The Long Wait is Almost Over: Diablo III Arrives on May 15th

Mar 24, 2012

I consider the Diablo series of PC games one of my top gaming experiences of all time. Diablo was released in 1996 by Blizzard Entertainment, who has gone on to become a gaming juggernaut with the Warcraft and Starcraft series.

As one of the earliest online RPGs, Diablo was very addictive. It was Gamespot’s game of the year in 1996, and is also their number one PC game of all time. Our hero appears in the humble town of Tristram, where he meets Deckard Cain (“Stay awhile, and listen!”) and sets off on a path that will take him through Heaven and Hell.

This was the first game that inspired me to play it again once I had finished it. It wan not extremely difficult to finish, but it wasn’t easy either. The cool thing was playing the whole game as a different class, or playing over and over to see what special gear you could find. In the end, you defeat Diablo and lodge his soulstone in your own skull in an attempt to trap him forever. Most people would consider that pretty dumb, but hey you are an action hero, not Einstein.

Then in 2000, Diablo II was released. There were now five classes, the Amazon, Necromancer, Barbarian, Sorceress, and Paladin. You had four acts to hack and slash your way through, defeating first Mephisto and then Diablo. The expansion, Lord of Destruction, added a fifth act in which you had to defeat Baal. This expansion has one of the most memorable intro cut scenes in the history of PC Gaming.

Deckard Cain was again there to guide you through the battles with the minions of hell. The game introduced multiplayer through a new internet service called Battlenet, which would go on to host the most popular MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) of all time: World of Warcraft. Many of the mechanics introduced in Diablo II and its expansion made their way into WOW (World of Warcraft) when it was introduced several years later.

After Diablo II, Blizzard seemed to forget about the series as they concentrated their efforts on WOW. You could still play Diablo II on Battlenet, in fact you still can, all for free. Diablo II still has millions of players and it was one of the top selling PC games of 2008, years after its initial release. For years now, they have promised that Diablo III was in development, but we fans never knew if it was ever really going to happen or not.

It is finally happening, and Diablo III will be released on May 15^th. The preorder price is $59.99 from Blizzard, which will give you the ability to download and play immediately on release day. In a clever (or desperate) marketing ploy, Blizzard will give you the game for free if you sign up for a year of WOW service. The subscription based gaming services are proving to be a death knell to the MMORPG market, and even World of Warcraft is feeling the pinch as people decide they have better things to do with their cash than pay a monthly subscription fee to play a game.

Good news for fans though, in keeping with the Diablo tradition, Diablo III will not be a subscription fee based service. It will continue to be free to play. Instead, they are adding an auction house. Two auction houses actually, one based on game gold and one beased on real cash money. Yes, you will be able to auction off and purchase rare items for cold hard cash, of which Blizzard will take a cut of course. You will also be able to sell off your gold for cash to other players if you want to. This is an extreme annoyance in WOW, so Blizzard embraced it in Diablo III and made it part of the game experience. Now the thousands of children in the world who were previously forced to spend countless hours farming gold to be sold on Ebay will be able to indirectly make money for Blizzard as well, right in the game. Those guys at Blizzard are always thinking, that’s for sure.

The official storyline for Diablo III is:

Two decades have passed since the demonic lords, Diablo, Mephisto, and Baal, set out across the world of Sanctuary on a vicious rampage, twisting humanity to their unholy will. Yet for those who battled the Prime Evils, the memory fades slowly.

When Deckard Cain returns to the ruins of Tristram Cathedral seeking clues to defeat new stirrings of evil, a fiery harbinger of doom falls from the heavens, striking the very ground where Diablo once entered the world. This fire from the sky reawakens ancient evils and calls the heroes of Sanctuary to defend the mortal world against the rising powers of the Burning Hells once again.

The classes in Diablo III are the Witch Doctor, Barbarian, Wizard, Monk, and the Demon Hunter. Diablo III will also introduce a PVP (Player vs Player) system and arena combat, as made popular in WOW. This won’t make the original release though, it will be introduced later. The single player and coop modes will be there. There promises to be random quests to go along with the standard ones, so that the gaming experience can be different for every player.

I’m really looking forward to the release of Diablo III. Just considering all that Blizzard has learned about game development and MMORPGing over the years really makes this potentially one of the best games ever, but we won’t know until May.

Hurry up May 15^th.