Strike exclusive loot, vendor refreshes, factions, faction loot, class specific weapons. The feeling of inspecting a guardian in D1, seeing some unknown weapon and wondering where the got it was exciting. I remember first running into someone with hopscotch pilgrim in the crucible and became so determined to grind for it and it was fun. Like what’s causing the difference between D1 and D2 as far as those things?
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I'd say it's less the fault of "free to try" and more the fault of the higher ups moving D2 into the "games as a service" field. Remember, D2 wasn't free to play at launch, and it was missing a ton of features we had in D1.