l don’t understand people who think there’s any meaningful comparison between Diablo and HoT.
HoT is a vampire-survivors game, and in my opinion is the actual best in the genre, I have dozens of hours in it. This type of gameplay has absolutely nothing to do with ARPGs.
It has a bit of resemblance, in that it’s a dark fantasy action game in which the player character fights a very large number of enemy units in order to level up and increase their power while fighting bosses interspersed throughout, occasionally upgrading abilities and acquiring gear. and of course the art style is directly cribbing Diablo 1.
But in the nitty gritty of how the combat works, how the gear and abilities work, the format of the levels and win condition of the game and pretty much everything else, it’s very different from Diablo.
Supposedly it just scratches „that itch” - mindless grind and loot cycle integrated into survivor-like formula. There are more games like it but HoT is also nailing aesthetics. Death Must Die is another game in similar vein but they also went one step further and copied upgrades from Hades too (this one I played myself). Both are enjoyable remixes on proven formulas and there’s nothing wrong with that.
I agree that there’s nothing wrong with remixes. Vampire Survivors dude invented a new genre and all, people who say these games are “copying” Vampire Survivors probably also say that every FPS is copying Maze War lol
Death Must Die was indeed fun. Soulstone Survivor is pretty good too.
I find the biggest difference in itch scratched between Diablo-like ARPGs and Halls of Torment is that the pacing is very different. Diablo has a lot more player control over when there are breaks in the action providing downtime for the player to sort through gear and abilities. Halls of Torment sort of has that when you’re making choices, but it’s waaaay faster
Have you ever played Diablo 1? Graphics in HoT straight up look like they were ripped from the og diablo 1. Also, both of them have a very similar loop: you go to the dungeon, you kill a bunch of stuff, you come back to the hub area. I never fancied Vampire Survivors before I had the chance to play HoT more than a year ago, and the similarities in graphics and gameplay loop between it and the first diablo were THE reason that made me buy and play the game.
EDIT: yes, Halls of Torment is the actual best in the genre. I’ve played most of the famous ones (Vampire Survivors, Soulstone Survivors, Holocure, Death must Die, Deep Rock Survivor, Pathfinder Gallows something…), and HoT is clearly a cut above the others in how solid it is built and how great it iterates on the ‘survivors’ trope. A game that is technically not a survivors but scratches a similar itch and has been hogging a lot of my time right now is Kill Knight.
I never heard of the game until the 1.0 release. I have 59 hours in the game, it cost me less than 4 American dollars. After I’m done typing this comment I’m going to go back and play it.
My partner who’s been a Diablo junkie back in the day couldn’t stop playing this in early access to the point of being on some leaderboards. From what I’ve seen over the shoulder it seems VERY solid and it’s probably one of the better survivor-likes around.
so good +1
I bought this game in July 2023 for some reason, and have 60ish hours in it.
I randomly fire it up every so often because it’s quick to load, quick to get in to action and actually playing, and most importantly it’s fun - you know, what games are meant to be!
Vampire Survivors is the other time sink in this genre. Unfortunately I have that on PC and mobile. That’s bad for productivity.
