The Diablo III Thread

[Wizard]

Looks alright, but I'm taking the same stance I am with SC2. Going to wait. Nice teaser, decent gameplay footage, you'd think I'd be hype, but I'm not.

[Lucandrake]

Who wants to play with me when it comes out !

[Wishdokta]

Who wants to play with me when it comes out !

Oh boy . I'll answer in 15 months ^^

[BlackKnight]

So BK, how about I join you in D3 then instead?

See you 2011~

 

Oh boy rolleyes.gif . I'll answer in 15 months ^^

15 months? Hahahahaa- we will be waiting years for this man.

[BlackKnight]

Cartoony Warcraft-style graphics = fail.

[Wishdokta]

Cartoony Warcraft-style graphics = fail.

Was one of my first thoughts, too. On a closer look it's (unfortunately) the style Blizz can't get rid off. The interiors lookin good with spiderwebs and candles. But outdoors it's silly compared to Titan Quest, which is obviously much older than D3 on its release. But hey, we're looking at material announced 12 hours ago. Maybe we'll see some more interesting stuff. It isn't a next months game to agonize anyway.

[ken_cinder]

I never thought about the length before release, I figured (Without actually thinking about it) late this year/early next year. Given how much material is actually available, I'd say late 09 at the earliest.

 

Guess I might pick up a retail D2 then.

[BlackKnight]

It will take a long time to get out- Starcraft II looks likely to be released 18 months after its announcement, and it has been in production about as long as Diablo III.

 

The thing is, the next year is going to be tied up with Blizzard releases- Starcraft II and Wrath of the Lich King. It wouldn't make a lot of sense to saturate the market with anymore than 1 title a year at the minimum. And as the pecking order goes, D3 will likely come out last.

 

So yeh 18 months at least, more likely 2 years from now.

[OverlordMondo]

Cartoony Warcraft-style graphics = fail.

So they should've gone into the graphics options and turned down the gamma a little? My god, how did they screw up so badly?

[BlackKnight]

Let me just also get on my box and whine about the creative direction for Diablo III for 1 second.

 

-All the lore text on the site looks like it was thrown to some hack writer when you compare it to any of the eloquent narrative in the D1 and 2 manuals.

 

-The art style seems... uneven. Does the mild Oriental influence in the logo and SFX seem a bit out of place to anyone else? They take a tiny bit of unmarked land from the original Sanctuary map, make it bigger and call it Xiansai. Great flocking idea, morons. This isn't WoW- Diablo's world would benefit more from consistency than having every culture on Earth thrown in. Sanctuary was a mix of the European and middle eastern dark ages with the exception of the Aztec-inspired Travincal City. Now we are going to have the Asian flavour to things- something that's all too trendy today. Need to add exotics to something? Copy-Paste generic Asian faction in. Just seems like a very typical, almost cliched design choice.

 

-Witch Doctors, for that matter... what's up there? Every Diablo fan on this planet wants the Necromancer back. It is the favourite class in Diablo II- no questions. Replacing him with this cheap imitation is a kick in the face to every fan out there. Let's just hope there is a really, really good lore rationale for having Necs as an unplayable class...

 

-Also on the one hand you have all the ancient-to-middle ages locales of the previous games but now the new city Caldeum looks like it was taken straight from LotR or something. Huge towers, bright green domes? Seems like they threw the Diablo series' gritty realism out the window when they designed that place.

 

-Speaking of realism, what is with their post-Warcraft III style anyway? This set of designers does a good job with so few polygons but damn, if there was even one series that should have been spared the Saturday morning-treatment it should have been Diablo. Looking at the gameplay vid now in HD, I know it is Diablo. I know that is a Barbarian using Shout, and Whirlwind... but honestly I have a tough time convincing myself this isn't DotA or a custom hero map from WCIII. The style worked there. But WCIII came out in 2002, an expansion, an MMO and Starcraft II ago. It's old now.

 

I'm probably the biggest Diablo fan here. So expect more bitchin' from me in the coming day or so . None of these are major gripes- Blizzard, in a few key ways, just seems to have forgotten what made the Diablo atmosphere so special at some point in the last 10 years. Here's hoping they remember before release time.

 

So if you agree on any points just raise your hands and let me know

[BlackKnight]

Cartoony Warcraft-style graphics = fail.

So they should've gone into the graphics options and turned down the gamma a little? My god, how did they screw up so badly?

The contrast and gamma just hide the problems with the current approach. Too few polygons, and textures that are not made to look real. Compare that Barbarian's shoulders with anything from WoW. It's the same style. There is no texture to them, no aging, no stains or battle wear. They are just bright yellow and bright orange- that sort of contrast you only get in a cartoon, not in real life and certainly not in the kind of gothic art direction the previous Diablo games went for.