"I enjoyed the Wizard the most of the three characters available in the Blizzcon build. That’s no guarantee of long term fun though, since the characters are kind of apples to pomegranates at low levels.I enjoyed Barbarians in D2, but not until level 24, or 30, or really, 60ish. Late game Barbarians were a lot of fun, with powerful, fast skills, good equipment, etc. I found them very tedious early on, when they could do nothing but swing swing swing single-target, melee style. I wasn’t bored w..."

"Q: Diablo III looks set to be a success given the large fan base the series already has, but how do you intend to draw in new players who have never experienced the original two?

Frank Pearce: It's just one of those things where we have to abide by our philosophy of making a game accessible, 'Easy to learn, hard to master', I know we say that all the time but it's true. If you make the entry level experience accessible and introduce the concepts gradually to the player they learn how to p..."

"After so many years of painful anticipation, details about Diablo III start to pop up from everywhere and fans are delighted. However, not all news is good news (at least not for the more hardcore players)."

"new version of the multiplayer browser Battle.Net will debut with Starcraft II. How will it be superior to the previous version? Well, it'll be able to hit you up for money.

During a BlizzCon 08 panel discussion, Diablo 3 director Jay Wilson said, "We are looking to monetize Battle.Net so that we get to keep making these games and updating features. We kind of have to.” Blizzard wants to avoid putting in a subscription but yes, some as-yet-unknown features will cost money."

"UGO: I have to ask this...since I’m a girl...I like the whole gender choice thing this time. How did that choice come about? Was it a fan request?

RP: That was something we just felt like we wanted to do. Another goal of Diablo III...I kind of jokingly said that we want to actually add RPG elements to it, because a lot of people always joked in the past that Diablo‘s not really an RPG. So it was something that, Ok. Can we add RPG story elements to the game and still keep the action t..."

"When I first saw Diablo III in action, my initial thought was, "How is this different?" Now, having played the game I realize that it isn't all that different, and it doesn't really have to be. It's got upgraded graphics, a new leveling system, and some new classes, but this is still Diablo, and that has never been a bad thing. If it was the sort of game we got a new installment of every year than it would certainly be less impressive, but with it being seven years since we've entered this wo..."

"Blizz-Con 2008 has begun today and one of the games being proudly shown off is Diablo 3. Console gamers shouldn't ignore the news about this game, though, because the action RPG might hit your gaming platforming of choice someday, too."

"In the playable BlizzCon demo the Wizard begins with a Charged Bolt spell, with Frost Nova, Tornado and Blizzard Return attacks appearing in the list of skills."

"One of them most annoying parts about Diablo II was the death mechanic - every time you died, you had to run all the way back from town. Fortunately, things are going to be a little different for Diablo III."

"Gearbox has modeled the adventuring and questing after the likes of Diablo and the shooting after Halo. So you can pretty much bet that a lot of questing in Borderlands will render loot-runs and adventuring much like Diablo III."

"Images attached / in link"

"

quote Anonymous source

[Starcraft 2] is still being worked on, but only by a minuscule amount of people compared to what [Blizzard] put on the Diablo 3 team.

This has yet to be confirmed officially by Blizzard, and I personally doubt they will respond. Because this information was leaked unintentionally through a casual conversation with one of our staff members, we can not reveal the name of our source publicly - so to protect this individual and his/her position within Blizzard. Nor can ..."

"Improved Battle.net In-Game Functionality
Any quote from Blizzard clearly states that while they won't talk much about Battle.net 2.0, we will be blown away or be very impressed. It's a given that all current features for Battle.net will be included - and improved! Blizzard has said they have learned a lot from WoW on infrastructure, and features from WoW will definitely also be seen. So Battlenet 2.0 WILL feature:

* Excellent Ping
* Channels and Chat in-game
* Ladders and R..."

"According to lead “Diablo III” designer Jay Wilson, the team has to appease an “extremely broad audience” as well as hardcore fans.

“Up until fairly recently, ‘Diablo II’ was Blizzard’s best-selling game,” Wilson recently told me when I asked him just who “Diablo” fans are. “‘World of Warcraft‘ has finally surpassed it, but it took it several years to do that. And part of the reason is how approachable the game is.”

Keeping the game approachable is key for Wilson. “It’s one of the reaso..."

""Looks like after a barrage of folks whacking Blizzard servers, taking them offline several times, all the tickets for the upcoming BlizzCon expo have been sold. Blizzard is holding the event on October 10th and 11th at the Anaheim Convention Center (in Anaheim, CA). Tickets were $100 dollars a piece and there is no word on how many were sold.

What we do know for sure is that we have been offered two press passes for the event and will bring you the latest coverage from the expo as it unfo..."

Tracey John, over at MTV got a chance to go over some fan re-creations from the Diablo III trailer with lead designer, Jay Wilson. These re-creations were all touched up via Photoshop and it's noted even by Jay that these are not done via the game engine and to keep that in mind as some things done cannot be actually reproduced in game (ie: lighting).

Jay points out quite a few flaws with the fan images. Some major points include mundane and repetitive textures and lighting which makes eve...

"“Eventually, our plans are for the Achievement system to become an account-based system,” [lead “World of Warcraft” designer Jeff Kaplan] explained.

When the new Blizzard Accounts are active, a player’s ‘WoW’ points can be added to an overall score dubbed an account holder’s “Blizzard Level.” “It’s basically a gamerscore,” Kaplan said, when I made reference to Xbox Live’s Achievement system. “For now the points are just a ‘WoW’ character score. As we graduate to that Blizzard Account syste..."

"Some would argue that D3 takes place 20 years after the events of Diablo II - in a happy, joyful world where cute/cuddly bunnies hop around with butterflies in golden-green-meadows under rainbows of bliss. But honestly, this is Diablo: the very word means "devil" in Spanish. It HAS to have demonic creatures, hellish baddies, and dark, creepy themes. Blizzard certainly hasn't forgotten that. Sanctuary ain't no Azeroth, and D3 ain't no WoW 2!"

"[It] won't be appearing on consoles. Well, it's not planned. When asked, Pardo stops well short of slamming the door. "I think it's theoretically possible. It would have some control changes that I think you'd have to make... You'd need to think about a lot of the point-and-click spells, like point to area-of-effect, or things like line-damage in this direction. Target selection is something you're going to lose on console, you're really going to be able to do targeting direction, but not spe..."

We had our first taste of Diablo III and already 2600 people are complaining about the direction in which Blizzard has gone with their artistic style for the third installment.

The petition mainly claims that what was shown in the Diablo III videos is a lot brighter and colorful and not enough darkness and evil is present, comparing it to the likes of Word of Warcraft'ed style art.

Personally, as a Diablo fan, I found the style of Diablo II to be pretty impressive. You want darker? wear...

"Blizzard COO Paul Sams has suggested that there is the possibility of bringing Diablo 3 to the console market, but suggested that he would want to see console gamers able to play against PC players. "One question mark I have is whether the console owners would allow PC players to play against console gamers." says Sams, "I think the answer gets a lot easier if the console owners say yes. But at the moment they do like to have closed systems.""

Some lovely wallpapers for Blizzard's Diablo III have popped up and are yours for the taking.

With any luck, Diablo III should be out by the 2009 holiday season, as the game's VP of design Rob Pardo has said they typically announce a game a year to a year and a half before it comes out, though this sometimes doesn't work out.