Which then comes my question: What was the purpose of showing this video specially now? Did they really think that this could, don't know, make everyone more empathetic towards the devs? Maybe to just show something funny and lighthearted to 'cool the room'? Specially not when the dev team has changed, shifted and danced so much through its development.īut the final idea is that gamers that were already looking at the stains that DIV has, now start to 'join the dots' and say 'aaahh THAT'S why the game doesn't match my expectations, its creators aren't even knowledgeable of the game they have created!'

Specially in huge development projects like Diablo IV. The video has been poorly recieved because the concept of seeing 'devs' play has made everyone assume every developer knows the caveats, theorycrafting and posess and extensive knowledge of every area of the game they have well, developed.Īnd that's not true. That said, like other posts have said, there are plenty of roles in game development - just going off that video, I think it's reasonable that a level designer for a game in this particular genre might not be the most knowledgeable about its mechanics - and, more importantly, being good at a game doesn't necessarily mean you're good at playing it while speaking over it, so the environment in that OP video might not even be representative of how good these developers even are at the game. I do think all the posts saying that there's no reason a game designer shouldn't at least be competent at their own game read like kneejerk shadow-boxing, anyway. I wouldn't expect someone who is particularly bad at shmups and who doesn't have a good sense for what even a moderately decent player gets out of them to be able to nail down those mechanics and that appeal in their own project, for example. If you don't have a good feel for your game and its particular strengths and idiosyncrasies, I think it would be hard to properly develop on them and make something that can resonate with people. I don't think game designers need to necessarily be experts or consistently excellent (at their own games or at others in the genre), but generally playing a game properly (making use of its mechanics and the unique elements that make it fun) is the same as playing it well, and vice-versa.

Diablo 2 gameplay no commentary