I agree that the armor and weapons could be a little less exagerrated, but jesus christ. This is modern technology, we can't expect Blizzard not to utilize it to what they and (apparently) the vast majority of non-fans thinks is best effect.

Small-time rant aside, the game looks amazing and fun to play. Can't wait.

babyblues:
Diablo is not an RPG title. It is hack and slash.

If you want immersion, play an RPG. The story is there in Diablo to point players in the direction so they can kill more dudes.

I fail to see how it is not an RPG. The fantasy setting, the item/loot system, the exploration are all characteristics of an RPG.

Anyone know who the voice over artist for the intro movie is? She sounds familiar, is it the same person who did Kerrigan?

babyblues:
Diablo is not an RPG title. It is hack and slash.

If you want immersion, play an RPG. The story is there in Diablo to point players in the direction so they can kill more dudes.

But the story and the atmosphere is also what made the first game stand out from the crowd and made it popular. The amount of background material for the world supports that, and so is the fact that they say they're going for a more immersive approach (not that I believe them) and they're trying to make the player get more involved in the world and the different cultures and stuff.

Silvertounge:

That's not what I'm saying. I thought it was great in the first game. In the second it got worse, because the only difference was that there was more of them, and not many posed the slighest bit of challenge. The gameplay video takes it even further into the wrong direction.

I understand your sentiments and agree with you. I remember when D2 first came out, me and several other people were having a discussion about how we were upset that you would cleave your way through a huge group of enemies like they were warm butter, but then randomly would get killed by the one super powerful, unique enemy in the group.

And when I first saw the gameplay trailer, my first thought was that we were continuing even further down that path.

... But that doesn't mean that I don't think that it won't be fun, and that it won't retain some of the most important Diablo elements -- angels, demons, dungeons, etc. The new game will be different, but still awesome, IMO.

What is Diablo exactly? I've never heard of it before o.0

*Puts up flame shield just in case*

Diablo was an isometric RPG/Hack and slash were you clicked on demons to kill them, leveled up a charcter, etc.

I think Diablo II still holds the record for fastest selling PC game.

jezz8me:

babyblues:
Diablo is not an RPG title. It is hack and slash.

If you want immersion, play an RPG. The story is there in Diablo to point players in the direction so they can kill more dudes.

I fail to see how it is not an RPG. The fantasy setting, the item/loot system, the exploration are all characteristics of an RPG.

Those are not characteristics of an RPG. Characteristics of an RPG would be relations and interactions between the world and your character, and being immersed in the atmosphere.
Call of Duty 4 involves an item system and exploration, and most people consider it an FPS rather than an RPG.

If you ask me, I'd say the new graphics are more suited to the game then previous iterations. Diablo in the past always seemed to take itself far more seriously than it really should have. I mean, it's monster bashing. Nothing more, nothing less. Rogue with better graphics. This sort of game doesn't really need to be so bloody gloomy all the time. Diablo always was and always will be about hacking your way through legions of armies to get better loot. It's not the deepest game in the world and it never was.

Don't get me wrong though, I love the series and am really pleased that a sequels been announced. I like the new art scheme, but here's the thing: we've not seen everything yet. We've been shown about 40 minutes of footage, right? The darker atmospheric stuff is likely going to come later. Isn't it better that we have more varied environments instead of "Gloom, Gloom, Gloom" like the previous games? With more varied environments, the creepy settings will be more effective because of the contrast with previous areas.

The fact that fanboys are getting upset about a changed art scheme days after the game they've been waiting for years has been announced is absolutely ridiculous. And I'm sorry if this is a harsh post but seriously guys, it's Diablo.

Thread Necromancy is bad, but I think starting more than one thread about the same thing is bad too. So I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place:

From Diablofans.com:
"Following the announcement of Diablo III at the 2008 Blizzard Worldwide Invitationals, merely 9 days ago, Gamasutra reports that sales of the seven-year-old RPG hack 'n slash game Diablo II Battle Chest has risen considerably on last week's worldwide sale charts.

The Diablo II Battle Chest took the lead on North American PC sales as the #1 in the Top 5 Sales. On the United Kingdom charts, the Diablo II Battle Chest received the th spot.

At this rate, Game Stores around the world will be out of stock of any remaining copies. If your area already is out of stock and you wish to get your hands on Diablo II and Lord of Destruction expansion, your only option at this point is to head to the Blizzard Store to purchase a digital download of the game. It is now available after the Diablo III announcement. Blizzard Entertainment most likely foresaw this prior to the announcement. A clever planning."

www.diablofans.com

http://gameplasma.com/index.php?do=viewarticle&id=758:
"Well it seems that Blizzard hyped Diablo 3 enough. The Diablo II Battlechest is now the number one selling PC game on Amazon. You can find the list here. At the time of posting, it seems that it is also the #16 top-selling game for video games in genereal. This only begs the question of exactly how many copies will Blizzard sell of Diablo III?"

... It begs the question, a ZP retroreview of Diablo II?

EDIT:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/videogames/ref=pd_ts_pg_2?ie=UTF8&pg=2
Well, it looks like its #26 as of 9:07pm EST 7/7/08

Kemmler0:
What i would like to know is HOW LONG DO I HAVE TO WAIT FOR DIABLO3.
4 years?
6
10
Judging by Blizzards previous release schedules, my last guess is probably the most accurate.
We are still waiting for Starcraft two!
I'm afraid that by the time this comes out i will have lost interest.

Blizzard take as long as they need to make games as GOOD as possible, they take a long time (but 10 years is about 8 years too far in my opinion) to get it balanced and stuff and try to make sure it stays challenging.
Although it does seem like they have too much things to make right now with starcraft2, WoW wrath of the lich king and now diablo III...

WlknCntrdiction:
What is Diablo exactly? I've never heard of it before o.0

*Puts up flame shield just in case*

diablo games are about a big monster called diablo (duh) that in the first game appears at the bottom of a monastery and starts to attack a town with his army of demons, you go in and slaughter the lot of them and save some people and then kill him...
-spoiler now- you take a stone from him that contains his soul and for some reason your guy hammers it into his skull (to gain his power or something dumb like that i think) and then in the second game the guy goes a bit mad and heads east with evil following him and destroying towns on the way then your NEW guy has to try stop him.
But it never stops it from being fun, it never gets too easy (like in the jungle with those fucking annoying kids) and there are lots of spells and attacks you can use.

i think the games and their stories were great.

Oh boy the in-game video with the barbarian and the witchdoctor looks awesome. Canīt wait for that game.
I started playing Diablo 1 on the Playstation, loved it, but never got further than the caves :) I only got my own pc two years later, but i bought D1 immediately.
If i compare D1 to D2, the music in the first one was way better and in my opionion a main reason for its success. The overall sound was better, and so was the enemy design.
Most enemies in D2 donīt look like creeping demons from hell anymore, just look at the knights in act 4, or the catwomen. The D1 knights were much cooler. They had the greatest death animation of all time.
Still D2 is better in comparison because of the skill system and the item system with runes, gems and stuff. And you run faster :)

I have but one thing to say in all this.

*squee*

Diablo on playstation? i didn't know it existed.

My brother installed Diablo 2 again literally a day before the announcement, we had no idea the luck of that.

They are truly great games and i also take back most of the graphic comments like before after re-playing the flayer dungeon >.< that was TOO DARK.

These are some games that will just be loved by me always. I remember i was in love with Diablo 1 from the trailers in WC2 i would watch them over and over. Diablo is one of my most nostalgic games and i hope they don't screw it up.

babyblues:
Diablo is not an RPG title. It is hack and slash.

If you want immersion, play an RPG. The story is there in Diablo to point players in the direction so they can kill more dudes.

I kind of disagree, Diablo is not immersive, but Diablo does have an interesting and very dark take on classic fantasy trappings that I always find intriguing. My only disapointment is that any cleverness is soon drowned out by mindless hack/slash.

I might pick up Diablo 3 after the price comes down. The first two were pretty interesting.

Kemmler0:
What i would like to know is HOW LONG DO I HAVE TO WAIT FOR DIABLO3.

4 years?
6
10

Judging by Blizzards previous release schedules, my last guess is probably the most accurate.
We are still waiting for Starcraft two!

I'm afraid that by the time this comes out i will have lost interest.

I would rather they take their time and release a polished, complete game then a buggy, half finished game. They can take as long as they like, but I'm puttin my money on 18 months - 2 years territory for the release. I love the diablo series, 1 was above average, 2 was awesome, so 3 should be...i cant even think of a word to descirbe how good it should be. Blizzard don't tend to go backwards.

Why do people read so much into a teaser trailer? sure its a little brighter but that doesnt mean the game itself will be, i dark grungy game would be hard to show of graphically imo, and i think thats what the preveiw was showing.

I for one found the teaser mouthwateringly good, not sure i like the healing orb idea as i t was shown, im hoping they drop less frequently, as much as i hate attending my RPA meetings (Red Pots Annonymous) its a massive part of the game, hopefully pots will stack somewhat (in 10s one would hope) but the choice to risk it for more loot and take less pots to me is an angle on the gameplay that if lost, would ruin the game.

Also no one mentions how slick the animations are!! and to me thats hugely important, more so over the graphics, I play Diablo 2 over Titan quest for this reason (before anyone says anything i love TQ its astounding, but its no D2)

I just hope the game is as insanely difficult as the first game as apposed to the realtive ease one could tear through 2.

Diablo 3 will rule wether you troll it or not, so anyone whos like "this game looks awful..... *insert other ill informed trolling here*" just realise that your words are meaningless, it WILL be bigger than god and sliced bread combined and the only way it wont be is if one of the characters wears a bunny suit weilding a guitar calling himself bob, nuff said

I agree about the animations Necromaniacal. They incredibly smooth, in fact the whole thing is smooth. The gameplay demo is very impressive.

Q: Being less cartoon'ish and more realistic would make the game heavier on computers

A: False, there's a lot of techniques like bump mapping that help developers give a realistic look to textures, any recent graphic card with less than 8 years support bump mapping, there's a lot more techniques that can help giving that realistic look, being 3D doesnt mean it should look cartoon'ish.

It's interesting how you stop on "bump mapping" after mentioning "lots of techniques". And for crying out, bump mapping does not help "give a realistic look to textures"... it's just fake shading from one point of light, a method that is pretty much obsolete nowadays. I'm realtively sure D3 does contain Ambient Occlusion, Specular, and possibly some useage of Normal Mapping (the map that killed bump mapping). Those are 3 big hitters, and you want bump?

For what it's worth though, I 'somewhat' agree with the 'some' of the photoshop alterations. Diablo has always been about dark, sleek and sexy to me. D3 is pushing colour, and while I don't have a problem with that. I wouldn't say no to a mod/patch that did darken it up a bit. I personally think you've gone overboard with your photoshop alterations... and really sucked out the colour in places where just a hint of it would be ideal. I've not signed the petition, but I can see where you're coming from... well, for some bits. What was that "compare Tristram in D1 to D3" about? You didn't provide a comparison image, and the image of D1 is actually quite rubbish! So yeah... not sure what you were supposed to be getting at there.

Hey, it's not mine - or anyone here's - petition. I think it started on the battle.net forums. But be warned, if you go there, prepare for the arrogant flaming of 12-year-olds.

On a different note, I hope you brought your lollerskates:

http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/diablo-hate-internet.php

Ah, my bad. I shant be venturing off into the B.net forums to express my views, it'd be a looooong day then.

That link from something awful is hilariously correct. Cheers for posting.

I'm really more concerned about Diablo 3 being dark in overall tone rather than it daring to have colors aside from gray and brown in it. The Necromancer being replaced with the Witch Doctor doesn't thrill me, and I fear that the demons won't wind up actually looking demonic.

I read somewhere that D2 was "darkened" in one of the first patches following release. The original game was brighter.

Dunno about that though. My source might actually be the Something Awful article.

To me, I'm sure the game will be more than fun, just like the last two. However, I think in making the game more appealing to the masses, they have lost a lot of the atmosphere that made Diablo what it was.

You know what? I found Titan Quest fun. I also found Dungeon Siege, Neverwinter Nights, Nox, Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance, Champions of Norath, and X-Men Legends fun. Diablo III will be right up my alley. That doesn't mean that I can't not like the terrible change in artwork they have going with right now.

That's not to say the artwork is bad. Far from it. It looks right at home in a "Champions of Warcraft" game. It does not suit the Diablo universe however, and it is sad to see the developers adopting a "this is now our signature art style" for everything rather than trying to maintain consistancy throught each of their universes.

Will I play it? I'm sure I will. Will I like it? That depends on how it turns out. I'm sure that it will be alright, but I can't help but think they need more of the Diablo universe in their Diablo III game.

I'm still addicted to D2 currently and as others I'm getting kind of sick of all the constant complaining. D3 is in the works, show some gratitude. But hey, it's the same for starcraft 2 ( check out their official forums ). Thing is blizzard does listen, and considering blizzard games are totally different when they come out compared to the original pre-beta videos ( again look at the changes of starcraft 2 ) show a little faith. Some things do look uninteresting I admit, but I'm sure they'll fix most of it and there's most likely still a beta with alot of players.

Seems like there are two camps atm, the first is pre diablo 1 and the other pre diablo 2. I admit I've only played the second, and it's addicting as hell still to this day. If you've seen some of the interviews so far from the looks of it they're keeping what was good in D2 meaning it will have at least:
-reasonable fast paced action
-interesting classes with it's own playstyle
-variation in dungeons, weapons and enemies at each reload.
-inventory system, orbs for health/mana, etc.

But if you look at the interview videos they're stating that there will be alot more focus on the story as well, more ( diverse and different at reload ) quests and new places to explore ( a bigger map compared to D2 ). The main things that are up for debate at the moment are:
-Player versus player, how should it work?
-Art direction level and armorwise ( alot of comparisons to wow have been made )
-Orbs, yes or no?
-What are the other 3 classes and how will the skill trees look like?

It's only just announced so I'm sure we'll know more as developement progresses. So please enough with OMFG ITS WOW or SIGH THE PETITION banners on some forums. Blizzard is well aware D2 was huge and the fanbase is big. It's a long ways off from release and only the basic framework of the engine is done, how the actual full game itself will look is still a mystery.

My problem is that Diablo 3 isn't dark enough. It needs to be darker. If I start up Diablo 3 I want it to be so dark that I think my computer crashed. There is no sun in the Diablo world, only ambient lighting. And there is no ambient lighting, only a crushing black void from which nothing can escape. Remember that desert level with the burning sun hanging high in the sky? That's how I remember Diablo, because that place was dark.

And these health orbs are stupid. I want potions back. I loved it when there was no room in my inventory for weapons or other items because it was chock full of delicious potions. Nothing felt better than when you try to pick up a weapon only to find out there's no inventory space because of potions.

...I want to give you babies now.

I just watched the gameplay trailer again and realizied how motherf*ing awesome that boss at the end looks like. And its probably not even a real stage boss. Holy Mother. The bosses in D2 suddenly look like ... i donīt know but this thing can bite! your! head! off!. Case closed.

Actually that is a complete rip-off of the Guardian from Doom3. I wonīt buy this game. Also it should be darker.

Lord_Jaroh:

You know what? I found Titan Quest fun. I also found Dungeon Siege, Neverwinter Nights, Nox, Baldur's Gate Dark Alliance, Champions of Norath, and X-Men Legends fun. Diablo III will be right up my alley. That doesn't mean that I can't not like the terrible change in artwork they have going with right now.

All those games, plus the Gauntlet games. Awesome.

Damn Dirty Ape:
The main things that are up for debate at the moment are:
-Player versus player, how should it work?
-Art direction level and armorwise ( alot of comparisons to wow have been made )
-Orbs, yes or no?
-What are the other 3 classes and how will the skill trees look like?

-Yeah, there seems to be some debate on the issue, and no official stance from Blizzard yet, so my guess is that PvP is still in the works.
-... I doubt they'll change the art style. Maybe they throw some sliding bars so people can make the game darker or up the contrast, or maybe they'll patch it like they did with Diablo II, but as far as designs and stuff go, my guess is no change. The "Large" shoulder pads in D3 are not nearly as cartoony as Wow... and I think they kind of add to the epic feel.
-Orbs are in for sure. The fans may be quarreling, but every interview and opinion I've heard come from Blizzard and the development team is that they really like the orbs, and they plan to keep that system. Also, that potions are going to be put on some sort of short cool down to keep people from drip-feeding themselves potions.

I've said previously that I love Health Orbs though.

-I hope Blizzard suprises everyone with the other three classes. I also wouldn't mind if they changed their mind and added 2 more, for seven total classes. After all, 7 is a biblical important number, the perfect number, and should fit nicely.

Ahh, but there's my fanboy desire for more classes/the return of other old classes rearing its ugly head.

I am wondering how they manage to work the classes out... there has to be like an archer/ranged attack class, a paladin-type knight and also a magic guy, but iīm sure they can blend that together nicely.
What i would love: a character that can morph into monsters, like the druid, but more than just a bear and a wolf. Perhaps take over the forms of enemies you killed.
More classes will surely come with an Expansion... and i have read in another forum that Blizzard plans to reduce PvP in D3, making it less important, can anyone confirm that?