Items tagged with Diablo III
Earlier today, a leak pertaining to Diablo IV hinted that the game would feature an even darker and grittier tone with a few winks and nods to Diablo 2. Well, Blizzard today at BlizzCon 2019 officially announced Diablo IV, which it confirms will have "dark, visceral gameplay" that will appease longtime fans. If you recall, the last installment in the franchise, Diablo III, landed on store shelves way back in 2012. Seven years later, Diablo IV lurches forward with a new adventure complete with fresh adversaries and plenty of treasure to track down. "True to the franchise’s roots, Diablo IV will deliver visceral combat, gruesome and varied monsters, an epic hunt for legendary loot,...
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Nintendo has announced a special edition Switch bundle that fans of the video game Diablo III will want to take notice of. The Diablo III bundle isn't a normal console with the game bundled in as Sony did with the Red Dead Redemption 2 PS4 Pro bundle; this console gets some cool graphics to set it apart from the other Switch consoles out there. This bundle will be exclusive to GameStop locations and will set you back $359.99. That much loot gets gamers a Switch in two tones of gray with the dock featuring Diablo III artwork engraved in light gray on a darker gray background. The Switch has a dark gray body with lighter gray controllers and Diablo III artwork on the back. A red and gray Diablo...
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It has been twenty years since the release of Diablo, and Blizzard is celebrating with some very special new content. The team is recreating the original Diablo inside Diablo 3: Reaper of Souls with its "The Darkening of Tristram” update. The forthcoming update was announced at BlizzCon 2016. The Darkening of Tristram will offer a sixteen-level dungeon with the four main bosses from Diablo. The name of the bosses have not been clarified yet. There is speculation, however, that they will be the Butcher (Level 2), King Leoric (Level 3), Archbishop Lazarus (a secret lair adjacent to Level 15), and Diablo or the “Lord of Terror”. The art style is reminiscent of the original game and comes with...
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Can't get enough hell raising fun in Diablo III? You'll be devishly delighted to know the game's first expansion pack is on the horizon. Blizzard says Diablo III: Reaper of Souls will debut on March 25 for both Windows and Mac platforms, and while that requires a little bit of patience on your part, you can pre-order a digital copy right away. There are two versions up for grabs, the Digital Standard Edition for $40 and the Digital Deluxe Edition for $60. The $20 premium gets you a "wealth of in-game goodies," such as a collection of exclusive helm - and weapon-transmogrification recipes to help distinguish your hero, a loyal Spectral Hound minion, three additional character slots, an in-game...
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Blizzard was very forthcoming in admitting that Diablo III is "not living up to its full potential" in terms of the co-op experience, adding that "it can often feel not worth the effort" to jump into multiplayer when playing solo "can often feel easier and more efficient." If you feel the same way, you'll be happy to know that co-op was a major point of focus in the latest patch (version 1.0.8). One of the multiplayer improvements Blizzard introduces in version 1.0.8 is the ability to specify a "matching tag" for Public Games. In addition to selecting a difficulty, quest, and MP level, gamers can also select a tag that will identify what kind of gameplay they're looking for, such as Questing,...
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The first gameplay footage of Diablo III on the PS3 has surfaced, as well as screenshots of the PS4 version. Blizzard has confirmed that the game will come to both consoles as part of a partnership with Sony. The console versions will feature four player split-screen multiplayer and all the updates Blizzard has released for the PC version of the game through Patch 1.07. The company has also confirmed that it'll keep D3 up to date on both platforms as it evolves the game further. There's some interesting potential here. Diablo III was a DirectX 9 title, and the PS3 version of the game will likely keep that feature set. The PS4, on the other hand, could adopt a more advanced engine with DirectX...
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Three days ago, EA launched the latest version of SimCity. Opinions of the game itself have varied widely. Pre-launch reviews were generally positive, though a number of publications criticized the heavy reliance on multiplayer, small city sizes, and the fact that other players can deliberately sabotage hours of careful work. All other characteristics, however, have been overshadowed by the game's disastrous launch performance. How bad is it? Bad enough to make Diablo 3's launch look good. To date, EA has disabled online features, forced the game to run slowly, and implemented login queues. It hasn't delayed plans to launch the game in more areas, and sure enough, gamers in those countries are...
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Guild Wars 2 Developer Slows Digital Sales, Takes High Road As Server Load Affects Player Experience
It takes real guts to pull the plug on your game sales when you're concerned about server stability, but that's exactly what Arena.net has done with its just-launched game, Guild Wars 2. According to company spokesperson Rubi Bayer, "Ensuring the best possible play experience for our fans is our highest priority. We’ve said before that we would be willing to temporarily disable first-party digital sales if we felt our high player concurrency may compromise player experiences. We have now reached that point. Effective immediately we have disabled sales via buy.guildwars2.com. To be clear, box and digital sales are still available via our retail partners. We are tracking our concurrency closely...
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Blizzard announced yesterday that its popular Battle.net service has been compromised. The company's investigation is ongoing, but Blizzard has released some early details on what's been taken and what the theft means for its users. First off, the company doesn't believe any credit card information, Paypal addresses, or similar data was seized. No billing addresses or real names have been accessed, either. What was taken includes: Email addresses for non-Chinese Battle.net users Personal security questions and answers Information related to Mobile and dial-in Authenticators Cryptographically hashed passwords Those last two items are worrisome, and Blizzard's Mike Morhaime addresses it directly,...
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Diablo III isn't just a game -- it's a sequel, a social service, and a financial experiment all wrapped up in one. We've discussed the game's structure and balance in our extensive preview as well as its security problems earlier this week. Diablo III will likely go down as one of the most polarizing games of 2012. What follows is a detailed examination of the game's best attributes and a frank discussion of its failures. Sometimes Michael Bay gives us Transformers, sometimes Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Yeah, it's kinda like that......
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At 12:01 AM this morning, Diablo III launched. Normally, at this point, I pontificate. I write a bit about the game, share some pithy comments, and offer some well-reasoned considerations of salient points. I'm a journalist. It's what I do. But my priorities have changed, and you're going to have to deal with that. Alternately, you can read my amazingly good preview. But really, you should be playing by now. Why are you still reading? Are you blind? Did your PC freeze? Do I need to draw you a picture? Fine. Here's a picture. Diablo III is OUT. PS - Dave? I'll be back in the office....on the 22nd. Month to be determined. Hold my calls, and please come by periodically to drop off tasty snacks and...
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If it's been a long an stressful work week and you're in need of a hack-n-slash fix before starting it all anew on Monday, Blizzard has some good news. Diablo III will be available as an open beta this weekend starting today (Friday, April 20) at 12:01 PM PDT and going until Monday morning (April 23) at 10:00 AM PDT. "We're pleased to announce the Diablo III open beta weekend, which offers open access to all players with a valid Battle.net account!," Blizzard said in a blog post. "Beginning this Friday everyone is invited to log in and help us put the game and servers through their paces in this three day stress test as we march toward the game's release on May 15." The open beta will let you...
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Diablo III's long-awaited launch date has finally been unveiled; gamers can expect copies of the game to go on sale May 15. The game is available for pre-purchase and, as we previously discussed, can be had for free if you're willing to sign up for a year of World of Warcraft. The game will launch internationally at 12:01 AM with copies available in the US, Canada, Europe, South Korea, Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau. A Latin American / Russian launch will follow a few weeks later, on June 7th. The amount of translation work going into the game is truly impressive; D3 will be translated into Latin American Spanish, Brazilian, Portugese, French, German, European...
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What a difference a couple of weeks make. About this time two weeks ago, U.K. games retailer GamePlay was listing Diablo III's release date as February 3, 2012, and there was at least one Best Buy brick and mortar location with a Diablo III advert announcing availability on February 1, 2012, plenty of time to get your hack and slash on before switching gears into Mr. (or Ms.) romantic for Valentine's Day. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like either of those release dates will pan out. "While working on Diablo III we've been called out for messing around with systems too much, that the game is good as-is and we should just release it," game director Jay Wilson said on in a blog post on Battle.net....
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Diablo fans were equally disappointed and miffed when Blizzard announced back in September 2011 that it was delaying the release of the franchise's third major installment, Diablo III, into "early 2012." Blizzard was apologetic about the delay, though said in a statement that despite hoping to launch the game in 2011, the publisher "never committed to it." Fair enough, but Blizzard did commit to early 2012, and it looks as though everything is on track. U.K. games retailer GamePlay lists Diablo III being released on February 3, 2012, shipping in plenty of time for Valentine's Day, assuming your significant other would prefer a PC game to a box of candy hearts. Granted, we wouldn't want to bet...
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At Blizzcon this weekend, Blizzard Entertainment dropped a bombshell—commit to signing up for a year of World of Warcraft, and you can have the upcoming, hotly-awaited Diablo III for free. For WoW subscribers, it's a great deal—Blizzard is giving the game to people in exchange for a promise to do what they were going to do anyway. The true genius of the offer is that it's also attractive to Diablo fans. Buy Diablo III for $59.99, and receive a year of World of Warcraft for just $9.99 a month. It's a great offer either way—but it's also a sign that Blizzard is becoming concerned about the long-term staying power World of Warcraft. During Activision's Q2 conference call in early...
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Blizzard's Blizzcon has wrapped up, and we've gathered up the best of the goodies to discuss them with you. There were major unveils for all three Blizzard 'verse's (and a new game announced)—whether you're a WoW player, Starcraft fan, or anxious for Diablo III, there's updates and goodies to review. New Warcraft Expansion: Mists of Pandaria The Pandaran race began life as an April Fool's joke; Blizzard originally unveiled them as a 5th playable race for Warcraft III. The positive response from fans was tremendous—so much so that Chris Metzen, Warcraft's Lore Keeper, began to write them into the universe. Over the last nine years, Pandaran have occupied a fringe position in the Warcraft...
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It isn't our intention to rub salt in the wounds of Diablo fans who missed out on participating in the Diablo III closed beta program, but while those lucky gamers are getting their next-generation hack-and-slash on, everyone else will have to wait until next year. Blizzard made the unfortunate announcement that Diablo III is officially being delayed until early 2012. "With every game we make, the temptation is always very strong to launch as soon as possible. However, we didn't put so many years of work into Diablo III to release a game that was almost ready," said Mike Morhaime, CEO and co-founder of Blizzard Entertainment. "The beta test is going very well, and we look forward to making the...
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The Diablo III closed public beta has begun. Earlier, Blizzard had opened the "Friends and Family" beta, but now, it is selecting players from those who opted in to the Diablo III beta via their Battle.net accounts. Note, that won't mean everyone will get a beta key. Some will, but many will not. In addition, Blizzard will be providing keys through beta promotions and giveaways. The closed public beta is so new, there aren't even any beta keys being auctioned on eBay ... yet. Truthfully, we fully expect there to be beta key auctions, soon. And there may be plenty of takers. Based on what Blizzard says on its site, if you haven't received a beta key in your email (beware of phishesrs) or...
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Blizzard's size and success have allowed it to remain one of the only major developers still focused exclusively on the PC, but new job openings posted on the company's website could indicate a multi-platform future. The new opportunities are all related to Diablo III; Blizzard is looking for programmers, designers, and quest script authors. Blizzard's Diablo III community manager Bashiok posted the following in response to various questions and concerns. As some of you may have seen over on the Diablo III home page, we’re currently exploring a Diablo-related concept for consoles. As we’ve said in the past, with proper care the gameplay could suit the console platform, and we’re...
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It's true! It had been widely anticipated that Blizzard was set to announced Diablo III at WWI, and on Saturday it happened. Naturally, Blizzard is tight-lipped about a release date, but based on the amount of time they've been working on Starcraft II, it's no time soon. Blizzard's already set up an official site (linked). Go there to see (and hear): The cinematic teaser trailer shown at the 2008 Worldwide Invitational A 20-minute gameplay demo video More than 60 screenshots and pieces of concept art Deckard Cain's journal, narrated by Deckard Cain himself And much, much more Watch the teaser trailer: Check out the gameplay footage here:Part 1: Part 2:...
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