News Blizzard announces Diablo III Open Beta Weekend

played some.. it's kind of dark and gloomy all the time- classic dungeon crawling.. the character creation is pretty bad for a new game.. runs great though good engine- it could be pretty good as you level.. I can see some combos starting to form- thing that struck me though.. it's the easiest game you'll probably ever play- like it was playtested by a snuffaluffagus with one arm and cheetos all over his face, next to a tv with a cookie jar tipped over (only crumbs left..)

when you run out of mana holding the right mouse button.. your guy auto shoots his arrows instead- and it's auto aim! just point in the general direction.. so you can just hold a button and have a sausage in the other hand



aye, so this is the future of gaming xD man if guildwars 2 is this easy, might as well retire.. that was ridiculous

 

Sandcrawler: This game is lazy. It has had so much hype as to be ridiculous and is exactly what StarCraft 2 turned out to be - a rehash with slightly better graphics, of the one that went before. Where's the progression? Where's the innovation? My choice of words granted, perhaps slightly too strong, but suggesting I should in turn shoot myself in the head for daring to criticise a developer? Well... Those in glass houses, my friend...

FreshDandwiches: I concede your point about assessing an entire game based upon a beta, but if that beta is less than 1 month away from the full release date, its a pretty good indication of what the finished product will be like. After the massive delays, all the hype and 'jazz-hands' over Diablo 3, I expected a bit more than the same old game with an evolution of the graphics. It's just a slightly more sophisticated Torchlight, which cost a hell of a lot less, had no stupid requirements, and was just as much fun.

I think perhaps it was incorrect of me to call the game a piece of sh*t, however it is really just reflective of feeling let down by a developer that just seems to have taken the easy way out as they did with StarCraft 2, instead of trying to bring us a genuine next step.

 

Stress test is a bit of a pain, couldn't log in at all last night as they limited the number of users, this morning I can log in and create a character (or 8) but cannot start a game.

 

Yeah, because SCII isn't one of the most popular games in the world with a massive online following purely because it followed a good formula that works without a hitch...

 

That's the thing though. It is a beta. The trend is these days for beta's to be glorified demo's. This clearly isn't. I think you'll see the finished product being very different.

Torchlight was very enjoyable, remarkable as well considering how long it took to develop. I'm hoping D3 will be the same and better with the on-line play that Torchlight lacked, the Auction House and all the rest of it.

If you follow the Torchlight 2 blog even Runic are excited about D3. http://www.torchlight2game.com/news/2012/03/16/congratulations-to-the-diablo-iii-team/

I totally disagree with you about SC2 as well. I think that it has evolved as well into a fine game which requires a hell of a lot of skill to play.

You keep mentioning graphics. You'll never get amazing state of the art graphic in Blizz games. They design them to be accessible to lower end machines and more about the gameplay.

 

thehippoz:

While I agree so far it's really, really easy (even actively trying to die is difficult) This is the first act of the first difficulty, so I'm not too worried

 

You guys need to go to the Dr and get some anti-depressants. You are in the UK so it is covered!

We are talking DIABLO 3 here and you are not satisfied! Get real, the Brit Debby Downer thing is getting old.

Oh wait a second, were you not old enough to play the first and second iterations?!

Downloading now and going to have Fun!

Yours in Demonic Plasma,
Star*Dagger

 

save your time star.. it's pretty bad- I mean it could be fun maybe if your mentally disabled xD

I upgraded the crafter to see what he offers too.. it was the same stuff that drops- the gameplay is fluid and the graphics fit diablo, but really they could make things a little challenging.. I know these console guys want to roll around in cheetos while a game tells them they are not a dingaling- but how easy it was to beat whole droves of mobs by holding the mouse button down

sad thing is I didn't even know wth is going on, beat the first boss and it says thanks! like I was supposed to jizz my pants or something.. didn't even get close to dieing once

should add the graphics well see them in the pics posted.. no way to zoom in and out either.. the character creation is pick a guy- that's it.. no way to customize.. like if your black- too bad xD asian- too bad.. arab- well that's never in there.. played diablo so far back- all remember is the area where you slaughter some cows.. had some fun in bnet back then.. warcraft 3 was probably the most skilled rts blizzard made- thought was better than starcraft.. but this is a money grab to farmville players- my opinion anyway

have a bad feeling guildwars 2 is going to be the same.. the snuffaluffagus dollars is too strong nowdays- if you don't dumb it down they lose interest.. then they roid rage in the sd forum

 

Star*Dagger - I was in the last year of my teens when the first Diablo came out, so yeah, I know all about it and its sequel.

And where Shayper09 says SC2 is one of the most popular games in PC-dom, I'm not quite sure about that although I acknowledge that it has done very well indeed. I don't begrudge it that, but I was really hoping that Blizzard would actually try something new for D3 instead of rehashing the same method they used for SC2. I just expect something a bit better from one of the supposed shining lights of PC developers. We can't lambast Infinity Ward for rehashing COD ad infinitum and then praise Blizzard for putting new clothes on the same old Diablo, surely?

Freshsandwiches - If I 'bang on' about graphics, its because in some circles the pendulum seems to have swung the opposite way and now to spend time on ensuring graphics are of high quality is a sure indicator that the developer has given sod-all consideration to the fun of the game itself. This is clearly not true. I see no reason why you can't have both. In the specific context of my comment above though, I just expected more from a game that was announced back in 2001. What have they been doing all this time? (WoW, obviously). I will also be very surprised if the finished game is radically different as you suggest. There's less than 3 weeks until you can buy a retail copy in the shops. This beta is a 'stress test' which tells me it's more about whether their own servers can cope rather than the game itself being tested - the closed Beta has been going on for a while, to accomplish that.

 

@greypilgers I'm not really sure what your getting at anymore. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens when the game hits the shelves on the 15th of May. Luckily for you it appears there will be a starter edition available. http://i.imgur.com/EEBPe.jpg

Hopefully you'll reserve judgement until then.

 

Z zooms in an out. (although it does
Also in regard to the difficulty, I repeat, that is the first difficulty on the first act, I didn't exactly expect it to be difficult.
I do agree however that the blacksmith does seem mostly useless, given how much gold it costs to train him up before he could make anything of any use to me what so ever.

 

Pre ordered the CE the day it was announced with GAME, was really on edge about them going down the pan, anyway keep trying to get in everyone, iv had a beta for afew months and its definatly worth it spamming at the login screen )

 

Freshsandwiches - Perhaps my argument has not been structured in the best way. I also concede the point we should reserve judgement until the finished article is in everyone's hands, BUT, I will be frankly amazed if it is even quite different from what we have all already seen. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it will not be a fun game, but I just expected... more from them.

 

You seen to log in quite easily at the moment. (1230 BST)

 

went to level 13 and got tornado on the wizard with high int gear in the wee hours.. talk about a wrecking ball- my teammates weren't even getting kills..

read it was perma death at level 10+? that might be why it's so easy.. now I'm holding down the other mouse button and tapping 2.. it's kind of an improvement =} lol

*edit just did a run.. tornado is the win button

 

Yeah, the difficulty level definitely needs tweaking. I ran through the entire scenario with my Demon Hunter using only his left-click autoshot and the machine gun like volley of my right-click. I only managed to die once when 4 of those great hulking beasts exploded on top of me at the same time.

 

The game definitely feels too easy... No deaths and I didn't use any heal pots until I fought Leoric. It was my first run through and my Witchdoctor was level 9.

I'm hoping that the ease of play is just because it's a beta demo.

 

It is Diablo we're talking about!
I am loving the fact that it remains true to its origin and it is not some travesty like Fallout 3 was!
I think it is a bit easy, but you have hardcore and nightmare modes, and I can garantee you will die (as we did in the previous Diablos).
I can't wait to see the craftables and the itens along the way. It is all abou collection.

Ooooohhh... BTW, I have to admit that I am less excited than I expected

 

I can't comment on D3 specifically as I haven't played the Beta, but I think you're being a bit unfair.

A new COD comes out every twelve months, but it's been twelve years since the last Diablo. It's such a retro series it makes sense the gameplay should be retro as well. Besides, it's been such a long time since the last one that even if the gameplay is identical to the previous game, twelve years is more than long enough for that not to be a problem.

Same with SC2 (which I have played): the last RTS of it's kind I played was Age of Mythology, and that was eight years ago. It's so retro is practically brand new again.

To use a more extreme but relevant analogy: it's like having issue with The Artist because it doesn't do anything new compared to all the other films in its genre that were released at the turn of the 20th century. Whilst technically true, it completely misses the point that a) it doesn't matter because it was a hundred years ago, and b) The Artist is a very good film irrespective of comparisons to others in the genre.