I look forward to using my Diablo 2 favourite-the Necromancer-in next year's pack, but after hundreds of hours spent wearing skull pauldrons in D2, I enjoyed the violent excess of the Witch Doctor's exploding frogs. The rethought classes, skills and progression systems take a smart step away from Diablo 2. The varied elevation of the keep gives you great views of the assault below-it's one of the most spectacular sections of the series. I have lost count of the times I have cleared the battlements of Bastion's Keep, fought through the battlefield below, to obliterate the siegebreaker beast. Putting the long-dead auction house aside, there's a very decent, occasionally exceptional Diablo game here. Combat, loot, hordes of enemies, big boss monsters-these are all key tenants of a Diablo game. You might argue that the enthusiasm for Diablo 2's items markets suggested that players would see the auction house as a feature. It also gave Blizzard a cut of every transaction.

The auction house attempted to legitimise the black markets that sprang up around Diablo 2 and created incentives for players to farm and sell high-level items in the endgame. Second sin, the big one: in some respects, Diablo 3 didn't seem to understand why people like Diablo.

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