f13.net

This is over a week old, but I didn't see it mentioned here.  Den me if mistaken, or if you're just feeling snarky.

Blizzard has recently acquired www.Diablo3.com and issued a statement denying any signifigance that rabid fanbois might gleen from such a move.

The last line of this article caught my attention. (http://www.efluxmedia.com/news_Blizzard_Announces_the_Upcoming_BlizzCon_2008_17513.html)

And a GoDaddy search (http://who.godaddy.com/WhoIs.aspx?domain=diablo3.com&prog_id=godaddy) revealed that a Roger Barr remains the owner of the site.  What gives?  Mr. Barr himself explains the situation (http://www.diablofans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=7199) to his community.


Hmm.  So, Diablo3.com will soon become Blizzard's property based on the idea of 'protecting their intellectual property.'  But, unless there is already something to be called 'Diablo 3', then there is no intellectual property to protect.  They were just fine with Mr. Barr's website until now, and he has not abused the use of the name.  If there were no Diablo 3 then he could happily use it until he finally realized that the Diablo craze happened last century.

(I should point out that Mr. Barr is transferring ownership of the domain name and not selling it - which indicates a more-than-amicable arrangement with Blizzard.  I raise this to illustrate that if the acquisition were only to prevent the besmirching of the Diablo name, the agreement probably would have involved substantial monies.)

Such circular logic dictates that THERE IS A DIABLO 3 IN THE WORKS.  OMFG.  PANIC.

I would sell the shit out of it.

Barr is a fool and a moron.

That was my thought.  Blizzard is richer than the Catholic Church - he could have asked for his silver pieces.  He's getting some exclusive rights out of the deal - which is yet another indicator that Diablo 3 is somewhat of a reality at this point.

Why the hell would you register a name like that if the idea wasn't to make Blizzard pay through the nose for it?  Even if Diablo 3 doesn't come out this year or next year, they're going to want to go back to that well SOMEDAY.

Someone get me diablo4.com, STAT.

Because Blizzard owns the trademark on that name as it applies to video games and movies and probably other entertainment products as well.

Diablo came to his house and "convinced" him to give up the domain.

(http://diablo2.ingame.de/spiel/akte/pics/akt4_diablo.jpg)

He was saving it so he'd be the first to know when Diablo III was coming out.

...and that prevents you from making them pay through the nose for it how?  Just don't make it a Diablo fansite.  Name your cat El Diablo, fill it with cat pictures, and say that you couldn't bear the emotional trauma of moving them for anything less than...

(http://zerotosixty.files.wordpress.com/2007/09/medium_dr_evil_1.jpg)

You could try. However the courts have been very good about forcing "domain name squatters" to give up their domain names to trademark holders. If you have the money to pay for those legal costs you could try and hold on to it. For Blizzard the costs are just a drop in the bucket and they love going to court anyways.

So now I'm curious what would happen if, say, Lamborghini decided they wanted www.diablo.com.  They've been making Diablos longer than Blizzard has, right?

At what point does Satan step in and just render the argument pointless?

Since it's an international dispute I would assume it would go to WIPO for arbitration. If both sides have valid trademark claims in non-overlapping domains my guess it whoever registered it first would get to keep it but I'm not an IP lawyer.

(http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f117/rodlightyear/LegendDevil.jpg)

http://www.nissan.com/


And etc...

Holy stupidity.

Its a good thing we all use Google now instead of typing in domain names.

That felt like it should have been green.

jesus.  8 years.  Perfect example of how corporations have all the power.

I'm kind of excited for this, I'm not too sure yet.

But, y'know, copyright and trademark laws are really all about protecting small businesses.  I'm sure the lawsuit was for Mr. Nissan's own good.

I'd imagine it's been in the works to some extent or another for years now.  Certainly there've been enough rumblings about it in the past several years that I'd be very suprised if they hadn't worked up a number of concepts for it which didn't work out for whatever reason.

For those who haven't gone there already, it's registered and redirects to www.word-of-diablo.com.  (A page that merely has a link that says "Censored by Theesa (http://theesa.com/)" ZOMG BLIZZARD IS MAKING WORLD OF DIABLO BUT THE ESA IS KEEPING THEM DOWN!!!

Starctaft 2 leads into Starcraft Galaxies or whatever they call the MMO.  Then Diablo 3 leads into World of Diablocraft.

But Vivendi-Acti-Blizzard-super-mega-dev-o-tron isn't a member of the ESA...

Exactly! they left because the man was keeping them down! It all comes together!  :drill:

G4 joins the speculation with a list of significant dates.. (http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/post/685668/More_Diablo_3_Announcement_Rumors.html)

..which happen to coincide with PC Gamer announcing that the issue to be published in late June will contain a "top-secret cover story so huge we had to go to [CENSORED] to get it.."

Shacknews posts the usual Blizzard "zere is nussing to see here.." response. (http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/52784)

Play.tm points out that,  (http://play.tm/story/18290)"The plot thickens further when you consider that PC Gamer carried the exclusive announcement of StarCraft II last year.."

There is no plot. WoW is out. Starcraft II was announced. They only have 1 other license that's worth anything.

Personally, I was hoping for Rock N' Roll Racing, but you may have a point.

Lost Vikings?

Hey, it'd work on XBLA. So would R&R Racing, for that matter.

(http://www.angelfire.com/ak4/ratman/blackthorne2.jpg)

Fuck Yea!

Story from Tom's Games. (http://www.tomsgames.com/us/2008/05/26/diablo3_rumor/)

Bastards.

World of Diablocraft will mark the end of my participation in civilized society. And in bathing.

El Gallo, we should be friends.

I can picture it already:

<sound of a ring drop>
<victory grunts all around>

Oh god, if the teaser at Blizzcon was a really high-res ring dropping and then the drop ping. I would shit myself.

Checking out some of those news links made me feel like I was reading Foucault's Pendulum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foucault's_Pendulum).


It's a web of madness!

(http://densscessario.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/sojaj8.gif)

I love that effing gif.

What does this mean? (http://www.blizzard.com/us/splash.html)

If you navigate to www.blizzard.com, you are greeted with that cryptic image.

I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT THIS ANYMORE OMG NO

You know something that we don't?

Yes he does.

But don't ask him.

I can find Diablo III in anything. If it was a picture of Santa I'd find fucking Diablo 3.

I made the following. Granted, I'm totally without sleep for the last day or so.

(http://xs228.xs.to/xs228/08261/ice1184.jpg)

(http://bay01.imagebay.com/_upload/img/38/blizz2.png)

(http://bay01.imagebay.com/_upload/img/38/blizz2-1.png)

And then this from diablofans.whatever


So, basically, if tomorrow is 09.jpg, it's Diablo 3. If not, it's not going to be worth following.

Also, I hate Blizzard in the face.

Looks more like Starcraft Protoss then Diablo to me.

They would not tease the same game twice in a row. That would be too much letdown for blizzard fans to take. Especially Diablo fans. They generally only tease completely unnanounced shit.

Also, WWI is in Europe (Diablo is biggest there) and the press conference is on Diablo's birthday.

Was thinking it would be for an announcement of a release date.

If Blizzard pulls something that lame, their PR Machine has gone awry. They've never done this sort of shit for stuff like that.

Eh, SC III is going to sell 10 million plus.  It's a BIG deal.

It'll sell 10 million+ without a release date.

That's my point. It's time to start the hype machine for something else. It's either a total letdown as the Wrath Open Beta date, or a D3 announce. If this was in Korea, I'd agree about SCII. If it wasn't Diablo's birthday and things weren't named the ways they are and if there weren't rune images from socket items in diablo 2 in the image, I'd agree with you. If you weren't just trying to destroy hope, I'd agree with you.

As such, I'm not going to agree with you. Punk.

That bit of deduction from diablofans is both sad and brilliant. Like a self-cleaning poopsock.  :uhrr:

Look, if this isn't for Diablo III, then Blizzard is composed of the largest gathering of marketing idiots ever.  Based on their past performance, I don't think that they're idiots.

(http://i241.photobucket.com/albums/ff26/stuabrtow/blizzteeaser.jpg)

(http://i241.photobucket.com/albums/ff26/stuabrtow/blizzteaserSword.jpg)

Found via http://www.worldofwar.net/n/414868/blizzard-image-solved (http://www.worldofwar.net/n/414868/blizzard-image-solved). And Kotaku.

edit: Is that rune something brought into Wrath of The Lich King from Diablo?

WotLK doesn't have an official release date yet does it? Melting ice! Frozen throne! White whale! Holy grail!
That or it's a chunk of the broken Worldstone :grin:

Do those hand-drawn images of schild's look vaguely pornographic to anyone else?

... anyone?

... anyone?

 :pedobear:

We've done this before haven't we? I just don't know if I can take lamentations and dissapointment here again. Perhaps we should just accept that it's the announcement of SCII Card/Board/Fastfood game. That's easier on everyone.

Hmmm.  I would love to try a Diablo like game - I fear Diablo 2 may be too old for me to enjoy. 

I'm already disappointed in blizzard in so many ways, this being nothing more than a WotLK thing would just be normal at this point.  Pimping their expansion like it's greater than anything Jesus could do.

I'd be pretty damn surprised it it was a release date for anything.

Blizzard's usual method for announcing release dates: "Hey Money-Printer-5000 is gold and it's coming out Nov. 1st."

It's probably a release date for the beta to wotlk.  I fucking announcement of beta for a goddamn xpac.  I hate to say it, but I think Blizzard actually needs a failure to humble them a bit.  I've never been comfortable with them 100% ever since I was paying full-game price for the Lord of Destruction xpac.

It's probably Warcraft Adventures Redux.

WotLK F&F Alpha just ended. It'll be a Beta announcement or a relese date. Possibly both.

Diablo? Big blue ice looking thing? Diablo?

Desperate.

Where'd you get that from? Just asked some people I know in the Alpha and they confirmed that it has indeed not ended.

(http://i38.photobucket.com/albums/e121/GrimDysart/lolbliz.jpg)

It was being spoken about a few places. Seems it was not the case though. *shrug*.

I'm still going to go with the announcement being about WotLK though. Expansion into frozen northern landmass, all the promo stuff being icy and blue so far, image of a icy thing, and so on all points to that. I'm not seeing anything Diabloish in it at all.

Icy blue background = snowy north = LOST VIKINGS ONLINE.

http://forums.f13.net/index.php?board=61.0

Ditto. You can even get the bundle (TQ + Immortal Throne) for 20 bucks at most DD sites. D2D is where I bought mine.

Having read through enough signs, it's basically 100% Diablo 3 and if it's something else, it sounds like the fanbase would collectively shun Blizzard for a million years.

Either that, or some people will be bitching on forums and WotLK and SCII go on to sell millions of copies anyway.

There's too many variables in place that point to Diablo. The runes, the date of WWI, the naming of the jpgs, the naming of the splash screens (tundra and cavern are both areas off the main path of chapter 5). Basically, if it's not D3, they're fucking evil.

Guessing D3 or as a long shot the new MMO. Bit too early in development to push that public yet though.

Or, we win twice and they're one in the same.

If they're one in the same, I'm going to open a commune named Tristram built around the idea of subsistence farming and loot.

Um, due to an internet fuckup at my house for a fucking week and a half, the wife and I got back into LAN Diablo II.

Not only is it miles fucking better than that shite Titty Quest, but it's still actually as enjoyable as ever, which shocked me rigid.

Favourite Quote thus far :

"Love, my computer keeps making the Ring dropping sound, but when I press alt nothings there..."

Yes, my wife is the fastest loot ninja in the west...

I still play Diablo 2 and even the original Diablo when staying with my parents, since their internet connection (dialup) and computer aren't able to handle much more than that gracefully.

It really does hold up well on replay.

If it weren't for the resolution, I'd probably still be playing it all the time.

WotLK

(http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa209/Torq-BL/FM.jpg)

This image:

(http://us.media.blizzard.com/232309/_images/ice2.jpg)

Just so you don't get those hopes up schild.

Though I hope it's D3. Maybe they'll get it right this time (I did to like D2) and WotLK is comming out anyway.

Oh, I see, you don't think that was the first thing I thought of.

Oh I know you probably did. I'm just seeing you jump to D3 from scant info and perhaps getting ahead of yourself.

Second image up (the one above) btw. Basicly the same, more light in middle. Another rune.

The second rune is Hel from Diablo 2. The first was Shael. If they're picking a certain 5 runes, they make up an item called Heaven's Will. Which further solidifies the hell vs heaven theme rumored of Diablo 2.

Neither rune is from Warcraft.

You know, that's the same for a lot of games.  It would be nice if someone built some scaling tech for older games.

Recently took a Mechcommander jag as well ;  it's also enjoyable, but the two resolutions and the jarring lack of a 3d zoom made my eyes water when I jumped back to desktop.

http://us.media.blizzard.com/232309/_images/ice2.jpg

Look at the runebalde there schild. Both runes are on it.

It makes sense for it to be a new game, not an expansion. But WoW is so huge now that a release date announcement might be possible. Hard to know.

None of it really adds up to more than this, which I actually felt good to figure out on my own.

The pictures end on the same day as Diablo 2's release day. That's also the day of the press conference with a "special announcement." Even if nothing else were taken into consideration (as in, there were no other images or anything at all), this would have been noticed.

i wish this thread would just go away, thinking about it is just plain depressing.  announcing d3 now would be the best birthday present blizz could give me, but i just know this is wotlk related and those hidden runes are being used to intentionally fuck with all our heads.  it feels as bad as when nintendo pulls shit like lucas in ssbb when they know damn well they arent giving us mother 3

How about we compromise and say this picture is teasing that Diablo 3 will take place in the Warcraft universe, and you'll run around and grind loot for your WoW character?

Err shit. I went over to diablofans.com to see.. man some fanbois are going to be pissed if it's not D2. Nevermind the fact that both runes are exactly the same as the ones on Frostmourne (there are 5, so far it's been the first run and the last), and only one is agreed to be from D2 (reusing art ftw!).

Also: Diablo fans are fucking crazy. Some of the most batshit 'connections' in http://www.diablofans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8623&page=1 (http://www.diablofans.com/forums/showthread.php?t=8623&page=1). Golly.

What would be worse schild? A WoW-like Diablo MMO or no Diablo announced yet?  :drill:

What would be worse is if Blizzard's marketing department went off the deepend.

pretty sure that happened already. remember the TBC thing on spiketv

When is this being announced? I wanna be around when schild's hopes are crushed :awesome_for_real:

If you're that sadistic, why not hope they announce Diablo 3 as a Wii exclusive?

Cause 1) Blizzard doesn't do consoles (yet) so that's an unreasonable expectation and 2) schild already has a Wii even though he hates it so he'd still be able to play it (and if he didn't have one he'd buy one).

Meanie.

Actually, now that I think about it it, the Wii would be the perfect choice for Diablo's mechanics.  Instead of just running around and clicking the mouse button really fast, you just run around with the nunchaku and wave the Wiimote really fast.

(http://xs228.xs.to/xs228/08262/universe708.jpg) (http://xs.to)
(http://xs228.xs.to/xs228/08262/universe_3998.jpg) (http://xs.to)

 :awesome_for_real:

It's going to be WotLK - either official start of beta, a release date, or both.

Blizzard artist adds new image directory 'Hydra' to his site, promptly pulls it - the other folders on his site are Starcraft and Warcraft. (http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=191534)

XFire pulls a mention of a new game announcement at WWI. (http://www.fragland.net/news/Diablo-3-on-Blizzard-WWI-2008/19243/)

Digging into the .CSS file reveals more links to Diablo II. (http://www.actiontrip.com/link.phtml?http://blizzplanet.com/news/2469/)

If this isn't Diablo III, someone at Blizzard is pathologically deceptive.

Golly.

I wonder if it's Starcraft 2.com all over again.

http://www.sc2pod.com/news/Splash_Screen_Updated/ (http://www.sc2pod.com/news/Splash_Screen_Updated/)

Some hidden images hint at Diablo.  Is schild dead yet? His drawn over pics really scared me.

HELLO I CAME HERE TO TALK ABOUT WHAT IS TOTALLY GOING TO BE DIABLO 3

Holy shit, I am totally getting batshit over this, Lost-style.

GOTTA LOVE THE NUMBERS~

also the classes in the .css? tundra and cavern

Frozen Tundra and Drifter Cavern were both Act 5 maps.

http://newd2event.net/index.php?id=maps/act5

People saw big Ice Thingy and jumped to Diablo 3? Even with the new Frosty Island Expansion coming?

I mean it still could be Diablo, but I was under the impression that was all firey and shit.

Probably, it's meant to represent hell freezing over--which is about when we all expected D3.

That's the point, though - they're being deceptive ASSHOLES who just want me to FOAM about it until it's OFFICIAL.

God DAMMIT.

I still think they should've just randomly loaded the ring *ping* for people when they went to the page. Then they could've turned it into a crazed DDOS of hype. Also, it's classier than a jpg.

That would have been a dead giveaway, though.

I think the developers have been watching too much Lost. Internet frenzy is going apeshit at this point.

Here's the most consolidated source of crazy:

http://blizz.cabinha.com/

I'd also like to believe that Diablo plays a prominent role in this art for a reason.

http://eu.blizzard.com/wwi08/_images/photos/wwi08_016.jpg

Then again, it's similar to what was used for Blizzcon 2007.

Someone on Diablo fans said the purple creature looked like fan art. I believe it. They probably just picked a ridiculous image so they could give the parts certain names. Unless it turns out to be something colorshifted, giving us the finger and holding a sign with the wrath release date.

I think those of you hoping for Diablo are clutching at straws.

I think it's just too obvious to be something Wrath of the Lich King related - any time they've played a countdown game like this, it's always been to the announcement of a bigger thing, such as a game.

The announcement of a release date or intro cinematic for Wrath would be anti-climactic at this point. Plus, the fact that they're pointing wow.com, blizzard.com and battle.net all at this teaser leads me to believe it's something larger.

SO FUCK YOU DON'T PISS ON MY CORNFLAKES

<tinfoilhat>

God I wish this was true. I would LOVE me some Starcraft Universe.

I am so torn. I would LOVE to play D3, but at I am not sure it would be better than watching all the fanbois commit mass suicide on Blizzard's front steps when this annoucement turns out to be something else.

Win/Win!

It's not fair to call us fanbois. We've played every Diablo clone out there. Unfortunately, the closest thing to it is Titan Quest and Iron Lore folded. Starved fans, sure. But fanbois? No. That's the people that still play SWG and Vanguard. Big difference.

They've done the whole spoiler thing for a mere website revamp before, don't forget.

Yeah, but what era was that in? We're in the Actiblizzard era here - they have a hobillion dollars, I think it's nigh time that when they make a big deal, it truly is for a big deal.

With how much of the internet they've stirred into a shitstorm at this point, I think they'd know better now then to have it be for a website revamp. If it were just a website revamp for one of their websites, I think they'd do less then link to the teaser on all of their friggin' websites in all territories. Korea and the US both have drastically different websites, but they're both linking to it.

So, back to rumor mongering -

Do you think that Diablo 3 is the rumored 'Project Hydra'? A hydra DOES generally have three heads, y'know. One of their artists' websites was going to link to some Project Hydra art, but now it just says that it is coming back in july.

http://www.peterconcept.com/

Starcraft has three heads.

I can not imagine this being a starcraft announcement. Not in Europe, and not on Diablo's birthday.

Basically, if it's not Diablo, it will be reverse PR.

Starcraft has hydralisks.

Starcraft can eat my American Ballz, Yegolev.

Or this could be that bullshit where they tie all three universes together, like in the lol manga books where they tied in Diablo to Warcraft somehow.

People are predicting that the first rune in the picture was from Frostmourne, the second one is a Hel rune from D2, and they're predicting a Protoss rune to be the third one.

My money is that the first rune in the pic was actually another D2 rune - plus, doing the whole lettering thing, it would make sense.

The first rune was a rune from D2, the last patch, Shael. It was part of the Heaven's Will item.

The guys at Diablofans and sc2pod are way better at decrypting this then I am, as they actually read all the lore and stuff.

I just firmly believe that everything is too coincedental to be anything other then D3. The ice stuff has GOT to be a red herring.

It's more likely a worldstone breaking than ice. The file name being ice is probably the red herring. Or "In 2009, Hell freezes over" or some lame shit.

Yeah, I guess its good to keep in mind that the D2 Expansion was a Barbarian cold northland type expansion as well, so ice wouldn't be to out of the question as far as artwork is concerned.

Someone's having a lot of fun at the fanboi's expense.

That's not really Blizzard's style. And it's how you get people to Not buy your games. It's like, "How to fuck up marketing 101" if they pulled shit like that.

I WANT TO BELIEVE.

THAT'S THE SPIRIT!

If they do mash the worlds together, it could be very interesting.  You can join a SC2 game as a D3 character, run around frost-novaing zerglings and getting into everyone's shit.  Once you get all your loot-bags full, you take them back to your base and use them to construct a gold mine or catapult.  Then He-Man fucks Captain Planet in the ass.

They've probably had enough time for the Activision people to take over marketing by now yes?  :awesome_for_real:

PLAYED ON A GUITAR!

That would be the worst fucking game ever. I don't want shitty sci-fi or generihammer in my Diablo.

I'm so conflicted.

Going by the Blizzard posts on the wow forums they love to tease and mess with their players. I'm not implying it's malicious, just that when you have 3 rabid fanbases, there is a lot of scope for tease.

What if the interface was a rhythm game you could play with friends?

Yeah I'm being a dick, but let's wipe our chins and think for a second.  Even if it is Diablo Three, we don't have any idea what it will look like other than that it won't be like DII:LoD.  Or maybe it will be, but it won't have sprites and I wager it will suffer from the same "it's not D2" issues that you see in TQ and Mythos.  I'm not going to get excited until I know some fucking details.

Seriously? Have you forgotten the clusterfuck that was SC:Ghosts announcement?

Maybe its a totally new IP!  :awesome_for_real:

That was Swinging Ape before they were part of Blizzard. Even Blizzard had no clue what to do with that thing.

Maybe it's an overhaul of Battle.net, with lots of bells and whistles like social networking (myspace, facebook for gamers), casual games (Pop the Zerg!), integrated chat and email and downloadable games and stuff like Steam.

*shrug* I think with SC2 they're going to do something really hefty with battle.net anyway.

Well, eventually they figured out the right thing to do: (http://xs228.xs.to/xs228/08262/emot-commissar803.gif) (http://xs.to)

It's DiabloIII...

But, it's FPS...

and has Faction Grinds 4 loot.

Oh, and sport PVP.

 :drill:

Diablogate: Reykjavik?

They're going to announce a set release date for WotLK, Diablo 3 and Starcraft Universe all on the same day.

And then they'll announce they've found a cure for aids, perfected cold fusion, and learned how to clone unicorns.

Okay, now I'm pumped. Unicorns are awesome!

Yeah, the fact that I can still go into any software store and buy Starcraft, Diablo2 and WC3 is going to be flushed if this isn't D3..   :oh_i_see:

Seriously, I own all of the Blizzard games, but I didn't know about this announcement until f13 started foaming at the mouth/knees over it..

http://sc2pod.com/news/Countdown_to_Diablo_3/

THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE

u maed it laem

We're already at maximum lame in this thread.

No, I don't think we are. Stop shitting on the froth parade, you top-hat sporting bastard.

Don't shit on my fun either. I find this kind of frothing hilarious and love to point it out.  :awesome_for_real:

That reminds me of one of those Bible numerology things :awesome_for_real:

Except there is more truth to it.

I would die.  For reals.

I just had a really dumb thought.  What if the announcement is the goddamned motherfucking release of some shitty WoW expansion, but all of the 'clues' continue to lead to Diablo?  Scratch that, I don't even want to consider it.

I can't find it but the ol' 4channers did some serious filtering of the image and it looks like it's an announcement that Wrath of the Lich King is coming even earlier than expected, like October,

Jesus H Christ! That better not be it. I would be so very very sad.  :ye_gods:

OMG I so hope that happens.  The nerd rage would explode the internet. 

At this rate I could really give a shit about Diablo 3.

If it's all for WotLK I am going to spam Schild on MSN for DAYS.

So we have "D" and "O" by the "number" system.

I say it spells "Dorks."

We'll know tomorrow for sure.  Sc2pod has a plausible theory, the third released image will confirm it.

Least plausible theory yet.

The Warcraft MOVIE. Blizz would go big for this. Lets not forget.

WotLK Beta/release date/trailer. Again, both runes are exactly the same as the runes on frostmourne, the WotLK sword that is identified with the expansion.

Diablo 3. Umm.. one rune was reused from D2, one looks sortoflike another one, and the tundra and stuff are like from d2 acts (and WotLK zones, but lets ignore that), and some Blizzard F&F wrote "looks like hell truly has frozen over" on their blog.

Yeah.

Maybe all three at once.

DO NOT WANT!

bl bl.

I'll be surprised if it's anything other than a date for WotLK.

Perhaps it will be "DOn't you want to be a Death Knight?".

(http://i241.photobucket.com/albums/ff26/stuabrtow/orgazmo-1.jpg)


Unicorns really do rock, BTW.

You don't schedule press conferences and have week long viral teasers to have it ramp up to anything regarding any beta or a release date.

You have these in place for MAJOR announcements. Release dates, comparatively, are not major announcements in Blizzard terms. They have always made such announcements via their web sites and press releases and the usual gaming sites. I'd be very surprised it they changed it now.

WotLK is still in F&F and anyone who has dealt with any Blizz product knows they would never go from that to a release date announcement. It's just not how they operate. If this were the case it would be a serious shift in their routine. Not completely out of the question though with the impending mega merger.

WotLK beta announcement? Also highly doubtful. Too much fanfaire for that simple of an announcement. In fact, in the past, they've never made announcements out of betas whatsoever. You found out about previous betas via leak sites, fan sites, or if you got an email in your inbox.

SCII's release date? Possible, but again, doesn't stick with their past history although evidence for it is there. Many of the major retailers (Best Buy, Gamestop among them) all changed their ship date to 12/3 simultaneously a couple days ago. We all know how much retaielrs are in the loop though so obviously this is to be taken with a grain of salt.

Warcraft movie? At a glance, possibly, but a long shot. Blizzard hasn't had enough time to get the marketing machine rolling on this yet. Barring, of course, that this is the start of said marketing bonanza.

New MMO? Probably the best bet next to something Diablo related. Everyone knows they've had this in the barn for a bit now and Blizz themselves have confirmed it.

Diablo 3? The best bet so far certainly. Their only IP left untouched now for any major length of time and fans are hungry for it. Most of the evidence points this way imo and it's probaly the easy money. Although, if this is the case, that means they would have 4 projects in development at the same time. SCII, WotLK, D3 and their new MMO. That seems like a hell of a lot of irons in the fire. It's very, very possible however that the last two are the same thing.

Of course, it'll probably be a new IP come this weekend and most of us will have to taste leather.

Oh and just for kicks, DII still has one of the best cinematics every pressed to a CD to this day..

http://youtube.com/watch?v=3-Jh_7IGjxI&feature=related

I'm going to cast a powerful spell by playing Diablo while singing Queen's greatest hits.

New splash page up. Looks like it's breaking into sky.

So, the third image is 23.jpg - that makes it W, which ruins the 'Diablo' letter theory.

Also, the new rune that appeared in the picture is from Starcraft 2 - which lends credence to the first one being a Warcraft Frostmourne rune.

I still think it's Diablo, but I think they're fucking with us now.

The jobs page has "Next Gen MMO" jobs galore, but considering the positions it's a little early for that, at least.  If this is for that MMO it's 2+ years away from Beta anyway.

The new splash is up now. New class is "icy" and number is 23. What's the new rune?

Look up two posts from yours.

New word added to the metawords in the .css file is Icy.

Icy Cellar was also a map in act 5 of D2.

Hmm.

(http://www.angelfire.com/ak4/ratman/habeebit.jpg)

teh winnar!

Yeaaa, yea, that's pretty hard to beat.

I'm hoping my memory is just shit, but I played the fuck outta D2 and I've only seen that movie now on Youtube.

What the hell ?

D2 expack, Lord of Destruction.

I think.

Looks like a frozen anus of a lich king. Wrath of the Goatse here we come.

Maybe they can just make a new Diablo 2 expansion instead of Diablo 3.  I think I'd prefer that.

As long as it ups the resolution and addresses the problem of Auras.

what is the problem with auras ? only one at a time?

It's the prelude to Act 4 in the main D2 game, Act 4 is the act where you start off in the little outpost of heaven on the edge of hell, with Tyrael and only a couple of others. Its the act where you ultimately kill Diablo.

W, eh? Maybe they're trying to be punny and telling their fans to Diablow themselves.

I LIKE THE IDEA THAT THEY'RE SPELLING WORLD. AND ANNOUNCING WORLD OF DIABLO.

FUCK FUCK FUCK.

(http://i59.photobucket.com/albums/g288/Deactivation/icepentagram.jpg)]

Next they'll see the Virgin Mary.

I'm so sad here.

Oh, right, also. The numbers being revealed seem to be a red herring.

4 8 15 16 23 42

Lost.

Also, this theory that's being tossed around of them mixing the 3 worlds together is the silliest fucking thing I've ever heard in gaming. The sort of godawful frankenstein piece of shit title that could come out of that makes my skin crawl.

lol.

Morning schild? It would be a piece of shit but is not outside the realm of possibility.

/shrug.

Whatever happens, I'll buy that bitch.

Looking at the WWI media, the runes and the 'clues', it seems like they are balancing all three products.  Which still points to Diablo since it is the only one which hasn't been updated.  I seriously doubt any kind of cross-over is in the works.  That would be risky, and Blizzard has no reason to be risky.  Damn you, Hope.

Uhh you Diablos people are sad. Really.

Lets see what we know:

Thay're working on a new MMO, have been for some time.
The Warcraft movie is in the works.

Logically one of these would be more likely than a diablo 3 people just want but we dont know they've bene working on. So:

If it's Diabloish it's most likely to be as a MMO.
If it's not it's most likely to be a new world MMO.
Or Warcraft the movie media campaign begins now.

Or It's Diablo 3.

From the picture they're piecing together I almost expect "Blizzard Presents: Whamdoodles Online, 2010"

No matter what they announced, it's whamadoodles online.

Awesome.  So you think they'll get Winger to do the art himself, or just train their in-house staff in his style then?

If it isn't Diablo this time, I will fucking cry and make a LEAVE DIABLO ALONE video and put it out on youtube and spam it to Mike Morhaime. I swear to Jesus.

That's cruel, making people think of Lost.

Oh shit, I laughed so hard!

They will simply announce that their next strategy game wont be called "Starcraft 2" after all, but "Warcraft 40000". With Terrans, Protoss, Zerg, Orcs and various Demons beating the crap out of each other. Oh, and they will probably squeeze some vikings in there too.

I'm still going to stick with the melded-IP theory.  Or perhaps a new line of miniatures and a set of rulebooks.

Yeah, I came here to post the pentagram theory, but schild beat me to it.

http://img504.imageshack.us/my.php?image=49026345zo3.jpg - here's the pretty version.

Didn't even think of the Lost numbers thing. Jesus christ. I hope they're not just being dicks.

http://diabloii.net/n/667390/on-to-the-next-theory

Another crazy theory about the purple walrus. Seems feasible, despite being a bit far fetched.

diabloii.net just basically confirmed D3 on Saturday.

I'm all for a WORLD OF DIABLO type game so long as someone from Blizzard has played Mythos and realized that they could do the same type of thing as that (and Guildwars) but on a much grand-ER scale, with a much better license, and with much more money to throw at people to create the thing.

So long as I'm fighting a screen full of enemies at a time and the ring .wav is still there, I'm playing it.

FUCK THOSE GUYS IF THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN.

FUCK THEM HARD WITH A STICK COVERED IN BEES.

 :ye_gods:

While all signs do point to it being D3, I'd take any 'inside information' with a grain of salt.

WAIT, HEY GUYS, I JUST GOT SOME INSIDE INFORMATION FROM BLIZZARD - THE NEXT GAME WILL BE

SIM TOWER 2

THEY BOUGHT THE RIGHTS FROM MAXIS

Man I can eat all this frothing with a spoon. I only wished they had put out these pictures a month in advance to add more whipped frenzy on top of this delicious speculation sundae.

Favorite part of the game.

 :heart:  :heart:  :heart: OMG YAY  :heart:  :heart:  :heart:

You guys have it all wrong, it is a new license for them.

(http://www.koanate.com/sharedpics/ice6.jpg)

Heh. Diablo III gets back to its roots.

I bet my left nut that is never going to happend. If the new Diablo is a MMO, Blizzard is most likely to follow the formula of WoW: recycle, redo and merge the best mechanics, polish the hell out of it and put it in a box full of pretties.

I was referring to Ingmar's picture. Diablo I and II are what you get when you take a roguelike game and present it with a modern graphics card instead of ascii text.

My bad, just read the Mythos comment, thought you were refering to that.

The thing I wonder about a Diablo MMO is how it would significantly distinguish itself from WoW. While the two are obviously quite different IPs, the period setting and gameplay elements share a fair amount in common.

2. (Trade) > Giglimesh: LF2M for T of Azzazel need healer and dps/cc. No pallies kthx.

I would see Diablo as a mmo hopefully playing a bit more like CoH then WoW.  Being able to blow through loads and loads of mobs REALLY fast.  instead of being capped at around 4 mobs of similar level at one time.

Probably be more heavily instanced too.

I'm telling Killjoy about Diablo 3 this weekend, in the middle of him telling me how Etrian Odyssey II is totally easy even though he hasn't gotten to level 2, and he says he would quit WoW immediately to play World of Diablo.

I'd like the next Diablo to have more puzzle elements.  My favorite moments were I was heavily out matched because I was in too deep and  had I needed use the terrain to squeak out a victory.  Nothing wrong with button mashing but I'd like have "Ah ha" moments where I realize I can kick the barrel off to fill and area with oil, shot arrow to ignite the oil and monsters on fire, barricade the only other exit so the panicing, half dead monsters have run to me so I can give them a merciful death.  All of this being randomized so I didn't exactly what to expect.

No, then it wouldn't be diablo.

And so it begins.  :awesome_for_real:

I don't think schild is going to be happy in the end.

What begins? Tazelbain was putting some bullshit sandbox style crap in my Diablo. I don't even think Blizzard has the balls to do that.

Can't they just buy the rights to Hellgate, rebrand it, add the ring ping, and call it a day?

 :drill:

I never really got Diablo I guess. Left click times infinity?

No, there are plenty of right clicks too!

It's all about the ring ping, man.

And about my badass Barbarian "Karsa" slaying screens full of monsters and scooping up their shiny shiny magical loot and gold and jewels and then using 'find item' on their bloody corpses to get even more.

The Diablo Online auction house would be more crowded with items than the bazaar from SWG!



(harhar, I managed to fit SWG in this. blasphemy!)

We're going to need a whole new thread to contain the angst when it's not Diablo 3.

I'd personally rather not see a Diablo MMOG. WoW is doing just fine, and Diablo doesn't need more than 8 people in a game. (I think more than 6 is silly myself)

As a Guild Wars style of multiplayer? (In game lobbies, etc...) Yeah. That would be aces.

This is standard operating procedure.  :awesome_for_real:

Anyone find it kinda sad that after ten years at one url, they have going to have to swap to a new one (assuming they've got it) or else be made instantly redundant?

New splash screen up.  Looks like we can have more MS Paint fun with this one, since I can already see an imaginary demon face when I look into the swirling mist in the middle.

What have you people done to my mind!  :awesome_for_real:

New rune on the page is interesting too.  I don't recognize it from any of the games, but it looks like a solar system.  Worlds of....?

Solar system with 3 planets and one extra ring around the outside.

http://www.game-say.com/forum/showthread.php?t=641

(http://www.angelfire.com/ak4/ratman/megablizz.jpg)

Anyone read this yet? :
http://www.diabloii.net/n/667423/diablo-3-announcement-at-wwii (http://www.diabloii.net/n/667423/diablo-3-announcement-at-wwii)

Long time Diablo II website announces that they have news from "reliable inside industry sources in the past 24 hours" that the announcement will be about DIABLO 3  :drill:

Scroll up 5 posts.

Haha, my bad.

I'm willing to bet this is something new.  They seem to be drumming up the frenzy for the inclusion of a 4th property line in their triumvirate of evil.

This is the first generally plausible theory I've seen. It's worked for previous games.

The first plausible theory I saw was simply that the first new Diablo art we've seen since Diablo 3 was canned after blizzard had it's problems with blizzard north was the new WWI art with a giant diablo wtfpwning the other franchises.

I didn't see that theory in this thread.

Like Margalis, I just plain don't 'get' Diablo.  I've tried several times over the last 8 years and it's always as uninteresting to me as the previous time.  As a result I'm only reading this thread here, not tracking down info all over the intertubes.

S'ok, I don't expect people to "get" my love for TBS games in return.

(http://img393.imageshack.us/img393/894/wwi08logovp5.jpg)

That image.

These guys seem to think that the announcement could be WoW on the PS3. (http://www.pspsps.tv/2008/06/wow_announced_for_the_ps3_this.html)

I can think of at least two glaring reasons why that would never happen, but Sony is in a tough position.  While the two spots on today's splash screen remind me of the Protoss on the cover of Starcraft,  at this point, I'm immune to Blizzard's misdirection.  The runes form a pentagram.  I hope you've all prepared yourselves for the third coming of our Dark Lord and Master.

Sup?

(http://xs228.xs.to/xs228/08264/zomgitsdiablo_resized884.png) (http://xs.to)

 :awesome_for_real:

The latest patch for Diablo 2 has removed CD checking. (It took a couple of .mpq file transfers for me to get it working, but confirmed.)

Make of that what you will.

That PS3 site is just looking for a link on NeoGAF. Pardo already said it was a new game. WoW is by no means new. Or a game. HARHARHARHAHRHHARHRAHA.

Plus Sony already has The Agency and DC Universe in the cooker for their console.

I think the biggest thing to take out of all this craziness is just how much love remains for the Diablo series.  Half the internet goes fucking apeshit over the possibility that Diablo3 is about to be announced, moreso than I think even for that actual announcement of SC2.  I would gather that even if it isn't Diablo3 being announced, the amount of fervor for it is something even Blizzard, atop their God-mountain, cannot ignore.

There's a reason Starcraft was announced in Korea. DOTA is bigger than starcraft here. And it's a fucking mod.

Oh I know this, believe me.  I just cant help but think about shit like how long the Necromancer was essentially broken, how fucking long guided arrow was broken, how long it took for 1.10, how long the elemental tree for druid was absolutely fucking worthless, etc.  Diablo2 is probably my favorite game of all time after SMB3, and if I could only choose between one of their franchises it would be that even though Starcraft is still probably the best game I've ever played for the PC.  I just worry that of all their franchises diablo is the easiest to leave by the wayside for them, and I half wouldn't blame them.  It had to be one of the most frustrating things in the world to see their entire online portion become decimated because of hacks and cheats even though it was something they were specifically worried about going into developement of the second.  Diablo players are, almost without exception, the biggest fucking assholes on the planet, and maybe that's why I feel so at home there.

Today's hidden JPG has the number 16, which plays into the 'numbers from Lost' theory - we have, so far (in bold), 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42.

It's the foot of the purple walrus, but today's letter is P, which shoots down the DARCHOW DASHOW (WHATEVER IT IS A DUMB NAME) theory.

New rune location so far supports the pentagram theory.

MORE TO COME WHEN I PLOW THROUGH 20 MORE PAGES OF THIS OTHER THREAD

What's the DARCHOW theory?

He meant Dashow. I hope.

WHATEVER MAN

People are still trying to theorycraft the 4th rune - linking it to Pluto's two orbiting satellites, one of which is Hydra, hence project hydra.

Also

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pax_Imperia:_Eminent_Domain

Boxart corresponds with rune, Blizzard had their fingers in that pie.

What is TBS?

Turn Based Strategy.

So, Nonentity claims Diablo 3 will be a RTS game.  Saucy.

I claimed nothing of the sort! I am just partaking in the wild speculation.

That's half the fun!

(http://img389.imageshack.us/img389/9980/tauranmarine2ku9.jpg)

Why are we doing this when it'll just be a repeat of the SC2 announcement.

"MAN IT JUST HAS TO BE DIABLO III IT JUST HAS TO BE BECAUSE YOU SEE LOGICALLY WITH THE MARKETING AND ALL AND ITS BEEN X YEARS AND THIS GUY FROM BLIZZARD SAID THIS AND THAT TEASER CLOCK IS OBVIOUSLY DIABLO THEMED JUST YOU WAIT IT'LL BE DIABLO III."

*is Starcraft 2*

Schild is going to morselise you and use the mush to paint his house.

I've already pointed out and apparently the excuse is that "It wasn't blizzards fault" last time. Denial is a fun game!

Hello. I am Nonentity, and I am a Blizzard fanboy.

Please release Diablo 3 so the trifecta of awesome can be COMPLETE.

Goddamn it, now you people have me all fired up for D3. That will lessen my joy when something else is announced and everyone goes apeshit.

I would say the split is about 70/30 on people thinking it's diablo/people thinking it's wow or SC related.

They better make the larger number of people happy, that's all I'm sayin'.

Someone on another board suggested it might be Lost Vikings 3.  HA!  I would SO laugh!

That wouldn't be funny. Also, I think Blizzard likes money.

Diablo 3 would steal money from the cash cow though.

The money all goes to the same people so it won't matter.  What will actually happen is that some WoW players will just flipflop between WoW and World of Diablo, possibly overlapping subs.  Five-gallon moneyhats.

Closest match for the rune I've seen is http://img238.imageshack.us/my.php?image=solarlp0.jpg

It's a wall hanging in Uldaman. Something related to the titans. Apparently it's an ode to Lost Vikings or something.

Or about 20 seconds into this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFwYygCY77c

So, basically what has been uncovered is that so far they have runes from multiple games, and ice. Thats all we really know for sure, right?

And that WWI is on Diablo's Birthday. And in Europe, where Diablo is bigger than anything. And has Diablo featured most prominently on the logo.

In my gift bag from Blizzcon 2007 they included a big sticker that wa almost identical to this. With a big Diablo right in the middle. I think taking his presence in the logo might be grasping at straws. Not that its not Diablo.

Morfiend, Killer of Dreams <Lightning Enchanted>

It looks more like a glaring Protoss to me.

Maybe Zealots are one of the classes in Diablo 3: World of Ice Pax Vikings.  I could live with that.

I don't know, now that simond posted that pic showing I'm not completely insane, that seems kind of a big tip off.  The eyes match up perfectly.

Or also they sort of look like the eyes of a raging Tauran.   :awesome_for_real:

ANY eyes would match up perfectly provided that the pupils were drawn in the same style.  They're eyes.  There are two of them and they're in a horizontal line.  You can get any picture to match up with them positionally as long as you scale it right.

The identical style on the pupils might be a valid clue, but I wouldn't be surprised if their artist(s) always draw pupils that way when they're trying to make something look evil.

Look at the eyes.

(http://tulsalan.com/tulsalan/images/stories/SC2Protoss.jpg)

But what have the draenei got to do with Diablo?  :grin:

It's a Protoss Zealot meaning SC2. I say shun to the blasphemists and bring on Diablo!

Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann the MMO, obviously.

(http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h88/bzalthek/TTGLMMO.jpg)

img-sarchasm.

Also, I'd play the hell out of TTGL-the-mmog.  :drill:

And they don't even match up all that perfectly, the image in the middle is using the ice image's pupils.  They are too slitted to "perfectly match" the Diablo eyes, not to mention being the wrong damn colour.  Since every blizzard franchise has glowing eyes it gets you nowhere.

(http://xs128.xs.to/xs128/08264/pedobear_blizz_splash2by_doom320.jpg) (http://xs.to)

 :hello_thar:

(http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2008/june/splashdetails.jpg)

This is absolutely hilarious.  Also, I'm commenting because I'm tired of not seeing new posts show up under new replies.

If it means so much to you. Here you go.

The one with the ? ? ?, that's totally a crop circle.

New splash.  Damn it, that could be a Demon or a Protoss.  At least it doesn't really look like anything I would relate to WOTLK.

Also, final rune appears to be a snowflake.

....

The numbers now are: 4, 8, 15, 16, 23 which match up exactly with the numbers from Lost (aside from the final number 42).

New metatag word is harbinger.

And they released two parts of the 'hidden image' - what the fuck is this thing?

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v201/ninjee/Evil_Penguin.jpg

Also, the runes match up to the pentagram pattern.

HM HM HM.

Lost Vikings. I'm calling it.

Hello Kitty Island Adventure. With Tentacles.

(http://i305.photobucket.com/albums/nn206/Ingmar_bucket/ice5.jpg)

Looking less and less Diablo-y by the minute.

To do list: set alarm for Saturday morning so I can watch Schild's forum meltdown in real time.

:awesome_for_real:

I think they're just fucking with everyone, on saturday they're going to announce that they've decided to have tea.

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v201/ninjee/Evil_Penguin.jpg)

That is pretty  :awesome_for_real: though, I want a copy in super hi res so I can print it out and frame it.

Found this: http://phillryu.com/2008/06/26/diablo-3-actually-confirmed/

Of course, I found it on R9K, so take it with a grain of salt.

Diablo 3... in space. 

It worked for the Jason/Friday 13th series, as well as Hellraiser and Leprechaun, right??  Am I right??

Looks like an Archon

That's just a rehash of what's already been discussed.

That image could not look less diablo now. Just saying.

Were there purple evil penguins in diablo?

I'm talking about Blizzard.com. That penguin means nothing to any of their franchises.

So, when can the rest of us start laughing hysterically while pointing?

(http://www.angelfire.com/ak4/ratman/LegoDiablo3.jpg)

I'd be on lego Diablo like flies on shit if every time I killed something it exploded into little lego bits.

I wonder if I'm the only person in existence who plays games but doesn't really care for any of Blizzard's stuff.

That last official image could look like Diablo III if hell froze over. So, maybe that's the thing.

No, you're not.

The last Blizzard games I had any real interest in were Starcraft (not Brood War, just plain old Starcraft) and Diablo 1. Since then all they've done other than make WOW is make sequels / expansions, and I found Warcraft 3 to be a step backwards from Starcraft.

That image doesn't have the faintest link to Diablo.  Someone go over to Nonentity's house and hide all the knives and sleeping pills.

we waited two years for a single game patch.  grasping at the thinnest of straws is normal for diablo fans.  how else could we kill pindleskin so many times without killing ourselves?

Why all of a sudden am I excited about the announcement? 

I haven't liked the last 2 games Blizzard has produced.  In fact, Diablo is the only Blizzard game I genuinely love, and I know damn well if it IS Diablo it'll be an MMO which I can't stomach anymore.  In my perfect little world this will be Diablo3 with shit tons more rogue-like influence and more item drops than anything I've ever imagined before.

OMG IS IT SATURDAY IN PARIS YET?? Hurray for time zone differences  :ye_gods:

I have, to date, enjoyed every game/expansion Blizzard has released, so any new game announcement is exciting for me.  I really loved both Diablo games, so I really hope it is a new Diablo.  But no matter what they announce, I'll give it the benefit of the doubt until they prove me wrong.

...


But it had better be Diablo.

To be honest, if it isn't Diablo 3, I won't be taking a trip to the ER for attempted suicide - I'll be happy with whatever they announce, being a fan of every franchise currently available.

I just decided to pick a side, and stick with it for this little splash screen game, and I went with Diablo 3.

Schild, on the other hand - well, yeah.

I've never been a Blizzard fan, although I've enjoyed some of their games. All I'm excited about is the possibility of another good PC game. I'll never have a console, so please, bring on the PC fun.

But don't you see the metaphor there?

At first I was thinking the new eyes looked totally like a Protoss, but after looking at some other images, I am now leaning to them being Arthas' eyes.

I'll be fine.

Right after I crack my unopened Burning Crusade collector's box, take a shit in it and mail it to them.

I loved Diablo II but Diablo I was just as good in a mindless fun way.

I think it was the 'chain lightning' ability?  The one where you filled the screen with massive waves of lighting and cleared what looked like several hundred critters all at once?  With huge fountains of gold and lewt flying around?  That has yet to be matched for pure glee in any game since.

I hung around in the 'Hardcore' (whatever the no deaths rule set was) channel on B.Net for months and just did runs to see how far up I could level a guy.  I think it used to show the level of your char next to your name?  Good stuff.

KISSIES, MY BOY, WE WILL MAKE IT THROUGH ALIVE

 :oh_i_see:

Murgos ++ in my eyes :) :heart:

Yeah chain lightening was the best.

http://www.battle.net/forums/thread-search.aspx?SearchType=2&searchtext=&x=35&y=15&forumname=d3-general

Change the number 3 from 3-6 and they all exist. Bah.

Yes, sir.

You can do that with anything.

What you want to search is this:
http://www.battle.net/forums/board.aspx?ForumName=d3-general

http://www.battle.net/forums/thread-search.aspx?ForumName=d6-general

 :awesome_for_real:

Paris is GMT +1
East coast USA is GMT -5
West coast is GMT -8

So depending on where you live--assuming you're in USA--Paris is anywhere from 6-9 hours ahead of you.

Better question. When is Blizzard holding their press conference???

EDIT: 11:45am-1:00pm followed by a press conference.

I'm predicting a Steam-like platform for gaming community and digital distribution ALONG with Lost Vikings 3 and Diablo 3. Project Hydra, the multi-headed beast indeed.

(http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/8034/faithv23tk1.jpg)




Yes, I'm at work, and have absolutely nothing better to do right now.

You did that yourself?  That's not bad.

Oh god no.  I'm just referring to the fact I'm endlessly posting stupid stuff in a Blizzard speculation thread.

I can only dream of being that good with photoshop.

Tease.

Most plausible clue yet!
http://battle.net/forums/thread-search.aspx?ForumName=war4-general

That's random.  It takes Warcraft + number and adds ghost to the end of it O.o

*edit* Only for 4,5 and 6.  7 works correctly.  I think Blizzard is just trying to mindfuck with everyone lol.

Teleku nearly gave me a heart attack. Thought it was real  :heartbreak:

Damn, I should have posted it without any other words.  :awesome_for_real:

(http://xs328.xs.to/xs328/08265/ice29718.jpg) (http://xs.to)

Blizzard.cn is totally not owned by blizzard.

It says 'Fan site' right on it.

GRAIN OF SALT~

Stevie Wonder can see that is shopped. Anyhow, I'm still optimistic in this case, bring on a new Diablo!!!  :heart:

1up.com is reporting that the above image chain is real.

http://www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?bId=8785958&publicUserId=4549175

Wouldn't be the first time they were wrong. Or the last. But we'll see. Pretty sure it's shooped.

We're what, 11 hours away from finding out?  That time can't pass quickly enough.

sc2pod has updated their D3 clues page. (http://www.sc2pod.com/news/Countdown_to_Diablo_3/)

7 hours.  Fuck.

And that's a damned good photoshop, but photoshop no less.

Too bad we're 11 hours away from an announcement and easily 2 years from playing an actual WORKING game. Fucking Blizzard.

I cant hold it any more. That fucking Eddie Murphy head is driving me insane. I think it is going to haunt my dreams for weeks to come.

Ah, someone finally broke. This is the best avatar since Pennywise. Five years ago.

(http://s.buzzfeed.com/static/imagebuzz/2008/6/25/13/1936ba624033537cb130dc8540f25b4a.jpg)

Photoshop it into the Blizzard promo background and send it around the internet.

Oh shit. That's a better one. Shit. Man. Shit. I would fucking KILL for one of those on my front lawn in white town.

My girl wants to party all the time, party all the time, party all the time! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m5LX16zia2k)

(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/06/C64_Archon.png)

If it looks like that then I'm in.

Unicorn >>>> *

Unicorns are cheap.

True awesomeness comes from pwning with the Valkyrie, Banshee, and especially the Shapeshifter.

Anyone who has ever read the WoW forums knows to stay a million fucking miles from any site ending in .cn

Hahaha so true! I used to only use a single Unicorn when attacking.

Meet Eddie Murphy's Ego.

(http://img78.imageshack.us/img78/8333/eddieheadgk7.jpg)

I would play that.

ya but is there anything you wouldn't play? 

WOW

For those who will be up, Blizzard is offering live streams of the event.

http://eu.blizzard.com/wwi08/streams.xml

Yes Schild, this will cover the costume and dance contest as well. I know you're a sucker for cos-play.

So announcement in like 4 hours?

Yep, 5:30 a.m. eastern I believe.

EDIT: At least that's when the opening ceremony starts.

The suspense  :ye_gods:

Do I stay up till 2:45 in the morning?

 :oh_i_see:

Probably not.

See it's almost a win win situation here gents. We either get Diablo 3, or we get to watch the Schild version of the Kill Bill red screens (complete with high pitched music.)

I wish I could set an alarm that went off depending on what they announced.  Wake me up if Diablo/Lost Vikings is announced.  Ignore if release date for Starcraft 2/ WOTLK is announced.  Secrete chlorine gas if web page update/B.NET upgrade is announced.

Like someone else said, it will be at least 3 years before we see any fruit. I'll try to get hyped then.

The splash screen's been updated: the eyes are brighter, you can see a bit of the face, and the five symbols are glowing.  I love diabloii.net:

"What happens in Diablo II when 5 seals spaced around a large circle are triggered and start to glow? Someone appears then... someone large and red... I can't quite remember who, though?"

Is that a winking smiley face up top? :awesome_for_real:

(http://us.media.blizzard.com/232309/_images/ice5andahalf.jpg)

Ok, the brow is looking really demonish to me.  Definitely not Lich king helm (its way to organic looking for that in it's texture).  It could be protoss, but they don't really have that sharp of brow lines.

And yes, that is a winking smiley.  Probably making fun of everybody who tried to make sense of all the completely random and non sensical clues they scattered all over the place.

Less than an hour and I don't see schild around -- somebody needs to wake him!

He's on the viewing platform of the Eiffel Tower with a high-powered rifle and a mobile set to refresh on www.blizzard.com?  :awesome_for_real:

Look at all the sorry assholes hawking this thread like vultures at 5 in the morning. Yeah, I see ya up there. Yes I realise I'm one of you.

well, it's 7:15pm for me. But yes, the only reason I'm still on the computer is the anticipation of delicious, salty tears.

 :awesome_for_real:

i'm here i'm here

I AM SO TIRED BUT 25 MINUTES BVVV

I'll come back in half an hour then.

I have a semi legitimate excuse in that, for various reasons, the batch of beer we brewed tonight in our kitchen went late.  So I only just finished boiling the wort at around midnight.  It took the fucker about 2 and a half hours (IE, just now) to cool down to the point where I could pitch the yeast and seal the container, which required me to stay up this late.  Now that I'm done with it, and its so close, may as well stay up a few more minutes to catch the final announcement.

The home brewery made me do it. Excellent misdirect there sir. Well played.

So I'm playing some Diablo 2 as a newbie paladin, and I can't remember what to do with my stats.  All the guides I've looked at just say stuff like "STR, enough to wear gear, DEX, enough to block max" and other non-helpful things.  Since everyone's going to be reading this thread, I'll just ask here.

Does anybody if any sites are live blogging this? My connection is way too pathetic to actually watch it.

Here ya go Trippy..

http://www.wowinsider.com/

Not quite what I meant but thanks. I found an IRC channel where a bunch are waiting :drill:

http://www.diabloii.net/n/667979/wwi-irc-chat

Caw caw!

Stage pic:
(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3048/2617255953_5e43dbb489.jpg?v=0)

The live stream was running for a minute but now it's back to the test screen.

Dicks.

The new image is up on the blizzard site.

While I was looking at it, I noticed in the lower right corner of the opening there is what looks like a horn highlighted.  I know of only one blizz francise with a horn that curves like that.

The announcement is about Female Dranei?

And of course the live stream thing blizzard had me download says that there are to many people connected, and to try again later.  Dicks.

I'm getting a 'fuck off' message from the site.

:(

Whats the bloody point eh. Zzzz.

Live blogging sites:

http://pc.ign.com/articles/884/884836p1.html (ads boo hiss!, fastest updates, though)
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6193003.html?tag=topslot;title;1&om_act=convert&om_clk=topslot <- auto streams
http://www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?bId=8786475&publicUserId=5380025
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2008/06/28/blizzard-opening-ceremony-live-blogging/ (not much info)
 

This stream thing is a liar. A Filthy liar.


Playing my ass!

I JUST WANT TO KNOW WHAT IT IS SO I CAN GO TO SLEEP IN PEACE.

(http://www.haryana-online.com/images/Birds/Szabolcs/Red-headed_vulture.jpg)

I just want to know so I can go tidy my house !

No Ironwood. F13 may need you now more than ever in the coming struggle. If the announcement is non Diablo we may need you to help us in the showdown against a mad, frothing, bloodthirsty tyrant.

SIC SEMPER TYRANNIS

Heh.  Giggle.

I'm still thinking a new IP.  Though I can see that horn now.

zomg.

And Whatnot.

Ok now the stream is kinda working. No sound.

Haha the bitching about the streams on IRC is too funny.

Last minute prediction: Diablo 3 and a full relaunch of Battle.net as a subscription service ala Steam.

Also: Diablo 3 gets announced in the closing ceremony tomorrow as the last thing.  :drill:

They've been introducing all the tournament competitors, total snooze fest so far.

Mike Morhaime is on stage now.

Stream =  :cry2:

Morhaime is on stage now.

EDIT: Damn Trippy's ninja edit skillz

Morhaime just declared that Blizzard is sticking it to the man by making a 'mature' product like WoW. wtf?

Ninja edit!

Could be a horn. Could be the side of a helmet. Could be a horn on a helmet.

The shit around the eyes certainly looks like a helmet's T-visor done all fantasy-style.

" Diablo 3 Confirmed, a bug in the teleprompter at the event "leaked the info", opening ceremony starting right now !"

Shush.

Seeing highlights from last years invitiational atm on the live stream.

So how long does this stupid shit go for, anyway?

Way too long, from GameSpot live blog:

Heh, from the rockpapershotgun live blog:
"11.08 - Black presenter just makes a joke about how black people are responsible for al the things that go wrong in the world. My mind is breaking."

From IGN:


Different kind of mature.

Here it comes..

Diablo tune playing

And a guy is on stage playin acoustic music from Diablo..

It's fucking on.

http://eu.blizzard.com/en/splash.htm

There it moves now!

time for the swerve?  :grin:

New splash screen up

It's animated and tis Diablo 3

IT'S ON.


CONFIRMED !

Click this link and bask in the glory...

http://www.blizzard.com/us/splash.html

Bah, all that schadenfreude potential, wasted.

Uh, the blizzard splash screen just changed.

Its diablo 3!


Edit: Jesus fuck we are sad, all at once.

schild lives another day!

Interesting, Jay Wilson is lead designer.

Crappy camera phone pic :awesome_for_real:
(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3162/2617302493_fbeb0a1e8f.jpg?v=0)

You never know, it might be first person perspective or something!

On one hand, I'm disappointed that schild shall not cry sweet salty tears this night.

On the other hand, it'll probably be a decent game to play. when it comes out in 2010.

 :awesome_for_real:

Live stream now showing in game footage of the Bararian.

The music is fucking amazing.

ok, I'm off to tidy the house.

To answer the obvious question :  It'll be released when it's ready.

 :awesome_for_real:

Alright back to what I was working on before. Have fun with the rest guys!

So glad it's not just some Lich King crap.  Fuck Warcraft, and it's gnomes, and it's PG-ness, and it's pussy PG demons that come from "the twisting nether" instead of motherfucking Hell.

One more pic before I go:

(http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3197/2618127694_72e6912b01.jpg?v=0)

Suicide watch crew can stand down.  :grin:

Also looks like they're nixing the potion spamming. Direct health drops now.

I wonder if it will incorporate modern innovations, like getting to actually pick the gender of your character.

UNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG

And with that I sleep.

Ironically, the beer we brewed tonight was a Red Ale  :awesome_for_real:.

New class shown. Witch Doctor.

FIFY.


I keep getting 404 errors on that page, and on the page after the EU splash one. I'm guessing they are having some issues getting it uploaded / the servers are getting hammered.

Apparently yes, there are male and female versions of the Barb and the Witch Doctor.

http://eu.blizzard.com/diablo3/

you can download all the movie clips, wallpapers, art, etc.

Well, I came.

Would the last person to leave Hellgate: London please turn out the lights?  :grin:

I guess the US site is up with trailers and stuff

http://www.blizzard.com/diablo3/

I was underwhelmed by the gameplay trailer until they popped the armor chest.  OMG LEWTZ DO WANT!

 :heart: :heart: :heart: :heart:

The dynamic music rocks... rocks hard.

Gameplay seems pretty much the same as always.

Edit: and yes, the chest was the best part by far.

Guys, guys, can someone call Schild and make sure he is ok, and/or call the police.

I went "Woah!" and chuckled at the destroyable terrain (bringing the wall down on the zombies), the Wall of Zombies! and the end boss dude.

Taking potions out and making them health pickups seems arcadey to me, at first blush.

Generally stoked. Waiting to hear about the archer class...

...and?

 :drill:

I saw potions too.  The guy didn't talk about them, but they were there to pick up.

<3 the "whukka whukka" item-dropping noise.

Intro (http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=HrxSEEavAu4&feature=related) youtubed already.

This is the first thing I really noticed, and it made me feel tingly inside.

At least in Diablo 1 the instantly drinkable health potions lead to some really stupid gameplay. IMO they should get rid of them entirely, or make them take like 5 seconds to drink. The solution to every problem in Diablo was more potions. Kind of silly to have a loot-centric game and the lowly potion is far and away the most important loot.

Hmmm.  Fairly sure it'll be red raw from rubbing by now.

:uhrr:

Dunno if you played it, but in D2 the potions were heal-over-time for X amount.

I'm not a big Diablo fan, at all, and that gameplay vid looked pretty fun to me.

I'm glad they kept the same style while making it '3D'. It gives me hope for other games.

Looks good.

Apart from the rejuvenation potions which were instant and sometimes absolutely necessary imho (because of the gameplay). MSLE 4tw (been years since I've used that term).

End boss chewing player's head off = star of the show.

Ok, ok, this (http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=UshzNT0FBrs) is the real intro. I'm having difficulties in my pants at the moment.

From the Beastiary:

Man.  Just...man, MSLE was terrifying to even think about in hardcore, especially because a graphical bug would cause all that lightning to become invisible.  I'd totally forgotten about that kind of stuff until you mentioned it, and if they were an Extra Fast modified creature...well, guess you're fucked if you can't progress without them dying.  Can't wait to see what new kind of fucking ridiculous deathtrap monsters end up spawning in D3, it's gonna be so sweet I'm getting goosebumps thinking about it. :drill:

Deckard's journal on the new site is aces. Full voice narration and covers all the history through the first two games and has the cut scenes embedded.

http://www.blizzard.com/diablo3/world/lore/journal.xml

Yup. That part was sahweet. I hope there's lots of crazy death animations for the different monstesr/ways of croaking.

Indeed. Going first person or any other break from the core gameplay would have been stupefying.

I am happy to report that schild is alive, on steam, and has ripped his caps lock key off.

Wow I really didn't think they were headed in this direction.  Congrats to the uber Diablo fans.

Blizzard's worthless fucking bittorrent system isn't downloading the trailer or gameplay video and I'm getting pissed off.  They have more money than God, buy some fucking bandwidth and let us download directly.  Maybe some other site already has the files.

AND THE HEAVENS...

Wait, you know what would make this better?  Postcount++

The graphics are amazing.  It also looks like they'll have allot of classes, sounds great.  The best part about Diablo is that everybody plays it, you can play with your non-gamer friend.

Hell, I'll probably play at realease with my children - I don't have any right now...

This is like waking up on Christmas morning.  Except Santa is Satan and I can't play with my presents for another year.  Evil.


That looks hella fun to play.  Boss chewing the player's head off came completely out of left field.  Nice touch.

Ok I just fucking came!!!!!!!! YES YES YES  :drill: Woke up and this is the news I see  :rock:

I FROTH SO NO ONE HAS TO. GAMEPLAY AWESOME. GRAPHICS AREN'T SOME CUT DOWN WOW BULLSHIT. YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS.

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

STAY A WHILE AND LISTEN MOTHERFUCKERS.

Bet you fight Tyrael.

OH FUCK the gameplay video looks AMAZING. I'm so happy I could shit! Ok now lets stop talking about it cause this aint coming for 2 years  :heartbreak:

Yep you can see that one coming. Tyrael gets cast out for destroying the world stone etc. etc.

FAQ says there will be 5 classes (well, until the first expansion).  Seems a little weak to me.

Barbarian, Witch Doctor... Amazon, Necro, Paladin?  Let the speculation begin!

Oh and:

(http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/1316/rrrrrrrbpbs3.jpg)

NO ONE GIVES A FUCK ABOUT THE STORYLINE

I WANT TO PLAY IT

PING
PING
PING
PING
PING
PING
PING
PINGPING
PING
PING
PING
PING
PING
PINGPINGPINGPINGPINGPINGPINGPING
PING
PING
PINGPINGPINGPING
PING
PINGPING
PING
PINGPINGPING
PING
PING
PINGPINGPING
PING
PING
PING
PING
PING

For those of you checking the youtube links, the ones on the official site work fine and aren't in that horrible compressed youtube quality.

Game play looked a little slower to me.. somewhat more methodical since they're allowing access to more than 2 abilities at once. From the creature design bits he talked about it sounds like they wanted some more thought put in to how you approached the monsters than just "Fucking hack at them."  Might actually be more interesting to me than the last 2 games.

I'm amazed nobody's bitching they didn't put then *ping* in the gameplay vid at least once.. Just the jewel drop.

Hm? I thought I heard a quiet ping when the final mob dropped that lone amulet. All mixed in with all the other noise though.

WHO CARES

WANT

D2-style Necro and Witch Doctor seem too similiar to share the line up at release. I'd imagine the last three will be magical/melee (Paladin), Magical Caster (Sorceress) and Physical Ranged (Amazon) for the last three slots. Or some variation of that theme, two reanimation-based pet classes doesn't sound right.

Still not as beefy as 'cutting edge' games. Wow came out years ago, dudeman.

I bet the sys reqs are pretty friendly.

And it never ceases to amaze me how far Blizz gets on a game without any info leaks. They must have chips in all their employees brains or something.  :ye_gods:

Betcha it's Ranger (or something) and not Amazon, now that gender is independant of class.

They better have a rogue/assassin class.

Also, paladin always seemed out of place to me. The only truly "good" class in the franchise.

Hehe yeh I think this too. When starcraft was reviled and they had a considerable amount of game play footage, I was like do they let the people working on these game outside ever. I'd love to see what kind of NDA the devs for any game have to sign.

Blizzard gives them an offer they can't refuse. Literally.  :nda:

It's my understanding that Blizzard is THE place to want to work in the industry.  You don't go around even remotely touching on anything that would jeopardize your job there, when you know after that it's all EA or EA-likes for the rest of your professional career.

(http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2007/20070523.jpg)

I would never ever want to work at Blizzard. For the sole fact that I would want to continue liking their NonWoW games. I mean, that's all there is to it. You work on something like that and all will to play goes out the window.

So, I'm guessing, free to play on B.net.  B.net has more advertisment then before.

I'm also going out on a limb and saying there will be some sort of microtransactions.  Just not sure which/how.

Second the suggestion to watch the streaming versions on the site, they are excellent quality and plenty of bandwidth.

The jewel drop was nice, so I would think that means at least socketing.  Hopefully the cube is alive, well, and revamped with all kinds of silly new combines.

The gold made that nice clinking noise was win, zillions of baddies was win, Wall of Zombies was pure win, destructible terrain was win,  Male and female of all classes is win, endless stream of loot comment was win, giant baddies was win.

Barbarian is nearly the same, Witchdoctor looks like a souped up necromancer.  I am thinking that Paladin will be back as a class though maybe turned to even more of a group support class, Assassin/Archer will get merged as super DPS and then probably we will see some sort of pure flame blasting, lightning zapping AOE glass canon magic type.

For a first look it had everything I would want to see, I am really impressed with the level of detail already there.  I'm guessing 2010 for release.   :ye_gods:

I mean, SC II was announced last year and that's still in the hopper.

Edit:  Although I am hoping they pull a double whammy and their last announcement before closing things down is, "Oh, yeah, SCII on shelves two weeks from Tuesday."   :drill:

I'll bet there's no microtrans. Agree that it's going to be free on bnet. The box sales of SC2 and D3, regardless of the WoW money press, I imagine will keep bnet running just fine without nickel and diming consumers.

I would go all capslock on that.  :grin:

Pretty sure socketing and/or crafting are back in some form, looking closely in the gameplay video you can see a chipped star topaz on the ground.

Am I the only one that saw it like that?

And then agreed?

So.  What's happening in here?  Are there refreshments?

RIP Hellgate. Heh. Fuck you Bill Roper.  :drill:

:awesome_for_real:

For the classes, 5 is disappointing.  I tough they could afford more with their development budget...  Speculations are pointless at this point.  Still fun though.   I would have guessed 5 new classes but we already have the barbarian.  The paladin is always a favortie for young boys, I don't think they can remove it.   It's also a great class to fight demons.  Amazon won't come back if we can pick up our gender.  We'll definitely get a wizard and a rogue/archer type. 

Meh, I was hoping for at least 8 classes when I saw the witch doctor, he doesn't look like a "cover the basic class".  They could still be original if they spread the elemental magic line to different classes.  The witch doctor has a fire line. Give the lightning line to a druid class.

An other theory is that they are shooting for 5 distinc visual style.  I know Blizzard love this design philosophy : you have to recognize a class by it's silhouette.  It would eliminate the paladins since the big armor type is covered by the Barbarian.   It would leave some room for original classes.

Wow, so Blizzard finally stopped jerking everyone around.

Now to wait 2 years for it to come out!

I was hoping for a subscription and regular content update.  I loved Diablo II but the patches and xpac took forever.  There's so much potential for a content patch every 3-4 months.  With out them the game become repetitive too fast - for me at least.

Chat gem on the D3 site.  They're still fucking with us...

Saw that, haven't seen any cows.  Yet...

I just noticed that they're using the BLIZZARD DOWNLOADER to distribute the high-res gameplay videos.

Awesome.

Edit: okay the downloader is a worthless piece of shit. Anyone got a mirror?

I know one guy who works at Blizzard. Well, I don't "know him" know him - I played qwtf with him over a decade ago.

He was still in IRC for about 4 months after WOW came out. He worked on mob pathing and spawning and that kind of thing. He's fallen off the face of the planet since that time. I guess he got promoted or something to a position where he could have even less "gamer contact" or something.

Here's a message from my 2 year old:

888888859''
l'o]
]]]\\\]y\lo[g[===i7hi'/j
?poip




yyyypdddddddd_____ook[m'
jk
< \p;[]/\


l][o

Yay!

Your 2 year old is a troll! Also one of my guildies works at Blizzard as GM at the moment and he plays actively when not working and is still in our Irc / forums, guess a dev has far more devoted role though and requires lots of time.


Your 2 year old nearly wrote poop. The pride I would have if my childs first e-word was poop. That is a natural born forum troll, in a good sense.

:drill:

That is all I can say right now.

Sorcer(er/ess) as we know may be gone, considering they are giving fire magic to witch doctor.  Necro is almost certainly replaced by the witch doctor.  There will be likely be either 3 new classes and 2 old classes, or 3 old classes and 2 new classes, at least based on the FAQ:  "Exciting new classes like the witch doctor bring new gameplay options to the table. Returning classes, like the barbarian, have been completely redone with new skills to give them a feel unique to Diablo III."

I'd guess paladin will come back.  Assassin was my favorite class in D2, so I definitely hope that is in. 

I'm still looking for a damn mirror for the high-res gameplay vid since Blizzard's downloader doesn't work. At all.

You've got to open/foreward more ports than just the standard bittorrent ones.  Add the b.net ones as well.

Did that, nada. Get no problems according to the downloader but it sits at 0%.

I still get the D2 itch and will play it for a few months out of each year - in addition to this happiest of days with the D3 announcement, today I also got the original ultimate Ping - my first Stone of Jordan drop, ever.  Eight years of on and off playing, and it drops the same day as Diablo 3!

God it looks awesome.

I think I've really played too many MMOs the last few years, I kept thinking, how cool is it going to be to have a multiplayer dungeon where there's no tank, no one just healing, and everyone just kicking ass. It's so oldschool it's new again.

Wikipedia has lots of info - the fanboi is rubbing off on me.  Hopefully we get an estimate as to when its release will be!

They don't give estimates on any of their real games.

I don't want to want this. I want to hate it with every fiber of my being. But the *ding*, she calls to me. My index finger already hurts at the thought.

Zing!

That first wave of mobs that climbed up from the depths was so fucking awesome.

To go along with the party atmosphere still permeating, here's some assholery I managed to SS a while back, one of my personal favorites.
(http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h292/ahoythematey/Screenshot088copy.gif)

Am I the only one who doesn't care about this at all?  And why do jaded MMO cynics, who froth at the mouth at the mention of "grinding for loot," find this fascinating?  I am frightened and confused. 

Doing it wrong is always option D.

A decent portion of everyone here goes through the cycle for every mmog. You aren't the only one, the other ones are off posting pictures of overweight Darth Vaders or describing new Hellgate patches.

YES.

Personally I'm going to wait till the game comes out to see whether its worth playing. The whack whack whack ding ding ding style gameplay doesn't hold my interest so easily anymore. I don't need a carrot on a stick.

The difference between grinding in an MMO and grinding in Diablo is relatively simple.

In an MMO, you run to a mob (or group of mobs) and then beat on them for a while, kill it, loot it, rest if necessary, and then run off to find another mob.  You continue this process until the piece of loot your are looking for, or you have managed to get enough experience to level.

In Diablo, you are swarmed with countless mobs and you cleave your way through them.  Blood and gold fly while loot flows from their bowls as if from some kind of grotesque pinata.  By the time you reach the other side, sometimes literally ragged from all the clicking and checking loot while killing and potting like a madman to stay alive, you find that you leveled in all that chaos and didn't really notice it.

(http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/39720/screenshots/diablo%203%20trailer/vlc%202008-06-28%2013-30-15-49.png)

Small bag?

THIS THREAD IS MINE!
(http://dl.getdropbox.com/u/39720/screenshots/diablo%203%20trailer/vlc%202008-06-28%2013-31-50-94.png)

THOUSAND POUNDER GLUTTONY INCARNATE.

So true.  But I would like to see less mouse click spamming in D3.

Get outta here with that shit. I need to buy some $19.99 razers from Woot next time they come up. Also, I CAN'T WAIT TO RUIN SOME MICE.

this thread makes me want to sing...


booom de yada boom de yada!

You've got a problem. Blizzard created another must-have downloadable file, but their miserly fuck-you-in-the-goat-ass bittorrent scheme won't work for normal humans.

What can you do?

Gamershell (http://www.gamershell.com/pc/diablo_iii/)

For all your game file mirror needs.

Holy shit! I'm agog.

Just heard about this in a Kara raid in /gu. Man.

Holy shit.

Inventory / equipment screen has to go. Hopefully it's just an early implementation.

Curious as to how they're gonna handle looting this time around. I liked the built in round robin system that was in Hellgate, but not being able to see the other guys drops in the party was ultra lame. Maybe make all loot visible and put an "Assigned To XXXXX" above or below the item name.

EDIT: Also, has anyone read any of the Diablo books? I'm assuming they are your typical video game novel cash-ins until I hear otherwise.

Hopefully, they take a page out of WoW's Design Spec and make the entire thing modable.

I'm happy that the Diablo fans got their game.  My arm can't really take these kind of games, however.  I feel kind of silly about playing a game that makes me feel actual pain.

Still, looks pretty hot.

I wish diablo caused pain. I want a hardcore-hardcore-hardcore mode where it takes 3 clicks to attack, has the original diablo loot system where you can only hold like 12 things max, and there are no town portals. Also, nothing is worth any money. You get potions from drops and can use those god of war orbs. So rad.

Sony already made this game.  Its called Everquest: 1998-2000.

Aren't you the guy that doesn't like Diablo?

You're unfit to judge this. Just step back. Back. Further. Into Gen disc. There you go.

Sort of related: I ran across this WoW interface screenshot (http://zombiehof.com/goor/wow/develop_ui.jpg) from a while back. :inluv:

For some reason, seeing the female barbarian got me all excited about Diablo 3. I'm apparently really easy to please.

EQ punished you for petty, wrong reasons.  Diablo punishes you for all the right reasons.  It's sort of like PoW torture versus sado-masochism.

I'm gonna have to change my avatard for this as well!

I'll be into the game. When it comes out in a year or more. I'm sure it'll be fun. I might even finish it, this time round (finished D2, but never finished D2:LoD)

I don't get the rabid masturbation going on in this thread, though.

Sounds like you played single-player mostly, which could possibly be tiring beyond the first one or two playthroughs, for some people.  Diablo2 was pretty much the closest thing to raptor-jesus as far as multiplayer rpgs go.  I would have paid a $5/month fee for the game back in the day and I meant it back then too.

Or maybe Australians don't like fun? It's a crazy world, who knows!

There was no way to change the camera significantly and let you keep the same gameplay. I've been thinking about his topic a lot lately.

With the camera they have you can have enemies surrounding the opponent, and you can have enemies waiting for the player offscreen. If you moved to say a first person view like Hellgate surrounding the player with enemies is kind of sucky as they can only see in one direction, and because the player can see very far they can either see the enemies from very far away or you have to purposely design your levels to have lots of obstructions and corners. You can't have something like a long corridor with enemies at the end very effectively, because you can see them immediately.

Also by rendering things at the angle and distance they are it saves them some artwork headaches. It sounded like they said each class will have their own armor looks - lot's of work. But if you render from that angle the armor only has to look good from fairly far away and doesn't need to be too detailed. Same with the enemies. In an FPS game you could get right up in their face so they have to look good from all angles and up close.

If mod tools are released, though, you'll presumably be able to position the camera wherever like you can with WCIII mods. It's also possible the in-game engine cutscenes will zoom in and out too.

Correct and agreed. Even when I play any MMO I zoom out to the max, usually try to script even further camdistance if possible. It gives you a great overview over the battlefield, your foes and allies and it grants a huge tactical edge.

Actually, I played online. In a mix of SP and with 4 other friends. What fucked it for me was when you took a break for too long (90 days?), b.net nuked your characters. After having that happen a couple of times, and forgetting a password, I went down to fuck-it town. Also, I was playing Everquest at the time with 3 of those 4 people, as well as a few other RL friends.

More recently, I was going to play it with my wife on our computers with the 2 copies I have here. But it looks too much like arse now.


Like I said. I'll undoubtedly buy it, I'm sure I'll enjoy it, but forgive me for not spending all my time now masturbating to the thought of playing it in a year or two.

"Nobody ever listens to me!" -- Deckard Cain

 :awesome_for_real:

Yeah noticed the same, quite funny and at the same time awesome that the Barbarian acts like one  :hello_kitty_2:

Geezus palomino. I can't wait. After seeing the trailers I can't even begin to concentrate on WoW. Or PSU.

Dammit, Blizzard, it'll be 18 months to two years waiting and it's already driving me crazy!

Ahhh, hell, just have to fire up D2 on this box (even though it does look like ass scaled to 1920x1200) and maybe even fire up my old Playstation Diablo disk. Prison of Bone...yeah...

hmm, odd, the barbarian game play trailer from gamer's hell comes out all corrupted on my media player.

Found a couple things digging around this evening...

1) http://youtube.com/watch?v=MlcQotL3wjk Audio version of the D3 development panel. Jay Wilson (lead dev) discusses what they are changing and why, what they aren't changing and why and more...

2) Jay Wilson appears to have been the lead dev on Dawn of War. Most thought he was brought in by Blizzard to work on SCII. Obviously not the case.

My pants are going crazy. Diablo 3 at last!  :awesome_for_real:

In terms of release date:


Basically what that says is it's a year at absolute minimum, and you'll be lucky to see it by Christmas 2009. Put it back in your pants folks.

No.  I, for one, am glad that Blizzard has resisted the Hellgate urge to go "Oh fuck, look at all the money WoW makes!  Quick, slap a subscription fee onto everything!"  I mean anyone who's thinking ought to know that SC2 and D3 are going to lead into StarCraft Galaxies and World of Diablo anyway.

I will buy this game and will likely love it.  The cynic in me though is a little underwhelmed that after all this time, it doesn't look as epic as I would think, given that it's been 8 years since the last game.  The beginning of that barbarian gameplay video damn near put me to sleep.

The gameplay video shows him zooming in at various points and there's that mini in-game cutscene with Cain that's zoomed in as well.

I played a lot of Diablo with a friend via a 33.6k dial-up modem.

I played a bit of Diablo II solo with a Necro, got to 4 acts in, found out that I'd put too many points in my basic Skeletons to actually have a workable character going forward. Since there was no repec, I quit.

Diablo III? We'll see. I'd be a lot more likely to multiplayer it, which adds a lot more fun.

Besides, this is f13, where we only like games that haven't come out yet or are less than a month old.  :grin:

Same. And I was particularly entertained by this quote from the lead designer (reported on Gamasutra):


Really? And D2 didn't have randomized zones either 8 years ago?!

WTF?  Is he forgetting that Diablo is basically just a gussied-up Roguelike?

That "..." seems important.

Also it kinda depends who he was talking to. People say stupid shit all the time when trying to explain things to the ignorant.

We're already at the point where people start nitpicking what the developer says? :awesome_for_real:

D2 wasn't all that random. There were a series of possbilities for each map area, but if you played enough (and you should have) you saw them all pretty quickly and knew what to expect about 1 minute after zoning in. Now what mob pack modifiers you might run into...that could be a really nasty surprise. Fanatism aura death knights? Oooh, yeah. MSLEBs? Good thing I like ranged and the panzer-valk can take a real whuppin'.

Regardless of randomness or instanceness or whatever, it's Diablo. That's the big thing. If done right it'll be lots of fun, some depth, some frustration with Blizzard's flailing about (and failing) at class balance, and a whole lot of smiles from Diablo fans like me. I'm hoping like hell the amazon makes the cut again (remember in the D2 manual, the males of the society were mentioned...) with missile and melee weapons.

I had to pull my bowazons out of retirement last night (they were down to about 50 days again) and make some CS runs to walk the dog. Easy stuff even on hell diff and it really does fire up the anticipation of D3, though I"m sure that will fade over the next year or two, damnit. After the TK run tonight in WoW, my strikazon is coming out of her retirement and going after Baal in hell--in her magic find gear. Good times still. 

D2 wasn't totally random in that roguelike "Oh shit why is an ancient dragon on level 9?!" sort of way, but it mixed things up enough to keep it from becoming totally robotic.  You know the Arcane Sanctuary will be shaped like a cross with the waypoint in the middle, but you don't know which arm of the cross has the Summoner at the end.  When you're looking for Lam Esen's Tome in one of the six mini-dungeons scattered around Kurast, you can't immediately skip to the right one just because you've done it before.  And so forth.

And yeah, all the D3 talk has me playing D2 again as well.  Offline, because Battlenet never seemed to add anything to the experience besides lag and retarded people.  My new zeal pally just killed Mephisto in normal.  Is it me, or are there a LOT more better-than-blue drops than there used to be?

It's hard to say better than "blue" when you just went through Travincal. That's the first great place for loot on your first run through on normal.

Also, I think I'm only going to play Hardcore characters in Diablo 3. TRIAL BY FIRE.

I mean in general.  I found an awful lot of yellows in act 1.

My smugness knows no bounds.  I'm in your head Blizzard!

Seriously though, I am pumped for D3.  Looks amazing. 

There was an update on b.net when I logged in last night. Ladder reset, I suppose, but there might have been some tweaking in the drop tables. Ladder games always did have much better drop rates. Still, these characters haven't been on the ladder in a long, long time.

I was in hell diff, but I noticed a lot of yellow drops and also got 3 gold uniques in two runs of the Chaos Sanctuary. Neither of my bowazons has dedicated magic find gear, but they do have some magic find, especially on charms. Still, random chance or slightly tweaked drop rates? Hard to say, but anything is possible.

I was going to hit AV in WoW, but now I"ll think I'll take my strikazon to Travincal and then settle Mephisto's hash in hell diff and see what pops in a full magic find set of gear (i.e. 300 magic find in equipment).

There was something on the D3 FAQ about randomized quests, and class specific quests.


I love random game stuff. That's why I give Hellgate London such a pass on it's failings. (Buggy as the poor beastie is)
One of the things that was a bit of a disappointment re Diablo 2 for me was that it was more scripted and less random stuff.

I'd be perfectly fine if Diablo 3 took us back to Tristram and just rehashed the old Diablo storyline with updated graphics and gameplay. (Although looking at the concept art and stuff shows this is probably not the case...)

From what is up on Blizzard's site, I think we'll be finding ourselves spending a fair amount of time in Tristram--and the cathedral and it's catacombs, which is way cool.

I think we'll find ourselves traveling quite a bit too, similar to D2. More of both, build on both, and maybe add in something totally new. That outdoor fight in the trailer reminded me an awful lot of Dungeon Siege. The good part of it.

I'm there. I'm so there.

You are extremely confused.

This is the most excited about gaming I've been since I first started hearing about this nutty game called Ultima Online.  I went out and bought D2 and the xpac again.  I haven't played in about 6 years.  I'm going to get more hardcore with Diablo than I ever have.  All in anticipation for Diablo 3.


If anyone wants to get real with me let me know.  Until then I'll be playing single player.

I know I am.  In fact, I think I'm going to play some Diablo 2 hardcore mode.  I don't think I ever have before.

I never played Diablo, and I probably won't play or buy Diablo 3.

But seeing the screens, I had to say I love Blizzard for being one of the only PC studios anywhere to actually use all our computers and hardware to render art, instead of just trying to re-create life. I hope it's a practice more studios start trying to rip off.

Funny how everyone everywhere, me included, went "DIABLO 3!  ME WANT!  CAN'T HAVE... SHIT...  I'LL PLAY DIABLO 2 INSTEAD!"  I'm gonna have to laugh when it shoots up 12000 places on the sales charts from wherever a game that old was last week.

or Titan Quest. Like the sane ones with widescreen monitors.

Maybe I'm the minority, but I just don't get why I should care about D3 right now. I loved D2 back in the day, but I'd rather have something I didn't play then nor a few times since. This seems like an obvious setup for D3 MMO even going so far as using the SC3 engine which itself is doing the same thing for SC MMO. I'd rather have seen something more than what amounts to a UI improvement.

Yea, I'll buy it and enjoy it. It's just not on the list of waiting-in-line-for titles. But then, little has lately so whatevs.

lol. The Diablo Battle Chest is now ranked #16 on Amazon. I think I'll just re-install Titan Quest for now.

I would much, much rather have a simple "UI improvement" than an attempt to significantly alter the core gameplay.  Diablo II was near-perfect; I'll take more of the same, please.

You'll change your tune in 2011, when D3 launches.

I think that's his point...

I never get the "it's just like the old game with some improvements" complaints. What's the point of making a sequal that is far removed from its predicessors? The Diablo formula works, and fans of Diablo want more Diablo. I'd rather they deliver Diablo 3 than some other game set in the Diablo universe and labeled Diablo 3. If they want to make a wholly different game type they can make a new franchise or create a spinoff game. Diablo 3 should be like Diablo and Diablo 2, only better.

The counterpoint to that is that if you make a sequel that's too close to its predecessor the franchise becomes stale.  By the time Diablo 3 comes out, it will have been around a decade since Diablo 2 released.  What videos we've seen so far don't look like a decade's worth of improvements.  Right now it looks like something that could have been released 3 or 4 years after Diablo 2.  If all Blizzard has up their sleeve is a slight improvement over Diablo 2 (and I'm aware that the release is still aways off and Blizzard could have a lot of surprises in store) than I'd have rather they just released more D2 expansion packs instead of putting this much time into developing a sequel.

The main thing Diablo has going for it right now is that there isn't a lot of competition in the genre, although that also means that there haven't been a lot of advancements that Blizzard can borrow and polish.

No, they couldn't have. Translating Diablo into a 3D environment is no easy task. If you look at the current Diablo "clones" out there (which aren't really at all like Diablo except for the loot) like Titan Quest you'll see they all cheat by only having you fight a handful of monsters, if that, at a time, and as a consequence the combat in those games feels nothing at all like that in Diablo. You could of course add more monsters on screen by dramatically lowering the number of polygons used but then you lose the "look" of Diablo with its detailed pre-rendered sprites and environments and it becomes more like WCIII in appearence.

GTA 2 to GTA 3 was a major leap. The formula is the same with a major addition of 3rd dimension  and sbetter story telling. Jack a car, shoot things in a sandbox formula of GTA remains the same with more and more feature added.

I hope D3 will not fail to surprise.

The down side to all this is I'm currently playing d2 and thinking things like 'Curse this two button shit.  Where's my 4 other hotkeys to Curse, poison AND corpse explode ??!'

Sigh.

I think that's really close to the mark. Blizzard could have half-assed a 3-D Diablo, but they waited until the average computer could run the graphics of having lots of decently detailed monsters. (And they're not uber detailed. Take a look at the monster entries from the D3 website.)

1997 called, it wants its isometric display back...

I'll never buy/play a game that enemies can shoot at you from 'off screen' when they should be trivally visible from your characters point of view.

I don't care about number of polygons in the mob models, I just want to see them, but not from a high overhead odd angle perspective.

I can't even think of that happening once in Diablo 2 unless you're running away from a boss and they've already attacked (diablo's ring attack comes to mind). They always run on screen and attack.

The Glooms from Act IV can blast you with lightning from a screen or two away but I believe they are the only mob that can do that.

You can hotkey skills to the F1, F2 and such - the downside is you need to r-click to cast as you load the new skill.  

I hope D3 goes with a WoW hotbar approach, where all 10 of my skills are castable at anytime without needing to load them.  

Being able to only cast a limited amount of spells at any given time was one of the charming things about Diablo for me. I don't play Diablo to be a superhero. There are no superheroes in hell.

Or you can go one further like I would do, reconfiguring the keys so that qwer asdf zxcv are where you hotkey your skills for quick and natural-feeling use(well, natural anyways to fps players used to WASD).


Agree almost completely.  Though you can fudge it with certain stuff like flashing paladin auras, I think this was one of the big reasons pvp was so fun for me.  D2 pvp still feels more strategic to me than a lot of other stuff.

I'm replaying D2 now.

Level 40ish trap assassin. I created the character after the announcement.

TQ is pretty sucky, are are the rest of the clones.

Mythos actually has TOO MUCH loot, especially since the crafting patch, and it's in a transitional stage with their crazy world-vision or whatever-the-fuck they're trying to do.

Maybe they're trying to do something extraordinary with the title so they can get some cashflow, one way or another, so HGL doesn't sink the entire ship.

I personally think TQ is underrated a tad.  It's slow but it has a ton of class combinations which can be fun to mess with. Certainly fun for those who like character building.  I just bought immortal throne on steam, and while the beginning is very bland, it's starting to become a lot of fun. 

I loved my gimpy trap/claw hybrid assassin in D2.  My strategy was to put down traps and then nightcrawler it up all over the place.  It worked great until hell/nightmare (whichever is the third difficulty), at which it was total crap.  It was the only character I really enjoyed in D2...my paladin and 'zon were total meh.

To be fair, I ultimately think the the change to the inventory system is fine - you'll just get pickier about what you pick up, since even the smaller items are on the same page as the large items. Playing Tetris in your inventory was somewhat fun, but after a while it just gets tedious. It allows bags to be a sought-after loot type.

Also - charms will only fill up one slot, which is pretty neat-o.

(http://ebabystuff.net/stuff/sherlock-squirrel.jpg)

Im surprised that no one has commented on the way the Siege Breaker boss at the end of the gameplay movie BIT THE BARBARIAN'S FUCKING HEAD OFF when it killed him (and then punted his body around for kicks).

With half the body still hanging our of his mouth.

There is a keyboard configuration utility in D2, you know. Two button shit doesn't get it done, as a few seem to have discovered. What I do is use the ASDF buttons for the belt slots then the four keys above and below as left and right mouse button bars, respectively. They're simply bound to those buttons. So, as an examply, Q would be normal shot, W would be strafe, E is multishot, and R is guided. Right button only and yet another attack are the ZXCV keys. I keep the third mouse button bound to the right bar in case you need something else for some unforseen situation. Generally, you don't need anymore than that.

The only other game, in my opinion, that came close to the feel of Diablo was Sacred. It had its issues (boy, did it have some issues) but the gameplay and loot-happiness was the most similar. The dungeons mostly sucked and the overall story was steeped in bland, but the characters were interesting and played in reasonably different fashions. And the fights. Man, it had fights. Murder and mayhem on a Diabloesqe scale, which is what I want in these games. Hell, it even had giant enemies. The only thing that surprised me was that it never came out on a console. The control scheme reeked of consolitis, but I suppose we'll see that "rectified" in Sacred 2.

Regardless, Diablo was just a confluence of gameplay elements I personally really liked. I'd like to see more. Simple as that. Oh, and I want to see what has really happened since Tyriel put paid to the Worldstone....

My biggest problems with Sacred, TQ, and even Darkstone, was that I beat them too quickly and right at release.

I have a knack for picking the most overpowered classes in every game I play. I breeze through the game while it's totally unbalanced and it kills the replay value of the game for me.

TQ and Sacred were very, very broken when they each released. Hell I still have some TQ videos up on youtube.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=57NNvWJtFf4

(http://www.myextralife.com/strips/06-30-2008.jpg)

(http://www.gucomics.com/comics/2008/gu_20080630.jpg)

Also, there are to many games already out like this. I am sure it will be a success for blizzard...

Wrong.

I didn't say there couldn't be another... Just that there are already lots of games JUST like it. Sorry man.

There aren't any JUST LIKE DIABLO. That's the problem :( :( :( :(

Yeah, but to people other than yourself ( who has a high standard, and love for this IP ) they really are. It doesn't matter, the fact that its the big daddy IP that started all the clones, remakes ETC will ensure that its successful.

I did enjoy the footage and what seems like a larger range of movement than before, and the environment has gotten a nice boost in regards to dynamic nature (little guys crawling up the walls from bellow ETC..). Pound for pound, its fundamentally the game, in this case thats a good things. People want an updated D2.

D1 and 2 were serious titles however, i wonder how much thats going to hurt them in acceptance, with diablo clones with much more humor in them.

I'm just rambling thoughts....

The difference between D3 and something that everyone would recognise as a MMOG is a graphical lobby, the ability to pull more than 8 people into your dungeon, and a subscription fee. All of which always seem bizarre things to think of as core to what a MMOG is, but nvm, that's another thread.

Some of the comments on the developer panel suggest that at least one of those might happen in D3.

I swear, if one of the classes is a monk, it might be too much joy for me to handle.

There's a fair amount of humor in D2. Black humor, but humor nonetheless. Cain's remarks involving Zakarum priestesses and Larzuk's backhanded reference to one of the Amazon's more obvious visual characterisics are cases in point.  Diablo itself was about as funny as a butcher knife, but that's one reason I did like it.

Here's hoping for a very serious and nasty storyline for D3. From the bits and pieces I picked up on in the trailers, I think that's what we'll be getting.

One could reasonably expect something along the lines of WoW's enchanting in this iteration.  Breaking down loot for parts, and such. 

This, with a dash of "let me freaking respec please."

Amen.  Why do I even have to TAKE Skeletons ?

Watching the gameplay video it looks fun, but I'm not so sure it looks Diablo...

Like whatever happened to all the cool monster death animations? I remember in D1 one of the best parts was the death animations and sounds.
Remember Hidden? How they would get their heads loped off and slump backwards in a shower of blood and gurgling sounds? That was so awesome.
The little acid splitters, with their murloc like sounds, and how you would get a big spawn of them and have to find a way to kill them off without getting gibed by their uber spit.
Lightning Demons and Doom Knights exploding into nothingness. And the satisfying sound of skeletons cracking into a pile of bones and dust.

To be fair the death animations in D2 were also lacking but D3 is just sad from what I see, mostly things just fall over, or explode into chunks. It sucked in Dungeon Siege it sucks now.

More bitching to come!

Start bitching about things like polish when the game is, you know, less than 2 years away?

I just played a little Diablo 2 for the first time - boring as hell.

At least as Barbarian 5 minutes into the game you've experienced everything it has to offer.

Needless to say, you're doing it wrong.

Why does everyone on F13 who does not like Diablo feel to need to come the the thread for D3 gushing and hate?

Maybe someone can make a thread for people who don't like Diablo to talk about how much it sucks?

Because it doesn't?

I think it's good to talk about stuff like this now while the game is so far off that there's actually time to change it.

It will be out in like 8 months guys.  Quit your bitching.

Hi, welcome to f13.

See also: every other subject.

I know.  Geez.  Having different threads for haters doesn't sound like fun at all!

Fixed it for you?


This is f13, we all have diffrent likes and dislikes, and that the point, to discuss them. I very rarely see outright "Hate" threads like on other sites. They are discussions, with some colorful language, but discussions none the less. Very rarely do people say something "sucks", with out reasons why, and with out a rebuttal furthering the discussion. This isn't an official forum!

EDIT: Also, when it comes out, everyone in this thread will play it. lol.

Not me. Not touching it.

Seriously, maybe I am doing it wrong. I remember liking Diablo 1. Diablo 2 just felt...dull. At level 18 or so I can only access a handful of skills. I got up to near the end of act two and the number of enemies multiplied dramatically and the levels got bigger as well. In particular the floating concrete walkway mage area where you fight the summoner and read the book that tells you which tomb is the right one.

Set double attack to left click and click click click. Is that the whole game?

Part of it is that I hate click-to-move. Dodging projectiles with click-to-move just feels wrong to me. Also I hate talking to people and listening to the goofy overly-deliberate voice acting. Especially when I click away a second too early then have to listen to the whole speech again.

But again I do remember liking Diablo 1. Maybe if I went back I'd dislike it though.

No, that's not the whole game.
Use the quest log if you don't care about the dialogue.
What other method of movement would you suggest for the fast-paced combat in an isometric viewpoint?
You don't like being able to control whether or not you can dodge attacks, Are You Serious?

We did.

I like that you can dodge attacks, but click-to-move is a sucky way to do it. What would I prefer? How about push a direction to go in it? WASD for the win.

Oh me too.  I loved Diablo 2 but click to move sucks. 

Is Diablo 3 click to move?

WASD? I think that would be kinda clunky..

Ya, Diablo should go dual mouse.

I'd just like a build of D2 that doesn't look like complete ass on my widescreen monitor.

Haha.  Love it.



My buddy and I were talking, and he suggested that Blizzard will probably implement an 'acheivement' system ala 360/TF2/Steam for battle.net.  Makes perfect sense imo.  They already had something similar in the titles that you could get from defeating the game on different difficulties, Champion, Slayer, etc.

King of Bones: *Killed Twenty Thousand Skeletons
Bareback: *Defeated Diablo While Wearing no Armor

What about classes?  Anyone think they'll deviate beyond Paladin/Rogue/Sorcy for the remaining three?


I thought more about the monk.  But they're not item dependent enough, sadly.

Oh. God. That would be so awesome.

Virtual On: Diablotorio Tangram.

Nobody's hatin'.  Margalis and I (who look to be the only "we don't get it." folks in here) seem share the same opinion.  Playing the game it felt like you only used 1-2 abilities and just click-click-clicked to infinity while going from place to place.

If "we're doing it wrong" I, at least, would like an education and some illumination as to what we're "doing wrong" and why you all find it so fascinating.  To me the game is more "catass 4 lootz" than any MMO-EVER but with more hassle because you have no fucking clue where to find said lootz.  It could be the 5th thing you kill or the 500 millionth.  Sorry, but I don't see the appeal. Educate me.

I wonder how much money advertising on B.net costs/earns.

It's the pinnacle of hack n' slash.  If that's not your thing then that's not your thing, but it's not as simplistic as you make it out to be, nor is it quite as random as you make it out to be.  There is some strategy to be had, particularly in building a hell-capable character, and though the game is dominated by random loot, that doesn't mean you are going to get windforce and azurewrath dropping off a quill rat in the cold plains, nor does it mean you are going to get nothing but cracked sashes dropping off Baal.

WASD would suck beyond words. Go back and play the REs pre-4 or the older Onimushas for an example of how sucky it would be assuming Diablo had a pacing like 10x slower than it really does. I.e. the suckiness that is the RE-controls would be at least 10x worse in Diablo because of the speed of that game.

When I said WASD I didn't mean A and D turn, I meant A moves left and D moves right. To me it would be so much more fun with direct control. Press the direction you want to move in and press a button to attack in the direction you are facing. You know, like Zelda or Landstalker or whatever. It would play somewhat differently for a variety of reasons, but I think I would vastly prefer it. Attacking an enemy by clicking on them just feels so wrong to me.

A and D to turn...yeah that would suck lol.

Gamepad joystick/D-pad works for that sort of movement cause you can move diagonally. On a PC keyboard you are talking about having to use 1-9 on the numpad or QWEASDZXC and you would still need to use the mouse to target many of the special moves like the Barbarian's jump.

WASD would be awesome in a Zombie Shooter sense.

You fuckers, talk more about Diablo 3.

Speculate damn you, I DEMANDS IT.

I played a ton of Diablo 2 in high-school, and I gotta say, I'm already re-developing a permanent kill-boner just thinking about D3.

Im starting to rethink playing an Assassin.  I think I'm a Sorcerer/ Barbarian at heart.

I liked D1. D2 was shit though. I want a roguelike. I make a charater and I go into a dungeon and kill shit. All this questing and world fighting and shitty shit I could give a shit about. I'm going to get a character and go down into the bowels of the earth and kill and nothing but.

D3 is going to be fucked up with WoW quest bullshit and lots of outdoor zones. Fuck that.

I'll still play it though.

I totally agree.  Well, except I wouldn't say D2 was shit.  But it lacks most of the charm that D1 had, and most of the outdoor areas were fucking annoying.  What they need to do is combine D2 or even TQ class/loot diversity with D1 game design.  Add shiny and a touch of respec.

My boys and I reinstalled D2 last night and went at it.  Of course this after I had to recover their characters off of some old hard drives.

I played my old barbarian character like shit.  Had to learn how to play him all over again.  Was surprised to learn the mouse scroll button actually scrolled through the skills instead of having to use the F-keys.

Had a bunch of fun, my kids got tired of it before I did.  It brought back a bunch of old memories of playing all-night with 2-liter bottles of Pepsi and bags of Nacho Cheese Doritos lying around.

I third the D1/D2 comments. The quests in D2 are lame, and all it really boils down to is doing dungeons in geographic order. And the outdoor areas are really annoying and pointless, basically I run around in them looking for the dungeon or the next zone. Every time I enter a new outdoor area I roll my eyes and bear down for the next silly easter-egg hunt.

It's just not the kind of game that needs an overworld map and different towns and such.

On random thought - does Blizzard have something against free camera / PoV movement? First Starcraft 2 provides a mostly fixed perspective, now Diablo 3 does the same thing.

For any other company but Blizzard, people would be asking why they hadn't paid attention to the genre for the past 10 years.

If you're only using two buttons in D2 you ARE doing it wrong. Moreover, you'll get schooled when you hit Act5 NM. Hard.

Just about any stupid thing will get you through normal. And yes, it's kinda dull, especially if you've been there before and you want more combat options and to get to the real loot, which starts to show up in NM. If you want to actually prosper in Hell difficulty, you have to be very dialed in on both build and playstyle. This doesn't even address level of play in hardcore or soloing in 8-player games (in hardcore). Of course, most in search of a trip down nostalgia lane won't care, but the game really didn't get interesting playwise until NM and Act2.

 I"ve had a retro blast the last couple of days taking my old 'zons back into one of the most difficult areas of the game (Act4 hell diff Chaos Sanctuary). Mowed down hordes of ravening enemies, took their shit, and walked the dog. These are very well equipped mid-80s characters, but it's still fun and brings back old memories. Like how old school lightning fury used to slow the screen to a crawl and get all my teammates killed in the CS. Or stumbling into triple boss pack LEBs in the Kurast temples...and beating their asses when your friends bought a farm in seconds. Or having a bowie get trapped on the stairs between two levels of hell with boss packs on both ends. Epic shootout with frantic decoy and valk positioning. Good times all.

Now D3...we simply don't know much and are just hoping for something that pushes all those old Diablo buttons. So far, consider my buttons pushed. Blizzard does this sort of fun very well. I can cope with control schemes as long as they work and are relatively intuitive. Dodge missles? Hell, I was a 'zon. I slowed them or used a decoy. Or dropped a valk on the offending missileers. Those are options. All classes had options. Some better than others, but you learned. That was fun. I think we'll see more of the same in D3 and that's a good thing.

Unless I'm forgetting something, everything is the genre has been shit since D2.

Well, i for one don't really find it that necessary to have 3d camera in my rts. Honestly, i think i spend most of my time controlling my units and stuff rather than panning around to find the best view. For replays, sure, it might be nice to take screenshots and make movies or whatever, but in-game? As far as D3 is concerned, i'd think that they have to go with isometric - it's the whole Gauntlet isometric hack & slash thing.

Well I suppose my last post should have been in a greenish hue.  No offense meant to anyone.


This. Not that anyone at blizzard likely cares about our fanboy ramblings.

Not really. I imagine all the important design work is done, and what makes it into the game is what they have time for without feature creeping it into 2057.
That and a bazillion Blizzard fans equals a bazillion times a bazillion suggestions for things they'd like to see in the game.  :awesome_for_real: