There’s been next to no Diablo III news of late. Bashiok has been absent from the Battle.net forums (likely he’s working on WoW tasks), there haven’t been new previews or screenshots, and we haven’t even had any rainbow-colored missing-Necromancer arguments to amuse us.Diablo 3 has been mentioned here and there, though.
Two new reviews of Sacred 2 drop mention of D3. Game Plasma gets it out of the way in the very first paragraph, while Kotaku sprinkles in the references throughout, before wrapping up with a remark we’ve seen in the reviews of every RPG since D3 was announced. ”Sacred 2: Fallen Angel is just a good time to be had that doesn’t take itself too seriously. It’s the perfect diversion for the PC action RPG fan looking for something to do between now and Diablo III.” Both the reviews give the game a pretty good score, and the overall MetaCritic consensus is 75%, so you could probably do worse if, as they say, you’ve got a click click click RPG urge to tide over with something during the long D3 wait.
This article seems designed to fool Googling gaming fans. It’s got the phrase “Diablo 3” in it, but the article is actually about… golf equipment. Callaway makes golf clubs in what they call “the Diablo series.” Tricky!
Finally, we did find one article about Diablo III, but I don’t think you’ll like it. It’s posted on something called Huliq News, and it’s a general overview of the game that seems to have been translated from Mandarin. Or possibly Aramaic. By someone who doesn’t speak the language. From some other space/time continuum. A few puzzling quotes, for your amusement (but certainly not your edification):
The main question, what is the game all about? Actually it’s a suspenseful as well as complex mystery. It comes out with different challenging tasks and puzzles that you need to complete to step up a level. To get rid of these problems, you should search clues and apply tactics by trial and error method. It’s all about discovering, exploring, cunning and cooperation and lastly it’s about combat.
You start in a medieval world supposing the identity of five unique characters. Each and every one of them has their own skills. Your objective is to move your hero through three different levels or steps and then proceed to the final stage with a diabolical Diablo.
...Diablo 3 is as good as its predecessors and with more enhanced user interface and added chat codes it has become much more addictive that any other version available yet in the market. But do remember playing Diablo 3 requires some patience and hardcore gamin skills which can help you get past other amateur players hoping to break the bar set by veteran Diablo players.
The article ends with a link to a dead D3 forum with troll links to non-existent D3 hacks, which seems strangely appropriate, given the overall quality of the presentation.
The number of submissions to our Diablo III wallpaper gallery waxes and wanes, and with no new source material from Blizzard for a while, the gallery saw just one new addition over the past week. It’s a nice piece though, with HolyKnight returning to his Fiery Runes series, this time featuring the concept art of a mysterious monster known only as the Mistress of Pain. Click it. Love it.
You might have read through the Diablo 3 Basics page and every single article, interview and panel in the Media Coverage Archive, but you will still find that there are so many things that Blizzard have not said about Diablo 3 yet. We could give all this information out if we just had the right question to ask Blizzard…
Are you at all interested in getting your questions through to the D3 Team? We have started an “Ask Blizzard” thread in the Diablo 3 forum, and we want your ponderings, opinions and questions!
Bookmark this link, and whenever you get a brilliant question to bring forward to Blizzard, share it with us!
The latest Flagship Studio refugee to find a new home is Phil Shenk. He along with Kevin Klemmick, who served as Senior Software engineer at Flagship, have formed Gravity Bear. Phil was one of the founders of the now defunct Flagship Studios and before that he was Lead Character Artist on Diablo II and Art Director on Lord of Destruction. If his name sounds familiar for other reasons it’s because Shenk the Overseer is named after him although he’s not a whip cracking disciplinarian like his namesake.
Gravity Bear is yet to announce any titles in production.
Lycos has posted their list of the most searched-for games and toys for 2008, and as you might expect, Diablo III is high on the list. D3 was the 4th most searched-for video game of 2008, which is pretty impressive when you consider how far we still are from release, or even beta testing. World of Warcraft came in 6th, for comparison. Here are the top 5 games; see the Lycos 50 page for the full list of search terms in games, toys, and various other categories.
Blizzard just put up this ad, and if you have some serious experience in making computer or video games and want to join the Blizzard crew, you can get a job with the boys in blue!
 Blizzard Quote: |
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| Senior 3D Environment Artist
The Diablo III team is looking for a senior 3D environment artist skilled at creating models and texture maps for both architectural and natural environments. The ideal candidate has experience modeling and texturing assets for a diverse visual range of environments. A solid grasp of form, color, and light for both 2D and 3D art assets is essential. The senior environment artist must have experience mentoring a team and have a skill in another art task as well (illustration, modeling, texturing, animation, or concept drawing) and be well-versed in related tools—Maya, Photoshop, etc. The ideal candidate works well in an environment of peers who are passionate about making great games. Blizzard Entertainment offers a fun, creative, and technically rewarding environment with excellent compensation and a full range of benefits. Requirements
Pluses
Please send demo reel and descriptions as well as a cover letter, resume, and salary history in separate Word format documents to . Please list this job and your name in the subject line. Basic Tips for Resume/Demo Submission No calls or follow-up emails, please. This is a full-time position in Irvine, California. |
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| Blizzard Quote: (Source) |
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| How long has the game been in the works? Almost six years. Although I've been working on it for almost three. In my team there are a few guys who have been involved the whole time, but the majority of the team has been involved for two to three years. Is this in part because of the creative issues that had to be resolved earlier in the project? Yeah. I think the first issue... I can't speak much about Blizzard North because its before my time, but one of the biggest issues was that because of the values of Blizzard in general its really hard to have an external creative group, separate from the core group. There's too much that's done; sound, cinematics and story - so much of its done at core Blizzard HQ that they learnt the lesson that all groups should be internal. That's the only way that all the philosophy gets passed on. That's the conclusion they came to when they tried to bring Blizzard North into the main HQ arena. I think they offered 46 of the 49 positions... to move down. It wasn't that they didn't want Blizzard North involved, it was that they said "you guys don't function well away from us". So a lot of the team came down. Since then, we've had creative struggles... trying to find a game worthy of the Diablo 3 name. |
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Blizzard offered up a generous single dungeon demo at the event, which inevitably became a playground of charnel pursuits for the hundreds of attendees that managed to score a playthrough. It wouldn’t be Diablo without fully randomized dungeons. During our three playthroughs, the game generated a unique dungeon every time, with few reoccurrences. And just looking at the dozens of monitors around us, we knew immediately what everybody’s favorite class was. The Wizard, which Blizzard unveiled only an hour before…
Prefixes - One of the biggest parts of Diablo 2 is under way to be fixed.
There has also been several other minor updates like that of the Giant Mosquito and Mephisto, and there has been updates by a few more people as well. For both the wikis, we should all thank Widus, HegemonKhan, Asteria, Mrguy, RedSky, Jeda, Milkman and IchiroMihara for taking time out to help the rest of us with keeping all the Diablo info up to date!
For the whole of November, the updates have been too many to list here, but some of the major updates have been:
Magic - Such a simple word contains SO much knowledge.
Barbarian skills - Smash things up!
Monsters - Updates include two new monsters! Unburied and Malformed
03/12