Over at the World of Warcraft forums, Blizzard poster Bashiok has chimed in on a discussion about player killing (PK) options in the recently announced Diablo III, saying that Blizzard will do their best to discourage unprovoked betrayal and griefing of party members in the sequel.
The main focus is intended to be on cooperation and working towards common goals, although that won’t necessarily rule out all PvP options. Bashiok explains:
"We’re – in general – not big fans of griefing for any game. It’s really only "fun" for one person, and that definition of fun isn’t generally something we’re going to want to encourage. It’s far more positive to encourage and support meaningful and skillful options and systems within a game, than a mechanic for people to instantly turn against one another for no meaningful gameplay reasons.
We have a large focus on cooperative play for Diablo III, and the mechanics and design decisions related to multiplayer are likely going to be based on supporting and encouraging it as much as possible, and not breaking it down.
That doesn’t mean that PvP won’t have its own focus, but those are details and features we aren’t yet discussing."
The reaction to this news has been mixed thus far, but I think that attempting to maintain civil gameplay is definitely a good choice on the part of Blizzard. Then again, I’m not a total a**hole, so I wouldn’t know how it feels to be on the other side of the argument.
[via worldofwarcraft]
