Diablo 3 - Miscellaneous Roundup

Dhruin

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Here's a bunch of Diablo III stuff, starting with the official launch presser:
DIABLO III NOW LIVE
It’s a bad day for demons . . .

PARIS, France. - May 15, 2012 - Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. today announced that Diablo® III, the highly anticipated next chapter in its award-winning action–role-playing-game series, is now available in retail stores throughout the U.S., Canada, Europe, South Korea, Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand, and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau. Gamers in the regions above as well as in Mexico, Argentina, Chile, and Brazil are also able to purchase Diablo III digitally via the game’s official website (http://www.diablo3.com).

In the wake of a Blizzard record of more than 2 million preorders*, and following more than 8,000 midnight launch events earlier today at retail stores worldwide,gamers across the planet are now storming Sanctuary in hot pursuit of the Lord of Terror.
Rock, Paper, Shotgun reports on an emergency fix for "Error 37-ing":
“We are in the process of performing an emergency maintenance for all Diablo III servers to resolve several issues that are currently impacting the game. This maintenance may cause some interruption in communication, ability to log in, use of in-game features, and disconnections.”
They also have a Three Hours With Diablo III impressions piece, and PC Gamer managed to get 6 hours in.
Eurogamer has the full interview we mentioned yesterday, which covers "replayability and post-launch plans". VG247 says a NeoGAF user claims to have finished the game in 12.5 hours.
CNET asks Is Diablo III Still Relevant? and The Rampant Coyote talks about the importance of the original game.
More information.
 
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An interesting article on Diablo III's online-requirement and always-online DRM in general:

http://www.gatheryourparty.com/articles/2012/05/14/diablo-3s-drm-a-customer-disservice/

States that supposedly Ubisoft's sales are off 90% since moving to always-on DRM for many of its games. Not sure if that's accurate, but it does suggest that inconvenient online requirements can have a significant negative impact your sales. Not sure it will matter for Diablo III though; still would really suck to have bought this game if your deployed in the military.
 
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States that supposedly Ubisoft's sales are off 90% since moving to always-on DRM for many of its games.

Isn't it more that they haven't made any good games since? :p
 
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An interesting article on Diablo III's online-requirement and always-online DRM in general:

http://www.gatheryourparty.com/articles/2012/05/14/diablo-3s-drm-a-customer-disservice/

States that supposedly Ubisoft's sales are off 90% since moving to always-on DRM for many of its games. Not sure if that's accurate, but it does suggest that inconvenient online requirements can have a significant negative impact your sales. Not sure it will matter for Diablo III though; still would really suck to have bought this game if your deployed in the military.

I refused to buy AC2 because of always online DRM - and I refused to buy Diablo 3 for the same reason. I know several other people who have also taken the same stance. But the D3 hype machine will ensure that its a huge success.
 
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jhwisner said:
States that supposedly Ubisoft's sales are off 90% since moving to always-on DRM for many of its games.

Somewhat off topic, but the 90% figure seems to be based on a misunderstanding between Michael Pachter & Ubisoft. In the original quote, which is from Eurogamer, Pachter apparently said:

"It's impossible to know how bad piracy is, but it's pretty bad. Ubisoft told me that their PC game sales are down 90 per cent without a corresponding lift in console sales. Some of the decline is truly due to people migrating to consoles, but my guess is that 40 to 50 per cent of PC games played are not purchased."

But the article has now been subsquently edited to read:

""It's impossible to know how bad piracy is," agrees Michael Pachter, Wedbush Morgan analyst, "but it's pretty bad. [Clarification - Michael Pachter heard from Ubisoft that piracy rates were as high as 90 per cent per title.]"

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-09-30-how-bad-is-pc-piracy-really-article

The "90% fall in sales" appears to have gained widespread currency despite the fact that it looks like Pachter misunderstood what Ubisoft were referring to when they mentioned the 90% figure, and that it means piracy rates, not a measure of the fall in sales.

For what its worth, I think it is highly unlikely that Ubisoft would go public and give any figures about whether their always on DRM harmed sales. They put too much money into the scheme to just turn around and say it was a complete fail.

As for Diablo 3, I doubt I will buy it until a functioning crack appears. As with Ubisoft, the problem is not so much the constant internet connection, but the fact that their servers can't cope which is causing the shit to hit the fan.
 
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3.4 rating based on 1208 people ! :O

That's crazy bad.

Risen 2 is at 4.5… A full point ahead. :D

Yeah the deluge of 0's and 10's are a familiar one.
 
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3.4 rating based on 1208 people ! :O
So I guess the Autocritic program I sold Activision works better than the Autofanboi program I sold Blizzard? Hmph. Glad I sold that thing "as is". I better go cash this check fast. ;)
 
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Been playing it for hours, great game so far. Ive played torchlight, sacred, etc - Diablo has that unique formula that makes action-rpg fun. Maybe it's nostalgia, whatever, but I'm feeling the Diablo addiction rearing it's horned head once again..

Is Diablo still relevant? I say give it a couple days, that rocky launch that left even me out in the cold is now hopefully behind us. No doubt the haters are very happy about that one, but what I'm seeing so far is a quality game - if you can play it ='.'=
 
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More details on character customization please. Is it as pointless as I've been reading or was that blown out of proportion?
 
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Well full information on customization has been around for awhile. The short version is that there are tremendous number of options that open up as you level, but none of your decisions are permanent and you can redesign your character freely whenever you want. At max level there are some mechanics in play to discourage you from changing specs at the drop of a hat, but before that, complete character redesigns are encouraged.
 
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Well, let me put it this way. Instead of weaving your way thru a tree of abilities/spells/powers/whatevr, choosing what you want, you simply gain abilities as you progress. You can then use those abilities as you see fit. Youre like "speccing" you character based on what you want to use, instead of setting in stone with a skill tree.

So yes, at first when you have the two basic attacks youre limited, but as time goes on you can use whatever you want. I'm only lv6, so I dont know down the line how much more you get, all that.

And now fucking Battlenet is down as they apply some fix or another, so rejoice haters your dream has come true once again. Here I just dropped two Norco and cracked a beer ready for the atmosphere, and I'm putzing around on 4chan instead of killing shit
 
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No attributes. Very limited number of 'skins', I believe 3 for each sex, class based on light, medium, heavy armor. Everyone can respec themselves at will.

Fun but super simplified. Ugg..
 
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I'm about to install the original to see if it holds up. I do that every few years, just so I can complain about no running and promptly uninstall it because I cant handle the slow walking speed.
 
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Once your level gets into the teens, the number of choices really starts to open up.
Even at that relatively low level, there is an incredible amount of difference between different builds.

And yeah I'm disapointed that Blizzard's launch didn't go better. I'm sure that things will get straightened out very quickly, but this will still cost them.

So yes, at first when you have the two basic attacks youre limited, but as time goes on you can use whatever you want. I'm only lv6, so I dont know down the line how much more you get, all that.

And now fucking Battlenet is down as they apply some fix or another, so rejoice haters your dream has come true once again. Here I just dropped two Norco and cracked a beer ready for the atmosphere, and I'm putzing around on 4chan instead of killing shit
 
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I don't really get the "you can respec at any time" complaint. I guess people felt like a deeper connection with and "pride" for their character, or something. But it's not fun to spend 100+ hours to try different specs, gimping your characters, etc. It seems like work.
 
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I'm about to install the original to see if it holds up. I do that every few years, just so I can complain about no running and promptly uninstall it because I cant handle the slow walking speed.

Didnt the Hellfire expansion add running? I think that was the only good thing it did actually from what I can remember.
 
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