Everybody Look Surprised - Diablo III Delayed Again.

[GreyLord]

I think they'll have a decent amount of sales, but I think they killed 1/3 of their sales by making it online only (MMO in all but name). Let's hope the AH can make it up for them.

The problem is that for the past 4 years most of their players that they had interactions with were online only for the most part, and the person they have in charge really only dealt with online...so his perceptions of what made Diablo and Diablo 2 good...were HEAVILY influenced by that factor instead of what made the Diablo SP and Open Battlenet/intranet type games so popular. He didn't have any XP in it so he just about discounted them as important at all.

So, probably decent sales, but if they sell 4 mil, I think they could have sold 6 mil instead. If they sell 5 mil, I think they could have sold 7.5 mil instead. I think they understand their online audience and will sell in fine numbers to them...but they've lost a sizeable (note, that only means a large portion, they still have another large portion that will still buy it) portion of those that were not primarily online players only.

 

[jmucchiello]

Oh, please. D3 has not been in ACTIVE development for 12 years. More like 2-3 years at the most. They were sidetracked by WoW for most of those years. Fans may have been clamoring for D3 ever since D2 was released. But they didn't publicly mention working on D3 until a couple years ago. This delay is not bad management. It is good management: they are not releasing a bad game. They are fixing it before they release. So many so-called "well managed" games come out and feel like Beta products that the end users get to beta test for $50. This is the right way to do it: Right, the first time.

 

[Steel_Wind]

Totally agree. Blizzard is the only Quadruple A developer. They achieve that status because they take the time to work and polish and work and poish their games more than any other software developer in the world.

It is a luxury that comes with their earlier successes, but it is not an accident. It is a by-product of shrewd choices at the management level.

My guess is that this also probably has something to do with the console version as well -- but whatever the case, If Blizzard thinks something isn't right and they need to make it better -- they are almost always right and they should do so.

Whatever the case, I'll buy it. And yes, I'll buy it even if there is an active internat connection required. Blizzard has a right to be paid for their premium work, and without heavy handed online protection, that won't happen to the degree it deserves to. So I'm just fine with that.

 

[Impeesa]

It does not seem to me like the delay has anything whatsoever to do with coding or coding speed. From the article, it seems like what is being overhauled is the game mechanics. I cannot imagine that it is a trivial undertaking to dissassemble major parts of a game, put them back together in a different way, and then have the balance be the same, as well as there being no bugs.

Well, it sounds a lot like they just sort of moved things around. Identify and Town Portal are now activated via UI buttons rather than items, but the code implementing them probably hasn't changed. That's not a huge deal, really. Same goes for most of the other items on the list (the stat shuffling, as you note, will require some re-balancing). Other than that, others have covered it pretty much completely - this isn't a Duke Nukem Forever team, this is a Blizzard team. They've been working on this for several years, no doubt, but far from 12, and their development model has always been to keep refining over as many iterations as it takes to be satisfied with the product.

 

[Hand of Evil]

Figure when it is all said and done, I will be playing it on my iPad.

To me this delay means failure at some level, sure people will buy it and it will make a lot of money but gone are the days of Blizzard being king of the hill. People were already ticked that you had to be on-line to play Diablo 3, add to that all the state of the art games that have made it to market while Diablo 3 was still being devoloped, now another delay.

 

[Umbran]

...gone are the days of Blizzard being king of the hill.

Because, you know, WoW is making so little money, clearly,they are peasants, not kings!

add to that all the state of the art games that have made it to market while Diablo 3 was still being devoloped, now another delay.

Blizzard has never been about "state of the art" in terms of technology, graphics, or the like. They've always been about having the best game-play.

 

[Hand of Evil]

Because, you know, WoW is making so little money, clearly,they are peasants, not kings!

Yep, it is the number 1 at 10 million+ users and it has been out from 2004.
Things to think about:

• Cost of maintenance & upkeep for WoW
• Expansion of WoW
• Other games wanting some of that market
• R&D for Diablo 3 and other games, including support

Somewhere cost and profit start to change places.

Blizzard has never been about "state of the art" in terms of technology, graphics, or the like. They've always been about having the best game-play.

True, replay ablity has always been key with their games but like George Lucas you can lose the magic. Does not mean people stop flocking to your product, they just don't see you the same way.

Also, don't forget BlizzCon got cancelled this year, so they could focus on getting products out.

Just saying that there is some choas in Blizzard...maybe they can correct it, maybe I am reading too much into it.