Official Diablo 3 Thread

[Known]

I think it would be safe to say it should be out mid to late next year.

[thro]

Dear blizzard: online only play eats a crate of dicks.

What am i supposed to do when my internets go down? (lately, this is when i am actually more likely to break out the games)

Maybe play D2 instead? Get a crack for it in advance?

How's that for advancement?



love

thro

[Lefty]

Wait, what?

It's only playable with an internet connection?

Motherfuckers.

[Dets]

Wait, what?

It's only playable with an internet connection?

Motherfuckers.

Yep, welcome to the new generation of online only games.

RE: Release date. For those that haven't been keeping tabs on D3 it was originally slated in for a December 2011 release. ie Christmas. At Blizzcon, which happened about 1 month ago, they pushed it back till early/mid next year. The standard "when it's done" blizzard release date applies but they will not want Diablo 3 to compete with their next WoW Expo which is scheduled for around this time next year.

Also yes, there are too many fucking games to play right now.

[okitoki]

so is it going to be like MMO style? or the old online Diablo style with 3-4 people to play with? or Single player with bots like how Left 4 Dead is? or just solo but need internet connection?

[thro]

No, its not an MMO. THe internet only thing is because the publisher is being a dick.

As with all forms of copyprotection, it will be broken within 24 hrs and the only people disadvantaged will be the paying customers - whilst teh pirates will be able to enjoy full off-line play, no doubt.

[Dets]

Yeah it's not an MMO so if you want you can play completely on your own.
If you haven't played a Blizzard game recently, they all require you to log into Battle.net which is an on-line only service.

On-line only has it's advantages and disadvantages.
Disadvantages are that you can't even play single-player without being connected and even in single player to can experience lag.

The advantages are that all your characters are stored on-line so tampering with character will be almost impossible. This quite important seeing as Blizzard is adding a Real Money Auction House in game. Yes that is exactly what it sounds like, you can sell and buy in-game items for actual dollars. Blizzard of course takes a cut. There is an in-game currency AH as well and you are not forced to use either one but it's still a debatable topic.

Other advantage is that you can list your solo-game on-line as open to others meaning anyone can jump into your game and you group up to kill harder monsters or you can invite your friends only.

Personally I don't mind the always-connected thing and am always willing to spend the $$$ on purchasing Blizzard games.

[FireStorm]

So much want. So hate Trexxie right now.

Blizzard games are always nicely polished and usually complete and bug free (apart from wow) on release date. I don't mind waiting.

[TRX]

Totally awesome!


Diablo III 22112011 102257 PM.jpg

[RY RY]

Dude what time are you going to sleep? I'll come around and play while you nap (totes seriously wont rape you)

[thro]

The advantages are that all your characters are stored on-line so tampering with character will be almost impossible. This quite important seeing as Blizzard is adding a Real Money Auction House in game. Yes that is exactly what it sounds like, you can sell and buy in-game items for actual dollars. Blizzard of course takes a cut. There is an in-game currency AH as well and you are not forced to use either one but it's still a debatable topic.

They did this with D2 by splitting battle.net characters and local characters.

If you want to play single player, because you have a real life and don't have time to compete with PFYs who have 8 hrs per day to spend on the game, then online only play has ZERO advantage. In fact, online ONLY has zero advantage full stop. Sure, split online characters off separately and make them impossible to fuck with. Go for it. Just don't take away my offline play.

What if i WANT to mess with my single player characters for my own amusement?

What happens if the net goes down, or i am somewhere with no internet (say, like i'm about to be when i move house soon)? What happens if blizzard decides to shut down support for the game? You're shit out of luck, that's what.

[Drasius]

Because you're playing it wrong according to the devs (I'm not making that up, they have stated that playing single player/offline is doing it wrong). I'm a pretty big fan of the Diablo series and my refusal to put up with stupid online requirements is battling with my desire to play the game I have waited nearly 10 years for. It's a close run thing, but every time I'm about to cave, I just have to remember one review video where they lost net connection for a couple of seconds and lost their progress and had to start again. Considering that I never played on BNet at all, they can go and get fucked and while I know it won't happen, I hope that a decent portion of the single player D2 fan base resists the urge to let devs tell them they must be always online.

[Dets]

Oh I completely understand the argument both ways and the main reason I don't mind is because it doesn't affect me personally. If was constantly travelling or had a crappy internet connection then yeah, it would probably annoy the hell out of me.

[Mirkz]

I agree that it's bullshit these days that a lot of devs seem to think that online is the only way.
You see a lot of games being released that require internet connection these days, even if you're not playing online.
It DOES suck, for reasons stated above (ie. no internet, shitty connection, drop outs etc).

Gone are the days where you buy a finished product.
These days, they release to get the money, then spend the next year updating...and fixing stupid things that should have been sorted before release.

[okitoki]

wonder if there will be another round of Beta release?

*wishful thinking*

[BlackFZR]

So.... first act/Chapter only in the Beta?

Any major system flaws that leap out at you? General impressions? How did it run on your machine, and what high end spec was it?

Totally awesome!


Diablo III 22112011 102257 PM.jpg

[Xuaxace]

I agree that it's bullshit these days that a lot of devs seem to think that online is the only way.
You see a lot of games being released that require internet connection these days, even if you're not playing online.
It DOES suck, for reasons stated above (ie. no internet, shitty connection, drop outs etc).

Gone are the days where you buy a finished product.
These days, they release to get the money, then spend the next year updating...and fixing stupid things that should have been sorted before release.

I dunno about this one, but I never had problem playing d2 with 512k, back in 2002. Played throughout to 2008, and lag was a non existent issue. And I have always been quite far away from the central.

I only played d2 single when I didn't have net, and it sucked. Once I got online the amount of items and stuff I got made the game much more appealing.

I wouldn't bang Blizzard for releasing an unfinished product when this has been in the pipelines for over a decade. Also things change when there are million of users, when they learn glitches that blizzard would have a hard time... and lets be thankful that Blizzard kept updating patches for D2 for a decade, well beyond what it was needed, that is just unheard of level of support for such an old game.

[Mirkz]

I'm not bagging Blizzard specifically here. Whilst I only played D2 single player (my multiplayer was too slow for me with 56k), I've seen the work they put into WoW alone which is continual and usually well done.
I'm talking about developers in general.

There's been a number of games released in this past year alone that have had issues from the get go... some even game breaking.
Dead Island was one that I had a major issue with. It was like they forced it out the door. It was unfinished to the point that the game got very frustrating due to the bugs.
Another one that had issues was Rage, although I myself was able to bear the gfx issues, but I know it did affect a lot of other players.
BF3 was another one that whilst amazing when it WAS going, there were a lot of major teething problems which should've been fixed after the beta.

My point is that yes companies are providing support for these games and continue to do so, however some of the bugs/glitches etc should not have been in there in the first place, they were that prominent.

I miss the days of buying a game off of the shelf of a shop and going home, without having to get on the internet (not that it bothers me really, I have a fast connection and plenty of download space), installing it and it worked first time nearly perfectly fine.
Most games may have a slightly glitch here or there, but it seems the quality of the final product is less focused, they seem to think 'oh we'll just iron it out in a week or two with the first update'.

[Dets]

The days of super polished games coming out are for the most part over. The main reason for this is the money involved in computer games.
One of the very first games I bought for my P133 was Command & Conquer from Myers in Karrinyup for $110. I remember the computer section back then was 4 shelves of random bits of software tucked away in the electronics section. Compare that to Modern Warfware: Black Ops release which at the time was the highest grossing release of any electronic media ever. So now that computer games are so profitable everyone wants a piece of the pie which means the developers are under massive pressure to push out games by some arbitrary deadline.
As an example, the Assassin's Creed IP (which is fucking fantastic btw) was kept to a 1 game per year release schedule which is why AC2 -> Brotherhood -> Revelations feel like expansion packs rather than whole stand alone games.

Also the ability to patch a game is something that did not exist back in the day so what you got in the box is what you had until you stopped playing it. If the game didn't work straight up, the developer took a massive credibility hit. Possibly even big enough to sink the whole company.

Back on-topic. The Beta is meant to be the first third of the first act.

[thro]

In other news

Torchlight 2 should be out soon.

The original was pretty decent for a small indie game.


Basically it was diablo 2 in 3d with some annoying bits removed (i.e., you can send your pet back to town to sell stuff for you, while you carry on killing). Single player only, no activation BS, etc.


The sequel will have multiplayer, here's hoping they learn from the complaints people have with Diablo 3.....