Humodour

Hey guys, so it turns out it was The Lost Vikings:

Somehow, I doubt they should be laughing about the fact they just pissed disenchanted a bunch of fans. Diablo 3 isn't a 'right' or an 'obligation', but if you're going to parade about with teasers and splash screens, you don't deliberately foster hype for what the product is not unless your aim is a PR nightmare. Id est: Blizz ain't stupid; it's not a WotLK or SC2 announcement (even if it isn't a Diablo 3 announcement). Edit: and lol, http://diablo3.no (Norway) redirects to Blizzard.com and is registered to Vivendi. Normally they're smart enough to not redirect the diablo3 domains they hold (e.g. http://www.diablo3.com/). Based on a whois, creation date and update date were the same time: 2006 (which is very roughly when Diablo 3 is speculated to have been really officially given the green light at Blizzard). Also, the Diablo 3 server/domain was last modified 8 days ago. It was created 10 years ago. It's currently hidden from the world by a time-out message, but Blizzard owns it and it runs Apache. No doubt getting it ready for when all the country-specific portals redirect to it. They also registered diablo3.ru in April this year.

I don't think so. They're not targetting at the same audience with their current projects Those companies responsible for Sacred 2 or Argonauts however... Largely irrelevant. Target genre isn't important so much as target audience, which is often interested in multiple genres. I recall for example Icewind Dale was overshadowed by Diablo 2, while Half-Life 1 which was overshadowed by Quake 3. Similarly, PS:T was arguably somewhat overshadowed by BG2. All these titles tend to do very well over time as cults, but it's the initial sales that are actually important to publishers. It's largely related to how the average gamer doesn't buy multiple games in a certain time-period, but the single most hyped game of that period (and unfortunately, but not unpredictably, usually the more 'superficially' fun one). Obviously exceptions exist in various ways, with us as the prime example. It's a phenomenon not restricted to games, where in general a high quality, and even cheap product can flop because it was overshadowed by a more widely hyped product, by one that was simply released a bit earlier, or even by one that's more anticipated but expected to be released later. I'm no expert, but I think something like this happened with the console wars and the xbox (well, one of them... they're always competing).

Ya. By all accounts they're making sure they keep things sufficiently ambiguous. I don't doubt that it was deliberately chosen to appear superficially similar to the Lich King, but I highly doubt they'd got to the effort of a teaser splash page just to announce a game they've already announced. It'll be a multi-release event, where they discuss Wrath, SC2, and another new project - Diablo 3.

Moat: what, it doesn't now? Interesting! Edit: I also wonder how much this has Bioware and Obsidian ****ting their pants. As individuals they're probably going "Hell yeah" but as a company "Oh no".

Actually, that shows up for Warcraft 5 and 6, too. It just means it's a ghost forum. Unfortunately, this is also true for Diablo 3, 4, 5 and 6... meaning while we definitely know Blizzard plans to make Diablo 3 soon, there's less indication it's definitely now. I still maintain that's what the WWI is about though. EDIT: Of course, I could have sworn I tested for a Diablo 4 forum initially and turned up nothing. It's entirely possible Blizzard threw these up very recently to try and let the rumour mill itself deal with their own slip-up. With Blizzard, it wouldn't surprise me.

You lie!

I know Honduras, Colombia, Bolivia, Venezuela, and El Salvador are in America, but that's not the America we're talking about. And Jamaica is technically the Carribean. Hah. About as unsubstantiated as the claim that more guns = less violence.

Magnum Opus: You should play it MP a friend or two some time. Quite a different game and many of the things you list as disadvantages you'll likely find turn into advantages.

Up yours America! The murder capital where low-life criminals are legally allowed to own guns and the homicide rates are the highest in the world.

I heard that one of the reasons Blizzard North split and made Flagship was that Blizzard was not happy with their design concepts for Diablo 3. So it may in fact be quite a good thing that fresh minds are working on Diablo 3.

$10 says Boyarsky is working on Diablo 3 and in more than just an artistic capacity, as with Fallout. And if I'm right, Diablo 3 is also a non-MMO multiplayer RPG, so just maybe Diablo 3 will be deeper, RPG-wise, than people expect. *crosses fingers*

Oh, yah, but the forum actually gives the "forum down erorr" for other random things (like a text search query), so this way you can see that it's not random and you can see they've actually named the Diablo 3 forum "Diablo III General Discussion" which is very premeditated. I'm as giddy as a schoolgirl.

Just to make it clear that Blizzard will be announcing Diablo 3: http://www.battle.net/forums/thread-search...ezacksawitfirst Edit: The Diablo III General Discussion forum doesn't normally pop up as an option in search; I forced it to. The point is, they've got such a forum created and read but are simply hiding it.

Without me?

Based on Blizzard's job postings, it's 3D and multiplayer but not an MMO; they're making a new MMO but it's not Diablo 3.

So it looks like WWI will be about Wrath of the Lich King, Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2. diabloii.net is an old and reliable site and they do have contacts at Blizzard. I believe them. http://www.diabloii.net/n/667423/diablo-3-...uncement-at-wwi

Ah, this site gives an excellent analysis: http://www.diablofans.com/ One of the runes is from Diablo (Hel rune). One is from the Frostmourne sword (Warcraft). One is from Protoss (Starcraft). So far the letters of the puzzle are: D O W P. There's apparently only 6 letters. Perhaps the fourth rune of the solar system means 'world', 'creation', 'the universe'. That's definitely in line with the worldstone and the tone of recent Diablo lore. The positioning of the runes forms a pentagram, too. Probably 6th rune is in middle or something. It seems that there will be more than one game announced, too. My money is on a Diablo game definitely being one of them. Perhaps the second game is a new IP? Hmm, I feel a bit chilly. Oh lol - it's Diablo 3: http://www.wowinsider.com/tag/wwi08/

They look like glyphs of warding. And where have we seen Blizzard use glyphs of warding before, hmm? Oh, and did you notice the demonic eyes and mouth in the middle of the snow?

A barter system! How innovative! If only RPGs in the past had used this, inventory management and item purchase would have been so much more meaningful and atmospheric. Oh wait.

I'll disagree here. BG got low level adventuring down great I thought. Introduced your character, their back story, you were able to discover some of Candlekeep, explore wilderness area's, meet NPC's, adventure to another area either (Beregost, Friendly Arm Inn) random encounters... it took you awhile to advance to 2nd level, I did not mind waiting. I distinctly remember throwing a single magic missile at a bear, and then running in circles with the bugger chasing me while Imoen pelted the stupid bear with arrows. Low level brilliance! That's what you get for attacking bears you fool!

That doesn't make any sense. Blizzard has done absolutely nothing in the history of their company to lead you to believe that. Diablo 3 would be the next iteration of the action-RPG series, just like Warcraft 3 was the next iteration of an RTS series and Starcraft 2 is clearly the next iteration of another RTS series. Now if they announce they are going to put out a new MMO set in the Diablo universe, sure, you'd have a reason to be negative. That's actually a fairly valid point. I'd ****ing adore Blizzard if they made an old-school Diablo sequel. Dungeon Siege proved you can still do hack n' slash in 3D (though obviously with some poor design decisions), so it's not like it needs to be 2D isometric (though that'd be fantastic). Eh, I hear people who love WoW say "I hope it's not like WoW".

I did; I said they were dissimilar.

Yeah, I'm afraid of that.

Come on, now, Krezack. I thought you to be an overall intelligent person. This 'general agreement' you speak of is something you've made up in your own mind. And I can damn well deny that it's half and half, as I lived with a gay guy for about 6 months, and we've been friends for years. It's not about some moral high horse. You're again making up a load of nonsense. Seriously, where are you getting your information? I'm seriously ****ing confused as to why it's so wrong for homosexuality to be a life-style choice? Is it because if you claim it's due to genetics that somehow makes it less 'evil' for you? Edit: maybe I use 'lifestyle choice' too losely; the point I was originally trying to make is that homosexuality is something that should be understood and respected regardless of the 'cause', while obesity is a disorder. Instead of arguing about whether or not obesity is a disorder or not, you're instead attacking me for stating what many gay people themselves consider to be the case. Maybe your gay friend's brain is different to a male's due to genetics. That would not mean it's 100% genetics for all homosexuals. The most annoying thing is for somebody to claim a statistic is wrong because they know of an outlier case (and I use the term 'statistic' losely here because what I said was fairly clearly meant to be a qualitative statement that there is a significant part genetics and a significant part lifestyle, rather than that it's exactly 50%/50%). I could no doubt just as easily bring up a case that's 100% lifestyle, yet that wouldn't mean genetics has nothing to do with homosexuality.