game.
Also I would recommend Daggerfall for grown-ups, but not for kids.
--
itl...@sn.no Yes! The one and only Magnus Itland.
The first signs of mental breakdown can be subtle,
such as for instance a slightly altered signature.
I am very much a grownup, and I have liked many RPG's such as U7 and
the Might and Magic games, but I really hated Daggerfall. The crappy
graphics, repetitive town scenes, pointless quests, etc. made it no
fun at all for me. I don't normally like action games like Doom, but
I found Diablo very enjoyable for quite a while even though it is more
action than true RPG. I am now off Diablo until there is some kind of
sequel or expansion pack, but it was VERY fun while it lasted.
Hold off to the end of the year and buy REDGUARD, the new ELDER SCROLLS
ADVENTURES game <G>.