Real-time transactions don't have a new look in any way by any stretch of the imagination. Diablo 2 Resurrected didn't pioneer them, and it would be insincere to make that claim as reality. Blizzard's action-RPG isn't the root of the problem, but instead is the most ineffective amalgamation of D2R Items hundreds of different free-to-play mobile and PC games. Two different Battle Passes that each have their own rewards that remain exclusive to your character (and not the entire roster) and too many different currencies available for the average player to track Diablo 2 Resurrected's economy reads like a giant mobile market.
Although they are sometimes encountered with resistance but have now become commonplace in the game industry as a whole. It is possible to argue that the presence of loot boxes as well as other real-money transactions within AAA games has led to this type of precarious economy. However, the more that AAA gaming shifts to the games-as a service model is the more it has the same characteristics as game-based mobile apps that've existed in this highly popular area for more than a decade.
And this doesn't just show in the use of money for items however, it is also evident in gacha mechanics as well as in the public disclosure of drop rates for the more scarce items. Gacha is the act of playing with in-game currency, no matter if it's free, or purchased through an in-game shop, to buy something random like pieces of equipment in the case Dissidia Final Fantasy Opera Omnia, or characters in the ever-popular (and persistant) Fate/Grand Order or Genshin Impact.
In Diablo 2 Resurrected's case, they use Legendary Crests (which can be bought or earned) to increase the likelihood of a five-star gem appearing in the dungeons of the endgame. While not entirely conventional in its design (most gacha are performed by "rolling" on a short-lived banner), players are still engaging in randomness similar to. In many ways this is how players are engaging in the same way. Diablo franchise has been building toward these mechanics since its beginning, in the words of Maddy Myers wrote a few weeks ago.
Diablo 2 Resurrected also, in unambiguous terms, draws direct inspiration from an "feeding" technique that many Japanese, Korean, and Chinese mobile games have been utilizing for over 10 years. "Feeding" entails raising the stats, attributes or rarity of an item , by making duplicates of a drop. The duplicates are then fed to an item with the same rarity to buy D2R Items increase the stats overall of that item. In general, five copies are required as a standard for maxing out an item or character.
