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Diablo 3

12K views 42 replies 19 participants last post by  SnowOwl 
#1 ·
Anyone played it yet? Mines in the mail, I used to play D2 like crazy in 6th grade, was the main reason I learned how to type well ;)

I've heard of some issues with getting it to run and server instability... Really hoping I don't have to download a typical 20GB Blizzard patch once I get it installed...
 
#5 ·
I agree. I'm not quite sure what the point of shipping a CD/DVD set with only a serial key but leaving the content to be retrieved from the server. The game client already authenticates with battle.net in order to combat single player piracy. The whole point of an on-line distribution model is to eliminate physical distribution and retail overhead and the whole point of still having physical retail distribution is to reduce bandwidth consumption for both the users and game developer's servers. It saves them no money to not include the majority of the game content with the retail package.

This model literally takes the worst of both but gains hardly any of the benefits of either.
 
#6 ·
The even bigger problem, which people are complaining about, is that Blizzard is cutting out all the businesses that could potentially sell the full game client. The lost revenue for small to medium business is pretty substantial.

I don't know all the details, so this may be completely inaccurate. I read something about it today and was pretty disappointed in their poor choice of economy stimulation considering they're one of the biggest game developers out there.
 
#7 ·
why would you not just order the digital copy?

I had it DL'ed completely like 2 weeks ago, fully installed at 8am like 18 hours before servers went live.

They had alot of downtime yesterday, and servers were extremely busy for the first 4 hours of opening night.

I've still had PLENTY of time to play, plus Blizz has gotten REALLY good at this kind of stuff. Very soon downtime will be to regular maintenance only, they know what is expected. They've been doing multiplayer games (not single player games put on the internet) for like 20 years.

Nothing is out of the ordinary for Blizzard on this one.

*pretty sure you can still go dL the whole game client and then just authenticate it when your key gets here.
 
#9 ·
I bought it with an Amazon gift-card I got for my birthday, so a digital copy wasn't really an option. It is really strange how they decided to launch it - if they're not going to put content on disks, why the hell are they even selling physical copies? They could have successfully initiated the first all-digital release of a videogame. It seems like the far-future of game sales is going to shift away from retail anyways.

Either way, I'm still pretty excited. I'm fine with getting Blizzard games a few days late because the first few days are a clusterfuck anyways with launch bugs. I'll just bring my tower to a friend's house in town and let it download.
 
#12 ·
League of Legends is probably the most widespread title to date that was released all electronically. I'm not aware of any physical retail distribution of the game. Of course, this jives with its subscription-less payment model.

Anyway, I am too excited about the prospect of cutting out electronic retailers and distributors and going with online distribution. Someone made a point that this removes revenue for electronics retailers but what do those retailers really add of value to the product that justifies them existing? Nothing, it just makes the product more expensive. Making games cheaper upon release is a good thing.

This model has allowed microdevelopers to come into existence and start to thrive. $1-10 games with amazing content coming from small, 1 to 5 man game studios are available on Steam now that the retail market would have destroyed because of the way physical retail distribution and retail works now are available on mobile and pc desktop platforms. I bought a game called "Limbo" for $3 which had about 2-3 hours of content and probably was more creative and had better thought out gameplay than the turds that used to retail for $50 that were nothing more than unoriginal, rehashed Quake clones in the mid to late 90's. These developers can sell these games at this cost without worrying about having a big publisher and still make lots of money for themselves all because the process is streamlined and cheap.

The music industry is going through a similar phase and the RIAA is having none of it. Let's hope something similar doesn't roadblock the gaming industry.

I may hold off on D3 for a few more days.
 
#10 ·
It's good.. better once you hit level 10 with any character. I would agree with some that no skill points to spend is a bit saddening as I do enjoy different builds in Path of Exile, however each game is enjoyable to play for their different aspects for a dungeon crawler :)
 
#11 ·
I bought it the day it came out and have not had any issues at all. Only thing I can think of so far is a few very short server lag issues that happened once or twice. Nothing to fret about.

I dont know what is everyone referring to as "game content" but I would think that most everything is stored on the physical disc including "game content" because the total installation is 15GB. What the servers are probably used for is to keep track of character progression (level,items,quest completion, etc...) which is relatively low data rates
 
#13 ·
This stuff is pretty old news. I only physically bought the first iteration of WoW, since then there have been like 3 xpacs, SC2, now D3. Companies like Valve have been pushing the concept with all their retail titles over Steam for quite a few years. With music this evolution has happened simultaneously but gone further with streaming. This step is as significant as any other such as from tape to cd, or cd to mp3. Sure I have a few hundred albums on my microSD card, but when my phone has service, I usually listen to Pandora.
 
#14 ·
The real reason they sell the hard copies is fanservice for the obsessive collector crowd. Those people eat that shit up, a lot of people I know buy two copies and one goes in storage in case it's ever worth something. (then it ends up with Barry on Storage Wars :cheeky4: )


I do contract work for blizzard....if you have watched any of the videos on the Diablo 3 website (trailers, game play or classes description videos) That's my work!! I hate to brag but Im really proud of some of that stuff it was a big project for me.

I keep thinking I'll buy the game but I don't want to get a new computer.
 
#20 ·
Having been playing it for about 3 weeks now, I would have to say it's pretty sweet and addictive. Like anything Blizzard produces nowadays, it does not stray far from the formula and mostly just fixes things that were annoying or petty in D2. The inclusion of deeper boss, monster and player mechanics also makes it much more of a game that requires some skill, vs a mindless grinding fest until your so high a level you just roflstomp shit.
 
#24 ·
Keepin my 60 monk conservative gearing up in Hell, mostly for gold used at the AH, Inferno is no joke.

30k HP
10.4k DPS
634 All res
5.1k Armor

The trouble is now going from someone with a few hundred k gold laying around to getting tens of millions for really top end items. I dont think I care that much.

Did a 9mile 3k'+vert hike today that was way better.
 
#27 ·
I'd be doing the same thing snowklinger, but it's been fucking raining for two weeks and we still have 6-12 feet of snow above 5000ft elevation :(. It was partly sunny yesterday so I hopped on my road bike, 15 minutes into the ride it starts downpouring. Life in N. Idaho :rolleyes:
 
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