Man in charge of Diablo thinks we should start calling games that he thinks are like Diablo ‘Diablo-likes’
The genre of ‘Action RPG’ is supremely annoying to write about, because the term can mean different things to different people, but here’s how I see it: Diablo 4 and similar games, such as Path Of Exile, are ‘ARPGs’. Which stands for ‘Action RPG’. But Zelda games are ‘Action RPGs’, which is a totally different genre that you could, if you felt like it, also shorten to ‘ARPG’. So, to summarise: ARPGs and ARPGs are two different things, and both are Action RPGs. Got it? Great.
It’s because of this kerfuffle that I’m not exactly mad at Diablo boss Rod Ferguson recently suggesting that we just call games that are similar to Diablo ‘Diablo-likes’. I just find it very funny that he’s the one saying it, in a bold faced act of admittedly very inconsequential linguistic colonialism that carries the unspoken connotation that something is “like the game I make, but a bit crap”.
“Feels like the genre of “ARPG” is starting to mean a lot of different things,” Ferguson wrote on X – thanks for the spot, GamesRadar. “Much like “Souls-like” and “Rogue-like”, I wonder if we could normalize “Diablo-like” for ARPGs that follow the Diablo formula…”
This caused a bit of uproar in the comments, but it’s Da Musk Zone – everything from saying you like waffles to recognising the existence of trans people causes an uproar these days. One point of contention I’m a bit sympathetic to, though, is that Ferguson’s suggestion does place the Diablo series in a sort of progenitor role that also assumes a level of quality. One which many don’t seem to think it deserves any more, even if the original games undoubtedly pioneered what we might call a genre.
Anyway, as usual, the one who has to step in to clear up is this mess is old muggins over here, and I say this: If it’s an RPG that features action like the action you’d find in an action game, it’s an ‘Action RPG’ (ARPG for short). But! If it’s an action game that features RPG elements like those you’d find in an RPG, that there is an ‘ARPG’, also known as an ‘Action RPG’. Note, however, that neither of these describe Diablo, which has demons in it – and is therefore a Doom Clone.
