I think telling people how Diablo 3 is a shadow of its original would be like beating the dead horse at this point but here's a question:
What can be done to make Diablo series have that eeriness and horror element that made the Original and to some extent the sequel popular?
Lets starts at the roots.
Diablo
The story was simple: descend into the cathedral and confront the evil that's been causing all the demons to spawn.
Of course the music was one of the prime elements that gave the game the atmosphere, but there's also something else.
The quests that led to confronting Diablo added a lot more to the atmosphere; the NPCs were talking about unspeakable horrors, constantly foreshadowing something far worse that awaits you below the dark dungeons.
Example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e02G...1AB4DE39C3183C
Next comes in the gameplay.
I was a bit slow paced, but it worked since you were constantly in closed off space and the areas you were traversing were small and narrow. It also forced you to think quickly, when numerous enemies appeared, you had to make sure they wouldn't flank you and in case of ranged enemies, they would run away from you and in meantime you could be pelted with projectiles of others while you were chasing them.
To use magic, you had to upgrade your mana pool before you could learn it.
And finally, the graphics and it's probably one of the biggest components that added to the the eeriness of the game.
The claymation in itself looks creepy; nothing's more disturbing (at least in my opinion) than to have something that's capable of moving but is normally not supposed to without external visible force, move on its own, the creepy factor skyrockets with that.
Let's continue with its sequel:
Diablo 2
So the story continues from where it left off last time, but this time it adds more complexity: track down diablo and his brothers and kill them.
Music has not changed and still adds a lot to the atmosphere of the game.
The NPCs still foreshadow the horrors that await you just as in the original game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1IS...list=PL3DF9The gameplay620E
Gameplay however is where the biggest change happened and it detracted from some of the horror.
Since the story this time aground is grander than previously, the areas had to expand and this time they're no longer in a close off places but an open environment with no loading time.
As such they had to add the running option, since you cannot slow walk through the entire world as you could earlier (I mean you could, but you would become bored slow walking on open plains).
But more on the combat: since the open world was introduced, the environment became far different than before. Because you could no longer use narrow passages to your advantage to prevent enemies from flanking and swarming you (except in rare cases), the combat had to adjust accordingly to be more fast paced and things became more flashy as the result; in some cases you simply breezed through enemies that weren't bosses and I think this is where some of that tension from the original fell off.
But it also added more good complexity to the gameplay. Now your class had a specific skill roster that was meant only for you and you could choose the playstyle you wanted to pursue, while some skills even boosting other ones.
Another addition to the gameplay were the mercenaries which eased the game for you, even if they did become a bit useless in later difficulties.
And finally animation. I think the character animation became better to its original. Visuals are more detailed, but there's still a sense of uncanniness to it.
I probably shouldn't bother talking about the problems of the 3rd instalment, but I guess I should anyway:
DIablo 3
The story is complex, but also a mess at the same time: It takes place 20 years later, the iconic recurring character dies, the girl who was with him was a perfect replacement as the new generation to continue the Horadric legacy, which would be a good story development, until it's revealed that she's Diablo's daughter and ends up getting possessed by him and end up turning into him, while the angel become a human, even though there was never mentioned such thing is possible.
The music no longer adds to the atmosphere like it did in the previous 2 and it's easily forgettable.
The NPCs no longer add to the latter either, since there's no sense of dread in the dialogue, but I think it's also because your playable character has a voice of his/her own. In the previous games your character would be silent and would only speak at specific points in game, like entering a specific area or killing a quest boss, it was a joy to hear the character's outlook on the situation. Here however there's constant banter between you companion and whoever is tagging along during your adventure, which also breaks the atmosphere; were this a Bioware game like Dragon Age it would've been a different story.
Gameplay was honestly a downgrade.
It was made too simplistic. I think it was a time when Blizzard wanted to remove the skill trees because of the cookie cutter builds that have been set, including in World of Warcraft, and tried to replace it with something more meaningful. While it did work for WoW, the same cannot be said here. One of the big things in Diablo, especially the 2nd was the anticipation for the next level when you could finally unlock a new skill of your choosing, while here they simply decided to give you ALL the skils without focusing on specific specialization.
As for the animation, while it looks good, I think that's the problem: it looks good, it doesn't have that unsettling messy look nor the uncanny character movement of the previous games that resembled claymation.
In conclusion:
So what can be done to improve the sequel?
Well, for starters the story of course.
But the most important is recapturing the atmosphere,
The music and character dialogue that builds up the horror is really important.
I think the animation is the trickiest part, because it would take alot of thinking through how can you make visuals that inspire dread, while also keeping it modern so that peple don't call it "90s graphics".
As for the gemaplay... I'd rather hear it from the rest of you.
Actually, I'd like the heard your thoughts in general.
Or do you think D3 is so bad that that the franchise is perma dead?