despite what you point out as advantages of d2, i cannot justify giving d2 any props over bg2. d1 was a landmark game, and without it we would never have had games like plainscape and bg1. true d2 is best at what it does, the hack and slash and the hail of spells that a sorceress can cast. however, all the spells in d2 only have one effect, dealing damage. some spells like the ice spells have an extra effect, freezing enemies. there might be a few other spells i'm not thinkng of. the palidin spells were kinda cool, but got annoying after a while since half of them were the same as the necromancer's spells. necromancer was the most original spell caster out of the bunch, and even he didnt have much else he could do past summoning an army of skelotons and blowing up dead bodies. barbarian has some interesting but farely useless skills, since that wirlwind attack just about diced everthing in site. when i played d2, i loved it and couldnt think of how it could be better (except for the intentional lack of plot, thanx blizzard). then i played bg2, and i couldnt believe that i had ever liked d2 after playing bg2. i'll admit that most people on multiplayer should play d2, since very few people i've played with in bg2 multiplayer care about the plot and just want to kill stuff. however, in single or multiplayer we had to take time to evaluate the situation and choose the most effective attack from a very large selection of tactics, where as in d2 i found my self using the same 2 or 3 spells the entire game, and being a palidin or barbarian was simple as hell. d2 is a constant stream of creatures that you eigther kill, get killed by, or (if your lucky) are able to run away from if they are too tough. in bg2, there were times where i savered the battle, yelled in anger when i lost or danced when i won, and the rest of the time was spent sweating over what i would encounter next. d2 has lots of hit points for characters and very powerful spells, but after playing the way bg2 is balanced, i dont like the way d2 was balanced. i was constantly looking for items that were only slightly better then what i had, and the interesting, unique items where a little too rare and usually didnt have much of an advantage over the normal items in combat. in bg2 when you find a better item, it is usually radically better then what you have, and at times necessary that you have an item of a serton quality. true, there is not as great a range for item stats in bg2, but i kinda like finding a sword that just kicks ass compared to my old one, every time i found a replacement it was MUCH better then the last. and lets not even compare the plot, i mean come on, WHAT plot does diablo 2 have? the same 3 monkey who wrote the script to Scream 3 could do a better job.
final verdict: d2 is all action and no meat, i will continue to play bg2 for a VERY long time...
|