Diablo III feels 'even better' on a pad

23 Sep 2011 at 01:39:17 by John Robertson

But direct control support is not likely at launch.

Diablo III's game director, Jay Wilson, has let it be known that Blizzard have been experimenting with with various control schemes for the upcoming dungeon-crawler, including direct character control with an Xbox 360 pad.

According to Wilson, it all comes down to Blizzard being a "game developer" and not a "PC developer."

"We don't see ourselves as a PC developer - we see ourselves as a game developer," Wilson told PC Gamer. "It's just that the games that we wanted to make suit the PC platform.

"We don't believe you can make a Starcraft style RTS and make it Blizzard great on a console, but we would have that idea, and that spark and that passion to make it."

Apparently, there's a feeling at Blizzard that Diablo III is well suited to the console:

"One of the reasons why we’re exploring the idea of a console version of Diablo III is because we feel that the controls and the style of the game lend itself to a console," said Wilson. "With some of our early experiments in putting a direct control scheme into the game via a 360-like analogue controller, I’ve been ‘Oh this feels even better, with direct control…’”

Wilson did finish by saying that such a feature is unlikely on release day:

“I can pretty much guarantee that if we decide to do a console version that we will look to support a pad on the PC. But initially with release I don’t think we’ll be ready.”

To demonstrate this, a video has been uploaded to YouTube of the Diablo III beta being played on a PS3 controller (after being hacked):

Direct control in Diablo III... thoughts?

Source: PC Gamer

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