Dungeon Defenders Eternity was announced on Steam offering the following description of what is new from the original game (italics mine):
New Missions – Play the best maps from the first game, plus four brand new missions with more to come for free post-launch!
New Features – Visible armor, pet hatching & abilities, crafting, dodging, consumables, weapon-swapping, spellbinding, "permadeath" mode and a whole lot more!
Secure Online Play – No more hacking! Eternity runs on playverse's secure dedicated servers, so other Defenders can’t cheat their way to the top.
Rebalanced & Retooled – Our young heroes have an entirely redesigned loot system that fixes major issues from the original, giving them a fairer fight against the Old Ones’ rebalanced army!
Cross Platform Play – Take your heroes with you on the go and defend Etheria at anytime, from anywhere, with anyone! Download the Android version for Nvidia Tegra first, then stay tuned for an expanded launch on more Android devices, iPhones, and iPads later this year!
Does the new game include all the maps from the original? What about DLC maps, characters, items, etc.? What are the 4 new maps? What does it mean when talking about rebalanced loot system?
Best Answer
It includes all maps and challenges from both the original game and the Eternia Shards DLC. It does not have any holiday-themed maps or challenges yet (such as Valentines, Thanksgiving, or Christmas maps). You can also choose any and all heroes, including Summoner, EV, Barbarian and Jester.
The 4 new maps are Dread Dungeon, Arcane Library, Magus Citadel, and Embermount Volcano. The first 3 are additions to the original campaign, and Embermount appears to be the beginning of an entirely new campaign that goes beyond the Eternia Shards.
Loot is now server-side, meaning that they are taking significant and active measures to stop hacking (as it was REALLY prevalent in DD1 and they really didn't have a way to stop it other than banning the hacker when they were tattled on). Map rewards are no longer the absolute best weapons in the game, meaning we are going to see a lot more diversity when it comes to players and the weapons they wield (as opposed to seeing everyone holding Classics and Obsidian weapons).
It's also worth noting that textures are streamed in while you're playing the game, so when you first launch it, almost everything is going to be blurry, or "graphically inferior". In reality, it has almost exactly the same graphics the original Dungeon Defenders has.
For a comprehensive guide on the major differences between the two, read up on the Steam guide Comparing Dungeon Defenders and DD Eternity.