>>>There might be a cow level, or a similar secret-level.

I thought they were strongly opposed to a cow level for DIII as it made the game way too silly than intended.  I remember some lead designer talking about it.

>>>Diablo III will bring the Diablo story to a close, but it’s not necessarily the end of the Diablo universe or series. (No, no one said anything about Diablo IV!)

The story needs some real progression, not Diablo simply coming back for the third time, whether that was Diablo’s plan all along or not.

>>>You can play every class as either male or female.

Never really cared for this as it is purely cosmetic.

>>>Even though the Art Director (Brian Morrisroe) for Diablo III left, the New Art Style (i.e. colorful) is here to stay. (Brian departed to form a startup company, incidentally.)

Art is fine.  I just wish they had better music.  DII music was okay.  DI music is still amazing, I still remember how engrossing it was for Tristram music, Lava level music, and boss level music…

>>>The game takes place in Sanctuary twenty years after the heroes from Diablo II saved the world and went mad for their troubles.

This is exactly same as DI warriors in DII.  Yawn.

>>>You’ll be able to go back to Tristram.

We already did in DII, what the hell?  At least make it go back to DII locales like Lut Golein.

>>>Anyone else wondering if Wirt will return as a grown one-legged man?

Wirt was clearly dead in DII.  We all know you can loot his dead body that gives you Wirt’s Leg which grants access to the Secret Cow Level.

I love Diablo series, I just wish they truly reinvent the game instead of doing the same with minor things.  Just look at Starcraft 2.  It’s not even a full sequel, more like a remake.  It looks the same, PLAYS exactly the same, just brought it to 3D.

Yeah, Wirt is dead. The only way he could return is as a spirit or skeleton or something. :\ Which is highly unlikely.

Response to Clair de Lune,

They never said they were strongly opposed to a cow level… they were just strongly opposed to people actually benefiting off of it (ie: running it for xp and getting nice gear.)

There will no doubt be some kind of secret level like the cow level.

I love Diablo series, I just wish they truly reinvent the game instead of doing the same with minor things.  Just look at Starcraft 2.  It’s not even a full sequel, more like a remake.  It looks the same, PLAYS exactly the same, just brought it to 3D.

So wait, you accuse Starcraft 2 of being identical to SC1 gameplay wise but ignore the whole new single-player mechanic and metric ton of story to go with it; and then you switch gears and attack Diablo 3 for having similar story elements while ignoring completely different gameplay.

Am I missing something here or is your idea of what constitutes a “non-sequel that’s mostly a remake of the previous game” changed from one unreleased game by a company to another unreleased game by the same company?

Besides, you wanted story progression for D3… Last time I checked Tyrael being a center point of the game story and direct involvement of Heaven is kinda major progression/departing from previous 2 games’ story.

@ jeremyk:
They said that they disliked how an Easter Egg in a game became one of the primary sources of gameplay, to get experience and loot. But yeah, you are right, of course they want people to get to experience Easter eggs as well as have a good time. They just don’t want a small funny thing like a “cow level” to be more significant than actual game content.

What about a Rainbow Level then? It has also been rumoured ^^

Wirt was “the peg-legged boy” in diablo I, in diablo II we all stole his other leg… Maybe he’ll come back as a 6-legged octopus!

I see what Clair de Lune is saying. D3 sometimes makes me think of Terminator 3.

T3 was basically just the 2 previous movies combined with almost no new ideas put in. The robots decide to try for a third time to go back in time and assassinate John Conner. There is absolutely nothing different in that regard. The robot vilianess was just the T1 and T2 robots combined. There was the old, obligatory truck/helichopter chase scenes…again. Arnold even got crushed again at the end.

D3 is indeed a little too much like d2 in some ways. Cain is back, we’re going back to visit Tristram again, Tristram has been destroyed then rebuilt and now being destroyed again, the heros from before go insane, etc. This is all stuff we’ve played out before.

T3 kind of sucked. I’m not saying d3 will suck; in fact, it’s going to be a great game. But it would be nice to have some VERY different stuff happening instead of the old equations of success thrown back at us.