Today I’m not focusing on any one particular channel as much as I’m focusing on a type of video. The release ofDiablo 3 last week has once again outlined the importance of YouTube as a service for gamers, specifically when it comes to skill builds and tutorials. With so many different options and strategies it becomes necessary for those who are inclined to showcase their builds, allowing the rest of us to determine which ones work and which ones don’t. So instead of sitting down and pouring over the numbers like some sort of nerdy mad scientist, I headed over to YouTube to see if anyone had done some of the leg work for me.
Before checking the YouTube Diablo 3 community, I felt I had a handle on the game and this new skill system. However after a few minutes it looks as if I have only scratched the surface. Want a Barbarian build? There’s like a dozen, each as different as the last and yet all better than the one I had been playing. I had been building my class based on my “primary” skills, oh how Diablo 2 of me.
As I don’t have the patience to sit down and read endless walls of text on a message board, YouTube allows me to get a crash course in Diablo 3 skill builds in just a few minutes. It’s easy to forget that someone had to sit down, make the build and the post it online with commentary. Without them, quite frankly, I wouldn’t know which way to spit.
Below is an example of what I’m talking about. I used this as a template for the build I’m currently using. If this was on some sort of old-school Diablo 2 forum I most likely wouldn’t have bothered, but it’s not. YouTube makes it simpler to access basic information about a game, and those that post builds are helping everyone in the community, one “liked” video at a time.