Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls Review (PC)

excellent
key review info
  • Game: Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls
  • Platform: PC
  • Show system requirements
  • Gamepad support: No
  • Reviewed on:
Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls review on PC

Diablo 3 came out 2 years ago on PC and Mac and the general consensus, after getting through the infamous Error 37 debacle, was that it delivered a good dungeon crawling role-playing game experience. Even so, it was no match for Diablo 2 due to quite a few faulty mechanics, from the bad loot system that drove people to the Auction House, to the troublesome difficulty system.

Over the years, Blizzard introduced a lot of different enhancements via updates, from the Paragon system to the Monster Power setting and much more. Everything culminated with patch 2.0.1 a few weeks ago, which overhauled huge chunks of the game.

Now, the title’s first proper expansion, Reaper of Souls, is finally here, bringing even more changes, not to mention a new story act, a new class, and plenty of major features.

Does Blizzard manage to improve on the RPG or should it stick to smaller updates? Let's find out.

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Use the new Crusader ...
... and progress with your other classes

First up, I want to make one thing clear: with patch 2.0.1, Blizzard has made a lot of great changes, chief among which being the vastly superior loot system, but also the new difficulty system and a few other things. Reaper of Souls adds even more things on top, in order to make the game that much more enjoyable.

For quite a lot of fans, the new Act V for the game's story is among the most important additions in Reaper of Souls. It continues the story of the Nephalem by throwing at them a new major villain, Malthael, the Angel of Death.

During this new but not that long adventure, players will explore Westmarch, the fabled land only alluded to in the main four-act story, which is filled with all sorts of new areas and plenty of different enemies for players to kill.

While the actual plot is a bit thin, the battles are really nice and there are quite a few memorable moments. The boss fights are good, but not that impressive and Malthael doesn't exactly come across as a big villain, despite his being the angel of death.

Besides the new story chapter, Reaper of Souls also introduces a new class, in the form of the Crusader. The new character is a mix between the Diablo 3 Monk and Barbarian, while referencing in quite a few abilities of the Diablo 2 Paladin. Even with all these influences, the Crusader is a fun class that stands on its own with some really great powers.

I can easily see it becoming the favorite of many people, especially since it can be played in different ways. You can choose to go full on tank with the many different defensive skills or you can gear yourself to deal DPS and just smash everything in your way. Middle-of-the-road builds are also possible, so experimentation is key.

Reaper of Souls also bumps the level cap to 70, adding to each new class one more ability and three more passive skills. Most of them are quite impressive, like the Wizard's Black Hole or the Barbarian's Avalanche.

A new artisan, the Mystic, is also included in the expansion, which can serve one of two roles. She can modify the appearance of your gear so that you can keep the stats but change the way your character looks, and she can modify the stats through transmogrification. The stat changing is quite expensive, but it can make great pieces of loot into fantastic ones. Be prepared, however, to spend quite a bit of gold on it.

While players will complete Act 5 rather fast and reach level 70 pretty easily, the biggest addition of Reaper of Souls is the Adventure mode.

In it, players can go on special bounties throughout the game's five acts, which consist of them completing various goals, such as clearing areas of enemies or defeating bosses. After completing them, you earn lots of gold, plenty of XP, but also special items like blood shards, Horadric caches, and, most importantly, rift keystones.

These keystones can be used to open Nephalem Rifts, which consist of mid-size dungeons filled with enemies and bosses from different acts mashed together for maximum amount of fun and chaos. After killing enough enemies, Rift Guardian bosses will spawn, which can produce even better loot.

There aren't a lot of negatives to say about Reaper of Souls, although the performance of the game can get a bit sluggish even on powerful computers during Adventure mode, where the number of enemies and mobs increases. The game still requires a permanent online connection, so those with error-prone Internet should steer clear once again.

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Get into intense battles ...
... and get legendaries

Conclusion

Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls is a great expansion for the core game, adding just enough new things to justify its rather expensive price. If you're only interested in story or new classes, however, you might not be happy with what you get, so just stick to Diablo 3 after patch 2.0.1, which is quite a great RPG on its own.

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story 8
gameplay 9
concept 9
graphics 9
audio 9
multiplayer 9
final rating 9
Editor's review
excellent