Almighty Video Game Designer - Chapter 192
Chapter 192: Demon Hunter
There was chatter after the cinematic finished.
“Incredible! The cinematics from Thunderbolt Movies still maintain their high standards!”
“I could see every single strand of hard on the girl. I think the manager started burning his money again.”
“What does that mean? I don’t understand what just happened. The old man already looked so sad, why was he hit by a meteor? Was it because he doesn’t his old lady cross the road?”
“The girl was so shocked. Where’s my grandad? Oh wait, where’s my uncle?”
“Start the game, I can’t wait!”
They entered a character select screen.
Five different heroes stood around a campfire under the blanket of darkness, so dark that you could only see their outline.
They looked like they had different looks and equipment. Some had cloth armor, leather, plate armor, wielding weapons like a great axe, crossbow, staff…
Zou Zhuo was quite excited to see this unique character select screen as it felt incredibly immersive, as though he was facing a group of malicious men.
Unlike other RPGs where every character looked like perfect dolls.
A tall strong barbarian stood in the centre of the screen wearing basic armor with a tribal tattoo.
Chen Mo didn’t pick the barbarian from Diablo 3, but Diablo 2. Gone was the old man with ashen hair and beard, in its place was a huge man like Kratos.
“Barbarian? Looks similar to a berserker.”
Zou Zhuo clicked on the other characters.
Everytime he clicked on one of them, they would walk out from the shadows next to the fire, making themselves in full view of the player. The character that was selected before would retreat back into the shadows.
Cool, crossbow wielding Demon Hunter.
Magic wielding Wizard.
The Eastern looking Monk skilled in battle.
Mask wearing Witch Doctor with the power over life and death.
Zou Zhuo clicked on each character to look through them.
There were only five different classes to choose from in this version. Chen Mo planned to add Crusader, Witch Doctor, ranked mode and a competitive mode later.
The player could pick from any of the unique classes. They would also go through a character introduction for each character, showing off special abilities and their story.
Zou Zhuo couldn’t help but quickly go through the story of all the characters.
It didn’t take long for him to notice the difference in the design of classes in Diablo and other games.
At first glance, the characters are exactly the same as classic western fantasy characters (warrior, wizard, archer, crusader, etc.), just reskinned. But after looking deeper into their abilities and story, they were actually starkly different.
The biggest difference was the lack of differentiation between characters by separating them into defensive, offensive and support style characters. All characters were offensive characters, only differing in the way they did damage.
Moreover, these characters matched perfectly with Diablo’s theme.
Take Demon Hunters for example. They possess an innate ability to resist demonic corruption. They allow them to use the power of demons as a weapon, wielding crossbows to destroy their enemies.
They are relentless vigilanties sworn to do one thing: Destroy the creatures of the Burning Hell.
Compared to the run of the mill archers, Demon Hunters suited Diablo much better. They differentiated themselves by different abilities and talents too, not completely relying on bows.
“Demon Hunter? This guy looks cool. It’s him it is.”
Zou Zhuo picked a male Demon Hunter, giving him the nickname ‘Zzz’.
A demon hunter that looked to be at the start of journey appeared on his screen, with little to no armor and a pathetic crossbow in his hand. He looked skinny and weak but had a cold murderous look in his eyes.
Zou Zhuo started the game incredibly happy with himself as loved vibes like these as he personally loved the Undead.
A vellum with drawing on it passed by the screen accompanied by a deep dark voice.
“My family was butchered by hellspawn. To witness such a thing is enough to leave your mind in ruins.
“I was left frightened and alone, until I was rescued.
“Rescued by survivors, who had joined together to rid the world of the creatures of Hell. They saw in me the strength to resist the demons. And they forged me into a weapon.”
“Now, I am ready.
“A meteor has fallen in Tristram, and the dead have risen in its wake. I will send them back to their graves. Once, I was hunted. Now…I am the hunter.”
A few lines were more than enough to convey the entire backstory of the Demon Hunter. It also helped the players focus on ‘meteor’ which was an important theme in the story.
Zou Zhuo was then placed in an empty field with a small village off the screen.
“So it is actually not first person.”
Everyone knew that this was a third person game, but Zou Zhuo couldn’t help but be disappointed upon seeing the gameplay himself as it would be more immersive in first person.
Luckily, Zou Zhuo was a seasoned Warcraft player and was quite used to a perspective like this.
The graphics were incredibly high quality. They could tell that Chen Mo spent a lot of effort on the graphics as every detail, icon, and pattern were extremely high quality, completely different from what the players are used to with third person RPGs.
The UI was clean and the theme was obvious. Zou Zhuo knew the controls after just looking through which abilities were bound to which hotkeys.
After making his character spin in a circle or two, Zou Zhuo was sure that it was a 3D game with 3D scenes and models. Everything was in 3D of fairly high quality. Chen Mo deliberately chose to lock the perspective forcing the players to go through the game in third person.
The animations were really smooth, the arcs of the bolts were well done too.
However, the graphics gave away a really tense vibe. The scene felt riddled with death before meeting many undead creatures. Dim street lamps, broken carts, and corpses suggested a world in a dire situation,
The Demon Hunter continued walking forwards and was met by a zombie.
After the first bolt, the growling monster charged at the Demon Hunter. Zou Zhuo handily kited[1] and killed the monster with ease.
TL note[1]: Kiting means to hit and run at the same time.
