I’ll be honest, I got into isometric “system” ARPGs REAL late. My first one was Diablo 2 Resurrected.
When I first played D2R, I tried to play it like a traditional game. I picked Amazon and wanted to use spears. Little did I know that D2R melee combat is so bad, you’re playing the game wrong if you do it.
Diablo 2 is all about using spells. Spells don’t need extra stat investment just to not miss, do more damage without gear investment, and actually have AoE. The AoE part is probably the most important, as you fight huge clumps of enemies in that game.
The combat being about fighting entire screens worth of enemies was incredibly jarring at first. Just wave after wave after wave. It still feels silly even to this day, but I get it now. It’s all about a massive power fantasy.
And ARPGs would go on to pretty much throw melee combat in the trash. Every ARPG after would essentially become spell caster games. Even melee characters basically cast spells, with their weapons being stat sticks.
I’ve gone on to beat Diablo 1, Diablo 3, PoE, and Last Epoch. And I have to say, they’re all “spellcaster ARPGs.” Which brings me to No Rest for the Wicked.
I personally think No Rest for the Wicked only FEELS like a Souls game with some ARPG mechanics because the ARPG genre has stagnated for decades. There’s pretty much zero “melee ARPGs,” other than this game.
Which to me is probably the most revolutionary aspect. Some people might say ARPGs are power fantasies and that makes them incompatible with the Souls like “disempowerment” fantasy style, but this is far from the truth. ARPGs are not exclusively defined by being a straight easy mode power fantasy, and the genre desperately needs non-stat-stick style combat systems and difficulty.
Oh, and the camera. Fuck my life, the world bowing to give you a longer view of areas is absolutely OBJECTIVELY revolutionary. That, and actual level design with vertically.
(I copied this from my reddit post. I wanted to share my thoughts here too.)