The Call for a ‘Diablo-esque’ Standard in ARPGs: A Community Debate
Diablo franchise head Rod Fergusson is experiencing considerable scrutiny online for asserting that ARPGs resembling Diablo should be classified as Diablo-likes.
In a tweet that has since gained significant backlash, Fergusson posed the question of whether ARPGs ought to adopt the Diablo-inspired label in a similar manner as a certain type of action RPG is termed Souls-like and a specific genre of dungeon crawler is referred to as Roguelike.
“It seems that the term ‘ARPG’ is beginning to encompass a lot of different meanings,” Fergusson remarked. “Much like ‘Souls-like’ and ‘Rogue-like’, I wonder if we could establish ‘Diablo-like’ for ARPGs that adhere to the Diablo formula…”
It seems like the term “ARPG” is starting to represent a variety of different things. Much like “Souls-like” and “Rogue-like”, I wonder if we could normalize “Diablo-like” for ARPGs that follow the Diablo formula…November 22, 2024
To provide context on the scale of the backlash to this proposal: the top response comes from streamer Empyrian and states simply: “I don’t think so.” That response has garnered 1.4k likes compared to the 728 likes on Fergusson’s original tweet. Even more telling, Fergusson’s tweet received a staggering 2.2k comments, with the vast majority being critical.
“I wish d4 was a Diablo-like,” stated another highly liked reply.
I’ll leave it to you to make your own assessment on the situation, but I would also like to point out that Fergusson tweeted the above just hours after Path of Exile 2 had its significant Early Access stream broadcast; Path of Exile being Diablo’s most vocal and formidable rival. From an external perspective, it certainly appears that there may have been a bit of irritation regarding the attention Path of Exile 2 received that prompted Fergusson’s tweet, but that is purely my own speculation not grounded in any internal data.
It is also important to recognize the influence Diablo has had on the action-RPG genre. After all, we don’t have an entire list dedicated to games like Diablo for no reason. Path of Exile itself is often considered a spiritual successor to Diablo 2, with its lead designer, Chris Wilson, having explicitly stated that Diablo was the team’s primary inspiration. The criticism directed at the tweet seems largely aimed at Fergusson himself, who did not join Blizzard until 2020 and therefore did not play a part in the original development of the Diablo formula.
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In the meantime, Diablo: Dawn of