RANDOM VIDEO GAME NEWS

[Morgoth]

Nice data from Blizzard: http://us.battle.net/d3/en/blog/9691895/diablo-iii%C3%A2%E2%82%AC%E2%84%A2s-one-year-anniversary-infographic-5-20-2013

 

14.5 million Diablo 3 players.

[Drowsy Emperor]

I thought the game bombed

[Malcador]

People bitched a lot about it, but as usual for a Blizzard game it made money well. 9.7 MM as the average amount of gold per player though, damn.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Maybe they're lying to make the game seem more appealing? I don't know. People were bitching all the time how no one was playing it online. To go from that to the population of Mexico city is a gap that's hard to fill on pure bull****.

[Rosbjerg]

People bitched a lot about it, but as usual for a Blizzard game it made money well. 9.7 MM as the average amount of gold per player though, damn.

 

Is that a lot? I think a friend of mine had almost 50 million.. I was more amazed that on average 8.2 million hours were played each day.. That's just insane.

[LadyCrimson]

I lol'd reading about the gold dupe exploit in D3 this month, where some people had trillions of gold. Of course they claim they've taken care of it and gotten most of the illicit gold away, doing no rollback at all ... reminds me of the NWO diamond thing. That's MMO economy for you.

 

I don't remember how much gold I had in D3 before I quit. Not millions and millions and millions, but IIRC it was a fairly hefty sum. If you work the gold-AH even just a little, it grows pretty fast. If you work the AH a lot, you'll be rich quick.

[Monte Carlo]

I thought the game bombed

No, the hive-mind decided it bombed because it was popular.

 

Once you get over the fact that it isn't D2, D3 is actually a good game. Bags of fun in multiplayer. I just don't buy into the whole AH BS and just stress-bust in a dungeon with it every now and then.

[Malcador]

Is that a lot? I think a friend of mine had almost 50 million.. I was more amazed that on average 8.2 million hours were played each day.. That's just insane.

Well the hidden point being that I'm pretty poor (think I've made 4 million overall). Gemsmithing is a nice way to rake in some cash. And you can buy the gold with real money, but I'm definitely not doing that.

[NOK222]

 

Dark Elves...IN SPACEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeee

[Bester]

Is this speech supposed to be emotionless? Cause it's obviously written from a vulcan perspective. This is plain bad. Bad bad bad.

 

"We must face doubt"? Doubt? Does this word even exist in vulcan vocabulary? This is beyond bad. This game has gone where no game has gone before.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Bester

[Oner]

I thought the game bombed

AFAIK D3 currently holds the title of Most preordered game in history?

[Drowsy Emperor]

Bombed after release obviously. As in - multiplayer abandoned by players. I know a few people who have it and no one plays it. I'm don't believe Blizz numbers.

[Keyrock]

I also know a good number of people that have abandoned D3.  I can't speak about the game from anything other than hearsay, though, as I've never played it.

[Hurlshort]

I didn't enjoy D3, but it clearly didn't bomb.  

 

edit:  I'm guessing a good chunk of the hours played per day are coming out of Asian markets.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Hurlshot

[alanschu]

I'd be surprised if D3 bombed.

 

Loud minorities are still minorities.

Edited May 23, 2013 by alanschu

[Oerwinde]

Is this speech supposed to be emotionless? Cause it's obviously written from a vulcan perspective. This is plain bad. Bad bad bad.

 

"We must face doubt"? Doubt? Does this word even exist in vulcan vocabulary? This is beyond bad. This game has gone where no game has gone before.

Romulan, not Vulcan.

[melkathi]

I doubt the game "bombed" but at the same time those impressive numbers they are showing don't really tell us anything. Just throwing one "statistic" at people, without giving the whole set of data is useless. All we know now is that over fourteen million battlenet accounts have had a copy of D3 tied to them. Every number they show other than that comes without context - no idea how the whole population is spread among the quarters, no outliers etc.

Hell, Steam achievements show more than that At least there you can tell exactly how far how many customers progressed in a game. And then you get 90% getting through the tutorial, 80% gettign through chapter 1and only 60% making it half way through any given game (my numbers totaly made up), while games with launchers have inflated "time spend" counters as what is counted is how long the launcher has been on, which people keep running to patch or maybe forget to turn off after playing.

 

So, good for them (blizzard) with the sales.To the rest of their posing: *shrug*

[marelooke]

I doubt the game "bombed" but at the same time those impressive numbers they are showing don't really tell us anything. Just throwing one "statistic" at people, without giving the whole set of data is useless. All we know now is that over fourteen million battlenet accounts have had a copy of D3 tied to them. Every number they show other than that comes without context - no idea how the whole population is spread among the quarters, no outliers etc.

Hell, Steam achievements show more than that At least there you can tell exactly how far how many customers progressed in a game. And then you get 90% getting through the tutorial, 80% gettign through chapter 1and only 60% making it half way through any given game (my numbers totaly made up), while games with launchers have inflated "time spend" counters as what is counted is how long the launcher has been on, which people keep running to patch or maybe forget to turn off after playing.

 

So, good for them (blizzard) with the sales.To the rest of their posing: *shrug*

 

Wasn't there some point where you could get D3 for free when preordering some WoW expansion or somesuch (or get a lot of game time when buying D3, much more than the game price) either way that surely would inflate those numbers "slightly" with a lot of "sales" that aren't (or not really anyway).

Edited May 23, 2013 by marelooke

[kirottu]

 

I doubt the game "bombed" but at the same time those impressive numbers they are showing don't really tell us anything. Just throwing one "statistic" at people, without giving the whole set of data is useless. All we know now is that over fourteen million battlenet accounts have had a copy of D3 tied to them. Every number they show other than that comes without context - no idea how the whole population is spread among the quarters, no outliers etc.

Hell, Steam achievements show more than that At least there you can tell exactly how far how many customers progressed in a game. And then you get 90% getting through the tutorial, 80% gettign through chapter 1and only 60% making it half way through any given game (my numbers totaly made up), while games with launchers have inflated "time spend" counters as what is counted is how long the launcher has been on, which people keep running to patch or maybe forget to turn off after playing.

 

So, good for them (blizzard) with the sales.To the rest of their posing: *shrug*

 

Wasn't there some point where you could get D3 for free when preordering some WoW expansion or somesuch (or get a lot of game time when buying D3, much more than the game price) either way that surely would inflate those numbers "slightly" with a lot of "sales" that aren't (or not really anyway).

 

It was 12 months of game time in wow(and maybe the panda expansion).

[Lady Evenstar]

 

 

I doubt the game "bombed" but at the same time those impressive numbers they are showing don't really tell us anything. Just throwing one "statistic" at people, without giving the whole set of data is useless. All we know now is that over fourteen million battlenet accounts have had a copy of D3 tied to them. Every number they show other than that comes without context - no idea how the whole population is spread among the quarters, no outliers etc.

Hell, Steam achievements show more than that At least there you can tell exactly how far how many customers progressed in a game. And then you get 90% getting through the tutorial, 80% gettign through chapter 1and only 60% making it half way through any given game (my numbers totaly made up), while games with launchers have inflated "time spend" counters as what is counted is how long the launcher has been on, which people keep running to patch or maybe forget to turn off after playing.

 

So, good for them (blizzard) with the sales.To the rest of their posing: *shrug*

 

Wasn't there some point where you could get D3 for free when preordering some WoW expansion or somesuch (or get a lot of game time when buying D3, much more than the game price) either way that surely would inflate those numbers "slightly" with a lot of "sales" that aren't (or not really anyway).

 

It was 12 months of game time in wow(and maybe the panda expansion).

 

Not the expansion but an in-game pet and possibly some other things. My husband and I bought the time, but never downloaded D3--even though we were entitled to--because it didn't interest us. No idea how many folks did the same or whether Blizzard counts us as D3 purchasers.  It's not quite the same as counting copies bundled with new PCs or video cards as purchased copies, but not totally different either in my opinion.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Meh who cares anyway. ARPG junkies have Grim Dawn to look forward to - D3 is old news now.

 

I don't even play that genre, I was just curious how Blizz is doing. Obviously they're still a money printing press, but I think they spent some of their reputation with D3 and Heart of the Swarm. Even the major gaming sites, all paid advertising by default, struggled not to comment on how silly the HoS campaign is and how poor D3 single player was and the rest of the changes don't bring much to the table either.

 

A lot went into the promotion of SCII as an e-sport but the game's staying power is surely not going to be like SC. WoW isn't going anywhere any time soon but its on an expected decline.

 

Legacy of the Void is a single player disaster in the making. I'm willing to bet good money that its going to be the recycled endgame of Warcraft III where all the races band together against the hybrids/big bad. I expect that exact outcome, and even the same/similar last mission. All the plot threads are pointing in that direction, with the Zerg becoming the good guys now, much like the Orcs did in WCIII.

If that happens I'll be majorly disappointed that they lack even that ounce of creativity to make a truly new product.

 

After all, they once had the balls to end Brood War with zerg victory. From that to the cartoon Zerg of SCII is facepalm worthy.

 

The new casual MMO is an unknown so that might shake things up a little.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Drowsy Emperor

[Morgoth]

Meh who cares anyway.

 

You seem to care enough to keep writing walls of text how crappy Blizzard games are.

 

Diablo 3 is so far the best Diablo clone I've played since Diablo 2. Probably sunk 100 hours of time into it. The last time I bothered to spend so much time on a game was F:NV I think.

 

HoTS is excellent. God bless Blizzard for still making big PC games.

[Drowsy Emperor]

 

Meh who cares anyway.

 

You seem to care enough to keep writing walls of text how crappy Blizzard games are.

 

Diablo 3 is so far the best Diablo clone I've played since Diablo 2. Probably sunk 100 hours of time into it. The last time I bothered to spend so much time on a game was F:NV I think.

 

HoTS is excellent. God bless Blizzard for still making big PC games.

 

 

They're not crappy but they're not as good as they once were. I played D3 for a little while (watched people play more at an internet cafe) and I think the game is complete ass. None of the horror atmosphere of the original and the SP is so short as to be non existent.

 

I completed Wings of Liberty and while the gameplay is pretty good, the campaign was overproduced crap which I blew through in two sittings on the hardest difficulty level without repeating a single mission. And the missions themselves were training sessions for the unit they give you in that mission. 

And everyone says HoS is even shorter and the story is weaker so you'll forgive me if I take your words with a grain of salt. 

 

The original SC could be crushingly difficult particularly towards the end and it actually had a decent story. BW was even better.

[melkathi]

The Diablo clone I spend the most time on, far more than on Diablo itself was Sacred. That was nearly matched by my time spend in Sacred 2, where work tore me away for a while and I had a hard time to get back in. I enjoyed Torchlight and Torchlight 2. Enough to make a second character in Torchlight 2, something I never could do in Diablo. So to each their own

 

I quite liked Wings of Liberty as I saw it more as world building for something to be done with the franchise in the future and less as a story to care about. HoS, even though I went in prepared to liek it, having as said liked WoL, I thing was a pile of... I doubt I'll even bother with the 'toss after that.

[Hurlshort]

I think my tastes have simply changed.  Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2 seem like solid continuations of the Action RPG and TBS genre respectively, but I'm no longer really into those types of games.  I buy them thinking I can recapture a time from my childhood, but it has already passed.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Hurlshot