Diablo III out this May 15th.

[labs23]

Source: http://pc.ign.com/articles/122/1220853p1.html

Blizzard has announced Diablo III will launch on May 15, 2012. You can pre-purchase the game now through Battle.net.
In recent months Blizzard has announced that a few features had to be trimmed to make this launch date, including the PvP
mode and Mystic artisan. Blizzard's current plan is to patch the PvP mode in at a later date.

theres' the catch...

Finally, after those postponements and countless rumors...
I love the previous titles - one of the best games I've played; and that's all I can say for now..


where's gomeler???

[Buckeye]

Well its not that far off now. Still haven't been able to get into the Beta

[PatRaceTin]

very very long time

[Bun-Bun]

And Blizzard the company who was against DRM and says they will not release a game before its its done and polished... Has DRM in Diablo III and released it with features incomplete or missing.

Glad I cancelled my WoW sub.

[Mungri]

/Koboldmodeon It had to happen two days before my birthday! /koboldmodeoff

[SKYMTL]

Blizzard's DRM hasn't caused me an issue in the past so I have no issue with them including it. Plus, anything is better than the GFWL crap that seems to be making its way into more and more games these days.

[Bun-Bun]

This DRM is different then their previous games.

Diablo III requires you to have an always on stable internet connection to play.

There is no single player. There is no offline mode.

You can't play on your laptop when on business trips or vacation. Deployed soldiers can not play. Those in rural areas without stable internet can not play.

Your ISP drops the ball. You can not play.

And now they are releasing products without polishing it first? Blizzard is going the way of other developers.

I am waiting for Torchlight 2.

[3lfk1ng]

Well its not that far off now. Still haven't been able to get into the Beta

You're not missing much.

Full Disclaimer: I used to be a hardcore Diablo II addict. Before the company was sold to a Chinese website, I used to work for VRItems.com as a virtual item delivery specialist under the companies owner Brian Weissman (now the executive producer at Grinding Gear Games, creators of Path of Exile. Before you think that I am pitching Path of Exile to everyone, I will tell you all to avoid the game at all costs as it is a direct rip-off of Diablo II as you can see from the video.) Back on topic... I know damn near everything there is to know about Diablo II as it was at one point in time, my job as well as an unhealthy obsession when I was younger. I spent my many months delivering items to users all over the world and making some of the most amazing Diablo II characters with the wealth of items I had access to. I'm not ashamed to admit that Diablo II is still one of my favorite games of all time and I am not ashamed to admit that I was expecting far too much from Diablo III.

Now, to get serious:
[rant]I spent all of 10 hours playing Diablo III beta before I got bored and went back to playing Diablo II in my craving for that genre.

I really wanted to like the Diablo III BETA but I just couldn't. Character builds didn't offer anything that made you feel "unique" as everyone can just switch skills on the fly without any penalties or having to respec, you just have to wait a few seconds before the ability you made the switch to becomes usable (could be a BETA exclusive feature). Like Diablo II, there is no character customization, everyone looks exactly the same (Way to stay in 2001 Blizzard). No longer did I need to use vendors in town to purchase scrolls of town portal, health potions, or scrolls of Identify. Enemies drop health, I can ID absolutely everything because apparently my character knows everything and I can TP to town at any time (I really hope these are exclusive to BETA only). Runewords have also been completely removed, what the hell?.

Basically any sort of "customizing" has been removed. It all just felt really watered down.

This is all just a matter of personal opinion but I am also extremely bummed that stat points cannot be distributed in Diablo III. Back in Diablo II, you had to play Hardcore mode very differently compared to normal mode. You could build your character however you wanted; if you wanted a Sorc that could wear plate armor you would distribute points into strength. If you wanted to survive long enough to live and to see Hell, you would distribute points into Vitality. Diablo III BETA just didn't offer that "Diablo II" experience, it felt lesser in many ways. As much as I hate to say it, Diablo III felt heavily consolized compared to Diablo II.[/rant]

I can honestly say, that for the first time ever, my heartrate didn't flutter when I saw the release date of a game that I had been anticipating for many years (Diablo III). I am still going to get the game hoping that it actually becomes fun in Nightmare mode like they said it will but I can see myself quickly casting it aside when Guild Wars 2 comes out. Guild Wars 2, although it is a completely different genre, offers stat distribution among many other things that I feel will make it the best game PC has to offer.

This is just my personal opinion and not an actual reflection of the final game. I have only played BETA.

[[XC] gomeler]

At this point I am setting my expectations as low as possible so that Diablo 3 cannot disappoint me. I'm hoping that the pvp delay is due to balancing issues and not due to software difficulties. Also, who played Diablo 2 off-line? Online ladder was where the real fun was and I don't see that changing in Diablo 3.

If Diablo 3 fails I have faith that the Torchlight MMO will carry on the torch.

[Buckeye]

Thanks for the input 3lfk1ng

Sounds like SWTOR tbh.

[Bun-Bun]

At this point I am setting my expectations as low as possible so that Diablo 3 cannot disappoint me. I'm hoping that the pvp delay is due to balancing issues and not due to software difficulties. Also, who played Diablo 2 off-line? Online ladder was where the real fun was and I don't see that changing in Diablo 3.

If Diablo 3 fails I have faith that the Torchlight MMO will carry on the torch.

I never played on the ladder. And the ONLY reason I even had a battle.net character was to play with one of my friends online.

I do not care about any online feature. Diablo I and II were always a single player dungeon crawler hack n slash game to me.

And like 3lfk1ng posted the game is a huge disappointment.

Blizzard has lost me as a loyal fan.

And I am quickly losing faith in PC gaming altogether. Time for a new hobby!

[Chaserjzx100]

finally!! i remembered i was still in middle school when i started hearing about the sequel from diablo...

[osiris999]

i get the game for free so no disapoinment here. Cant wait to check it out.

[Chickenfeed]

As much as I liked Diablo II it was far from perfect. I played for a couple months the last few seasons and in the end enough of the little naggles and problems pushed me away from the game. I personally feel its good that DIII isn't trying too hard to be DII.

Things like scrolls of town portal are just an added annoyance and they don't add to the game in my opinion. You still identify items but only the more rare stuff ( you no longer need to ID magic class items ) The shared inventory is surely a blessing ( my biggest issue with DII, please get the hell out of my face with that mule bullcrap... ) The rune system with skills allows for alot more flexibility within the same skill. This customization is basically what has replaced the traditional skill tree system and I personally welcome it. The auction house will make trading much more convient and will make it possible for the community to establish set prices without all the doubt ( trading in D2 was like haggling in a chinese food market, not cool ) I personally hated the notion of spending a good deal of time trying to offload items in petty trading games. The auction house absolve that for the most part. I'd rather be playing the game after all...

It seems to be a wash on the whole stat points thing, I personally feel they should have kept such a system in D3 but thats my only real complaint so far.

Pending a couple things here and there, I already see this game having a longer appeal than other dungeon crawlers. I have hopes for Torchlight 2 but games without a closed online system tend to be rampent with cheating and completely invalidate any and all economy as theres always the influx and hacked and duplicated items ( re Borderlands I'm lookin at you... ) I'd sooner deal with bots in an online closed system then play with people who have full access to client side character files. Obviously that isn't to say I don't feel they should have an open system like they did with Diablo 1 and 2 for those who wish to lan or play sans internet connection or on the go.

All in all I think the game will be more to the point in the end and from my perspective, thats not a bad thing.

[BababooeyHTJ]

This DRM is different then their previous games.

Diablo III requires you to have an always on stable internet connection to play.

There is no single player. There is no offline mode.

You can't play on your laptop when on business trips or vacation. Deployed soldiers can not play. Those in rural areas without stable internet can not play.

Your ISP drops the ball. You can not play.

And now they are releasing products without polishing it first? Blizzard is going the way of other developers.

I am waiting for Torchlight 2.

Yeah, because Torchlight 2 is really going to be competition for Diablo 3.

Torchlight wasn't even better than Titan Quest, not by a long shot. If anything I would be more excited for Grim Dawn. Now that has some real potential.

Torchlight was good for a $20 indie title but it was far from a top notch aaa big budget title.

[EagleRock]

i'm not sure why some people think that Torchlight 2 will be any good? Torchlight 1 was very boring after 2 days of playing !!

[Bun-Bun]

The indie games are turning out to be more fun than AAA big budget games.

Space pirates and zombies is a perfect example of this. $10 game that has consumed 80hours of my life. A feat no other game recently has accomplished.

These big game companies are losing sight of what made PC gaming fun in the first place.

And Torchlight is just one alternative. Like you mentioned Grim Dawn is also coming as are a few others.

[Buckeye]

i'm not sure why some people think that Torchlight 2 will be any good? Torchlight 1 was very boring after 2 days of playing !!

Agreed on this. Nice game for a cheap price but was not that big a deal tbh

[bamtan2]

You're not missing much.

I personally feel its good that DIII isn't trying too hard to be DII.

I have my opinion on this, but all I'll say is: a lot of the fun of diablo and diablo 2 is the atmosphere, music, danger, exploration, discovery, and if you play a really hard difficulty, the problem solving with friends. so it is possible for the game to be good regardless of your position on the game mechanic details.

[Mungri]

The Sacred series was my favorite Diablo clone. I tried Titan Quest, but couldnt really get into it and its too dated now.

I'm looking forward to Path of Exile and Sacred 3 as well as Diablo 3.

[Buckeye]

Sacred is a darn good game.

[SexyMF]

Why does every sequel lately seem to be a seachange in gameplay? Why can't we just get better graphics, new dungeons, more story and magic items and do it all again?

The three games I was looking forwards to seem to all fail:

- BF3 : Nothing like BF2, consoled and permanent training wheels (read no default friendly fire)
- Skyrim: Way to easy, no point in skill trees, no challenge = no fun
leaving D3 which I wanted as a single player grinder. Which seems not to be the case

[gumballguy]

Most big indie games are overhyped. Big expectations for torchlight, bastion, vvvvv to name but a few... they were all well executed but lacking in gameplay.
(I'm not saying to only buy big budget games - they have the same problem too).


Will try D3. Under a new battle.net account so that I can sell it if it sucks.

With only a limited number of games on battlenet, I see no reason to have a unified account as I do with steam.

[gumballguy]

Double post..

[WangChung]

It's funny that so many people are judging the final product of the BETA of a game. :golfclap:

There's a lot of options that are currently in the game now that make the game too easy that will be taken OUT. The talent options are in there now to make it easy to BETA TEST the darn game! You're supposed to be changing specs and using different talents to try and find bugs in the game. I see so many other players worried about grinding achievements or grinding gold/levels and they're totally missing the point of being beta testers. They don't contribute in the forums, they don't submit screen shots of bugs, they're playing to just play the game. Which is fine to a point, but when you are [complaining] about the game not being fun or the mechanics sucking when you've only seen a character level of 13 out of SIXTY, seen 4 quests out of ONE act on ONE difficulty level... just boggles my mind. And BTW, this is all coming from someone that didn't bribe/buy/win a beta key. I got into the beta on my hardware specs and my history with Blizzard alone.

I remember when WoW was being developed, and how people said it was going to be stupid because they were turning a RTS into this new-ish "MMORPG" format. Tens of millions of players and BILLION or so dollars later, Blizzard proved they were full of win.

And I'm 99% certain they will eventually change the 'online-only' play, most likely at the time of or shortly after official release. Right now, what the heck help is it to the devs for you to be offline generating stacks of error reports, only to not have them submitted? Come on...