Both Diablo 2 and 3 are revered as great Blizzard games. But D2R feels as far from Diablo 3 as it could be, with wildly different gameplay, pacing, visuals, storytelling, and endgame content. So in this article, it is high time to figure out how Diablo 2: Resurrected Is Different From Diablo 3.

Different Combat Gameplay

While both games involve furious mouse-clicking, combat between Diablo 2: Resurrected and Diablo 3 has a very different tenor. The pacing is much slower and more deliberate in Diablo 2. Diablo 2 also tends to have more enemies than act as HP sponges rather than because they have particularly elaborate combat routines, and variety and strategic interest tend to come more often through enemy combinations.

Diablo 3 shakes this up via its classes and with enemies that move in slightly more varied ways, and particularly through elite enemies and their packs that must more active movement from players. Many enemies use skills that restrict player movement or force them around the map, making combat more active minute-to-minute. Diablo 3's characters tend to be sprier, with more movement-oriented abilities available to them, and some of the abilities granted higher-tier enemies reflect this, asking players to get out of the way of barriers, traps, and damage pools rather than just tanking damage.

Different Character Skill

Diablo 2: Resurrected is different from Diablo 3 in some major ways regarding character progression and leveling. Resurrected has a more rigid system, with players being allowed to distribute their points as they wish and a single skill point being given to distribute at will toward one of a character's flowchart-styled skill trees. Diablo 3 automated the process almost entirely, with skills and Runes for those skills unlocking as a character leveled up and Attributes being distributed automatically with various distribution biases based on a character's class.

While it's possible to respect a Diablo 2 character, there are limited opportunities to do so, and when the free ones have run out, it's a grind to get more, meaning that players will want to have at least some general sense of how they'd like to start their character after going through the game on Normal difficulty.

Different Loot System

Diablo 2 had a completely different item economy than Diablo 3 ended up having, which carries over to Diablo 2: Resurrected. This manifests in various ways, from the kinds of items players will likely most want to collect to flesh out their builds to the rates at which different tiers of items drop and even the relative value of items in those tiers. In terms of drop rates, this boils down to rare items not being especially rare in Diablo 3, where Diablo 2 is far less generous.

Drop rates for most items are reduced in Diablo 2 when compared to its successor, giving Diablo 2: Resurrected a wildly different economy. Also, Diablo 2's Runewords are a component-based item tier somewhat akin to Diablo 3's Legendaries in terms of usefulness. But, Diablo 2 also has Unique items that work similarly - it's just that Uniques can be found as loot. In contrast, Runewords must be created out of slotted items and specific combinations of Runes.

Different Gear System

Diablo 2 Resurrected Items Runewords end up being a large part of most endgame gear for Diablo 2: Resurrected, just as they did when it came to Diablo 2's endgame items, and gear is emphasized differently than in Diablo 3.

Certainly, there is a lot of overlap, but Diablo 3 places more emphasis generally on set items, which provide increased bonuses the more items a character can equip from the set, and Legendary items that provide specific benefits to whatever build a player is undertaking to perfect. While that methodology isn't far off from Diablo 2 in some respects, Diablo 2 places great significance on Charms held in the inventory to provide passive bonuses and is generally less focused on set items, with Runewords likely being the lynchpins of most builds.

Different Economy Different

Diablo 3 has a considerable crafting system that overtakes Diablo 2's Runewords in many ways but also uses more generic drops for the most part, all of which are Account Bound - that is, players are unable to trade them with each other.

Diablo 2: Resurrected brings back a very different kind of player economy, one where barter thrives. Given lower drop rates for many items generally and the fact that several desirable Runes have to be farmed from making specific boss runs repeatedly, Diablo 2's player economy ends up with a very different vibe from Diablo 3, which often pushed players apart rather than together, generally encouraging the use of its endgame activities for farming Account Bound items rather than allowing players to share the spoils of war. Whether that's a downgrade or an improvement is a matter for debate, but certainly, it gives Diablo 2: Resurrected's economy a rather different tenor.

That is all you need to know about the difference between Diablo 2: Resurrected and Diablo 3. Was this article helpful? If you want to know more guides, feel free to visit here!