I am surpised how many people are still interested and bitting nail & tooth for every last particle of Diablo information. I've completely lost interest in petty news, at least until Blizzard comes out and sets a release date--this is the boat I am in, and it's growing evermore crowded.
And for Diablo fans to put so much stock into every single word, of every single tweet by Blizz, is moronic. Blizzard Community Manages are snarky and indirect. If people are going to try and read between the lines, and think there is some deeper meaning in every tweet sent out by a Blizz CM, they're going to wind up pulling their hair out.
With all that said, I look forward to the supposed "update" in the coming weeks, and I expect they will release some "news" by this time next week.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"I believe in the sand beneath my toes. The beach gives a feeling, an earthy feeling. I believe in the faith that grows, And the four right chords can make me cry. When I'm with you I feel like I could die, and that would be alright"
Im (at least) as pissed as you guys are but you have to be open to the fact how 'attached' you can get to such a huge creative project. They've spend YEARS working on this game and they want it to be perfect. Im sure there are a lot of marketing/financial people at Blizzard who are pushing them to release this game.
They dont owe you anything. Be patient.
That's where feature-locks are for, so that the devs don't go crazy in their endless desire of even more perfection, and delivery dates are missed in the process. One date has been missed already in Nov/Dec 2011, and that wasn't because of missing features or lack of perfection but the Korea RMAH issue!
It wasn't because of the RMAH. How many more employee statements do you need before you'll get that?
Yes, thank you.
Some people are really purposefully obtuse when it comes to the RMAH. This is definitely for the betterment of the game, foregoing a clear foothold for all of the illegitimate misfits who ruin the game, and it will lessen hacks and bots. I don't know why people are so hellbent on battling something that is for the betterment of the game. Moreover it's a completely optional tool for a non-competitive game. I don't know what more can be said about it.
History suggests you're the odd one out here though
A list of things people have protested against when they were introduced:
- Electricity
- Internet
- Telephones
- Mobile Telephones
- Automobiles
- Television
Though obviously, in hindsight, they were right, and these were all very bad inventions that did not benefit mankind at all! ^^
Wait, what?
Your response suggest that I'm the odd one out because people dislike change and usually resist it, even though it helps civilization out in the end. But in my post I'm defending the RMAH, saying that people should accept it because it will only drive things forward and actually aid the development of Diablo.
Here in Brazil we have a band named Restart that is very popular among rich spoiled kids. They scheduled a free (!) show that they couldn't attend to and all those spoiled kids got nerd-raged and gave some interviews speaking things like:
"They don't know who they are messing with! The Restart Family won't accept this lightly!" (by an 11 year old girl)
"They'll see. I'll curse them so much in Twitter!" (by a nerdy 12 year old kid)
So, everytime I see people talking about how Blizzard is losing fans due to the lack of respect and delays, that they are ruining their reputation with everything about D3 or that they will surely regret the way they are driving this game, I can't help thinking about those Restart fans and their spoiled empty threats.
Sorry guys, but you need to chin up and remember that this is just a game and Blizzard has its way of developing games. They've done it for a while and it has always worked fine. Almost every title they released was a ground-breaking success. They know what they are doing and they are not doing anything different than the other games, all of them were delayed, all of them had suspicions and people cursing the repetitive delays and possible new mechanics that made a sequel different from the precursor.
You are much better off waiting for the game and using your time to do something else.
My thoughts exactly. Blizzard has ruined their reputation with Diablo 3, and the new cash cow pilot project, the RMAH. I bet 100:1 that it still delays the game behind this new wall of alleged game system improvements. Sorry, Jay, I just can't believe it.
Sure, Blizzard is going to make money off the RMAH, but it's better than one of the possible alternatives that would have fragmented the Diablo 3 economy. There's a market for people to buy items in the Diablo universe, that's pretty clear from the spam bots and third party sites in Diablo 2's games...
Not to mention the third largest forum on the internet, according to http://rankings.big-boards.com/ where someone created a made up digital currency that people started using years ago to facilitate Diablo 2 trades because of the lack of in-game economy. I'd much rather have Blizzard making money off of it than some guy who had nothing to do with developing the game, while also fragmenting the in-game economy into people who use that site and people who don't.
There are 54 MILLION topics in their D2 trade forums, and 258 MILLION posts... There are people invested in that digital currency and it's likely some will continue to use it, but I'd rather have more and more incentives for people to abandon that practice. I don't want that crap in Diablo 3, I want an open trade community that isn't fragmented because of their past shortcomings.
Back in the day, d2jsp was HUGE. I definitely agree that, although d2jsp added to the diablo II experience, it also took a lot away from it because it wasn't official and not everyone that played diablo II was also a member of the site.
I remember browsing on the d2jsp site more than I was actually playing the game.
Then my clan opened up their own d2jsp-esque website, and then I lost interest. Blizzard is going to benefit greatly from ensuring that the economy stays completely inside of the game, through safe and secure services (PayPal).
On a side note, I realize that bots and item selling business will plague diablo III, but it may not be as bad as before.
I could be wrong, but since there aren't any hot spots for MF farming (since all areas of the game have the same drops), it seems like item selling services won't benefit nearly as much, at least until someone comes out with a build that is able to make full game runs without ever dying.
I suppose a bot could just keep doing the same area over and over again. Either way, it may not harm the economy as much as people may think.
Personally, I don't want the game released b/c of some sense of entitlement. I don't want D3 to turn into Duke Nukem Forever or Chinese Democracy, so overdone, so over polished, so bloated, and eventually irrelevant b/c the artwork missed its rightful place in chronology. Those two works were destroyed by hubris. At some point, you leave perfection to the gods, and release what you have. Hell, having it in players' hands gives you more feedback, and you can fix problems or get new ideas quicker when there are millions of people playing it.
Basically, When It's Done is a good philosophy, compared to the buggy, unfinished messes we usually see in this industry. But at some point, you're firing your third guitarist, rewriting the core engine, and adding features that were never inteded to fit into the scope of the original project. The noodling on the rune system (to me at least) appears to be at that point. Make them drops, save ranks 6 and 7 as hard to get craft recipes, and stop. There isn't anything you can add to them right this second that is worth the extra delay. If there is something awesome you can add to them (random affixes, ranged stats, unattuned gambling), add it in a patch or the expansion.
Or they're really and trully bulls---ing everyone, and they can't get their servers working, the RMAH has cracks in it, etc. Either way, SC2 development seemed much, much smoother, and definitely had a lot more concrete, under the hood stuff that the devs discussed w/ the fans.
It wasn't because of the RMAH. How many more employee statements do you need before you'll get that?
I don't need any denials from people who work for a living at Activision Blizzard. I prefer my own sources. I know, it's shocking, but I actually think for myself.
*tin foil hat on* so blizzard is making up an elaborate story of working on game systems and even coming out next week with a big update of all the new features and changes they've been working on and of course this is all BS because the game is 100% done and its just one small country holding the global release of this game? your not thinking for yourself, your throwing all logic and reason out the window for your own delusion. lol...
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"once the pretty hardcore gamers we had testing inferno found it fairly difficult, we then we doubled it" -trolololol jay wilson
Everybody agrees that Diablo 3 should be released when the game is finished and ready to be released. Nobody wants a bugged game for $60 or more. Just because a person complains that the game isn't out yet doesn't mean that they don't want a polished product when they purchase it.
Here's the issue - why isn't it done yet??? The game was announced (not started development which happened much earlier, but announced) in 2008. The overwhelming majority of the few people lucky enough to have access to the closed beta see a very polished game. People heard from Blizzard that the game was going to be released by Nov/Dec 2011. With this information in hand, the community expects that now that we are actually in the revised release date window of "early 2012" that we should have a release date given Blizzard stated lead time of 8 weeks give or take from release date announcement to release date. The community is on edge because they've already seen one release date window go by the wayside and there is no real indication from Blizzard that this one will be any different. If anything, all of the Blizzard employees conveniently dropping the “early” from “early 2012” (like Zarhym yesterday) are giving quite the opposite indication. Given where we are on the calendar, we either need Blizzard to give us something far more specfic to believe in for a release date time frame or just officially disappoint us again and delay the game further. "We will release it when it's done" is becoming a euphemism for "we're just not meeting our own expectations of being able to get our jobs done or meet realistic deadlines". People who miss deadlines (especially when they’re setting the deadlines for themselves) get criticized for it. That’s a fact of life everywhere in the real world (not just for Blizzard and Diablo 3). You can't miss the first deadline, show little indication that you're not about to miss another deadline, and expect that everyone who's anticipation you've built up will just sit, twiddle their thumbs, be patient, and quiet. This is 2012. The monster they created needs to be fed. That's the bottom line. Deal with it, Blizzard, Deal with it, Blizzard marks.
It seems to me that the people most interested in Diablo 3's release date would be fans of Diablo 1 & 2. If you fall in to this group, then you have been a follower of Blizzard's work for more than 10 years. If this is the case, then it should stand to reason that you should recognize that Blizzard has had a long history of pushing out release dates until "it's ready" and you should be pretty familiar with Blizzard's favorite word: "soon." Conclusion? Move along, nothing to see here. No conspiracy nor failure on Blizzard's part. Just Blizzard doing what they have always done; making great games. Think of the extra development time as sort of a savings account... the longer it is worked on and allowed to mature, the more value it will have in the long run. There is a reason that many of Blizzard's older games are still played 10+ years later and it is because they put in that extra effort
I don't think blizzard could handle this d3 situation any worse than they are.
This will go down as a massive black eye for their reputation.
What the hell are you talking about? This guys tweet got blown way the hell out of proportion because a bunch of children salivating for years over every little piece of news or information they can twist into something bigger than it is. It's like these kinds of fans won't be happy unless every detail about development is revealed to the point that the game has been spoiled before it is even released. Then they'll bitch because they already know about the whole game, so nothing "feels new".
The only thing that is going to "go down as a massive black eye for their reputation" is the relentless fickleness, selfishness, and immaturity of the D3 community.
It wasn't because of the RMAH. How many more employee statements do you need before you'll get that?
I don't need any denials from people who work for a living at Activision Blizzard. I prefer my own sources. I know, it's shocking, but I actually think for myself.
Yup! Those stinkin employees at Blizzard are out to get you!!
The problem is that you aren't thinking for yourself. You read what Daeity puts on his website and take it as the gospel truth, for some unknown reason.
Love this conspiracy theory you keep throwing around. Good stuff.
Basically, When It's Done is a good philosophy, compared to the buggy, unfinished messes we usually see in this industry. But at some point, you're firing your third guitarist, rewriting the core engine, and adding features that were never inteded to fit into the scope of the original project. The noodling on the rune system (to me at least) appears to be at that point. Make them drops, save ranks 6 and 7 as hard to get craft recipes, and stop. There isn't anything you can add to them right this second that is worth the extra delay. If there is something awesome you can add to them (random affixes, ranged stats, unattuned gambling), add it in a patch or the expansion.
The rune system isn't the only thing they are working on. If you saw Force's interview with Jay Wilson, you'd know he stated that there are different teams working on different parts of the game. The guys working on runes are only a few, and now that the game is being delayed, they have more time to polish the system. Because that's their job, developing the rune system. The rest of the team are still working on everything else.
The items aren't even finalized yet, if you recall the lackluster uniques and sets they had at a stage, and the lack thereof on the D3 site at the moment. Plus, we don't even know the state of the later acts. When the beta was released, some textures were missing, some stuff didn't work properly, and the AH was released in the meanwhile. There has also been larger changes due to feedback, like followers and the Demon Hunter.
We don't really know what's going on behind the scenes, and why would you want to know what went wrong for whatever reasons?
Here's the issue - why isn't it done yet??? The game was announced (not started development which happened much earlier, but announced) in 2008. The overwhelming majority of the few people lucky enough to have access to the closed beta see a very polished game. People heard from Blizzard that the game was going to be released by Nov/Dec 2011.[/size][/color]
People heard from Blizzard that the beta will be short if everything goes smooth. The projected date was end 2011, IF they had no problems. Blizzard said that their beta periods may last up to six months, and D3 is no different. They never promised Nov/Dec 2011.
The current incarnation of Diablo 3 only started in 2005 when Blizzard North was disbanded. They announced it in 2008 and the game will come out this year, 2012. Development cycle: 7 years.
Blizzard started development on Starcrat 2 Wings of Liberty in 2003, after Warcraft 3 The Frozen Throne. The game was announced in 2007 and released 2010 after more than five and a half months of beta. Development cycle: 7 years.
Diablo 3 is quite in line with Blizzard development cycles.
You know, I don't think it will really matter what Jay Wilson has to report, people will still berate him for whatever reasons they can contrive. If he says they have made large sweeping changes, they'd be angry. If he explains in minute detail all of the fine tuning that they're doing, they'd be angry. If he decided to tell us nothing at all, they'd be angry. Some people just enjoys being angry at life, and gleen some form of pleasure out of hating things for no better reason that just to nitpick and hate.
I don't understand why some people would be thick enough to make comments like: 'Blizzard is intentionally holding back the finished game to spite me personally.' Why exactly would a company intentionally delay a finished product that would make them millions? Yes, it sounds that stupid when you actually think about it.
I apologize if this post or several of my former posts make me look like a negative nancy, but i have one question to ask. Zarhym is a diablo 3 community manager, correct? Is he a WoW community manager? Either way, I'm pretty sure he's a CM. Pardon me if I'm wrong in assuming that he is, but if he is, it's my opinion that this guy should be fired.
I honestly hope he helps out a lot with the project behind the scenes, because I haven't seen exactly what he contributes as a community manager. He's rather incompetant. I've mostly seen him trolling or writing walls of text like the ones above. If he knows what kind of fan base he is dealing with, he would know better and say very little in response to legitmate concerns. He should just reply with a few threads and be brief. He should stick to the point. Any of the diablo fan mods could easily do his job and do it in a more professional manner.
It's ok for celebrities to have a little fun with their twitter, but even they know better. Celebrities don't post on twitter for the sole purpose of getting their rocks off on writing pointless walls of text replying to people that want whatever they're selling. This is his actual job. The other Blizzard CM's do a pretty damn good job in comparison. Karune anyone? Remember his endless Q&A's he supplied to the starcraft 2 fanbase before it was released? He was excellent and professional. This Zarhym guy is a complete joke.
At least Bashiok has been somewhat forcoming and honest about the game not being ready yet and i'm not a big Bashiok fan in the first place. He deserves some credit for being professional.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Some people tell me I'm going to hell. I just let them know that I've already packed my bags!
You know, I don't think it will really matter what Jay Wilson has to report, people will still berate him for whatever reasons they can contrive. If he says they have made large sweeping changes, they'd be angry. If he explains in minute detail all of the fine tuning that they're doing, they'd be angry. If he decided to tell us nothing at all, they'd be angry. Some people just enjoys being angry at life, and gleen some form of pleasure out of hating things for no better reason that just to nitpick and hate.
I don't understand why some people would be thick enough to make comments like: 'Blizzard is intentionally holding back the finished game to spite me personally.' Why exactly would a company intentionally delay a finished product that would make them millions? Yes, it sounds that stupid when you actually think about it.
word.... another thing people are forgetting is simply that Blizzard is no longer the "small" company that we knew. They have oodles of cash from WoW and are part of a much bigger company group. For all we know, the game is finished but someone further up the pecking order is asking them to hold off a bit to make a strategic play for the bigger company. Face it, that's the relaity of the business world out there. Only when the article comes out then (hopefully) we'll get some clarification
Blizzard change your director departament !!! 4 years for 1 game? f..ck in 4 years i buid 6 bulding with 30 floors.
You're comparing architecture to game development. That's not a very smart thing to do.
Most RPGs take years to create:
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning - 3 years (not including all the previous work done on Copernicus)
Elder Scrolls Skyrim - 3 years+
Mass Effect 2 - 3 years+ (only counting from the date it was announced)
Borderlands - 3 years (shares many quilities with the Diablo franchise, even though it uses an FPS perspective)
And D3 took longer than 4 years to develop. But we all know Blizzard can get quite anal when it comes to release date, even Warcraft 3 was delayed like mad. SC2 took 7 years to develop and D3 is at that stage now.
Anyone else feel that they're cautious about releasing for 2 reasons?
1. They want to make sure they get least amount of cancellations from warcraft deal so postponing.
2. Their reaping ideas off Torchlight & Possibly Torchlight 2 forcing us to another Blizzcon announcement on the Diablo 3 surprise where we all sigh and say.... WTH release this hack n" slash already and be done with it.
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And for Diablo fans to put so much stock into every single word, of every single tweet by Blizz, is moronic. Blizzard Community Manages are snarky and indirect. If people are going to try and read between the lines, and think there is some deeper meaning in every tweet sent out by a Blizz CM, they're going to wind up pulling their hair out.
With all that said, I look forward to the supposed "update" in the coming weeks, and I expect they will release some "news" by this time next week.
It wasn't because of the RMAH. How many more employee statements do you need before you'll get that?
Your response suggest that I'm the odd one out because people dislike change and usually resist it, even though it helps civilization out in the end. But in my post I'm defending the RMAH, saying that people should accept it because it will only drive things forward and actually aid the development of Diablo.
So, I'm rather confused now.
"They don't know who they are messing with! The Restart Family won't accept this lightly!" (by an 11 year old girl)
"They'll see. I'll curse them so much in Twitter!" (by a nerdy 12 year old kid)
So, everytime I see people talking about how Blizzard is losing fans due to the lack of respect and delays, that they are ruining their reputation with everything about D3 or that they will surely regret the way they are driving this game, I can't help thinking about those Restart fans and their spoiled empty threats.
Sorry guys, but you need to chin up and remember that this is just a game and Blizzard has its way of developing games. They've done it for a while and it has always worked fine. Almost every title they released was a ground-breaking success. They know what they are doing and they are not doing anything different than the other games, all of them were delayed, all of them had suspicions and people cursing the repetitive delays and possible new mechanics that made a sequel different from the precursor.
You are much better off waiting for the game and using your time to do something else.
Back in the day, d2jsp was HUGE. I definitely agree that, although d2jsp added to the diablo II experience, it also took a lot away from it because it wasn't official and not everyone that played diablo II was also a member of the site.
I remember browsing on the d2jsp site more than I was actually playing the game.
Then my clan opened up their own d2jsp-esque website, and then I lost interest. Blizzard is going to benefit greatly from ensuring that the economy stays completely inside of the game, through safe and secure services (PayPal).
On a side note, I realize that bots and item selling business will plague diablo III, but it may not be as bad as before.
I could be wrong, but since there aren't any hot spots for MF farming (since all areas of the game have the same drops), it seems like item selling services won't benefit nearly as much, at least until someone comes out with a build that is able to make full game runs without ever dying.
I suppose a bot could just keep doing the same area over and over again. Either way, it may not harm the economy as much as people may think.
Basically, When It's Done is a good philosophy, compared to the buggy, unfinished messes we usually see in this industry. But at some point, you're firing your third guitarist, rewriting the core engine, and adding features that were never inteded to fit into the scope of the original project. The noodling on the rune system (to me at least) appears to be at that point. Make them drops, save ranks 6 and 7 as hard to get craft recipes, and stop. There isn't anything you can add to them right this second that is worth the extra delay. If there is something awesome you can add to them (random affixes, ranged stats, unattuned gambling), add it in a patch or the expansion.
Or they're really and trully bulls---ing everyone, and they can't get their servers working, the RMAH has cracks in it, etc. Either way, SC2 development seemed much, much smoother, and definitely had a lot more concrete, under the hood stuff that the devs discussed w/ the fans.
*tin foil hat on* so blizzard is making up an elaborate story of working on game systems and even coming out next week with a big update of all the new features and changes they've been working on and of course this is all BS because the game is 100% done and its just one small country holding the global release of this game? your not thinking for yourself, your throwing all logic and reason out the window for your own delusion. lol...
Here's the issue - why isn't it done yet??? The game was announced (not started development which happened much earlier, but announced) in 2008. The overwhelming majority of the few people lucky enough to have access to the closed beta see a very polished game. People heard from Blizzard that the game was going to be released by Nov/Dec 2011. With this information in hand, the community expects that now that we are actually in the revised release date window of "early 2012" that we should have a release date given Blizzard stated lead time of 8 weeks give or take from release date announcement to release date. The community is on edge because they've already seen one release date window go by the wayside and there is no real indication from Blizzard that this one will be any different. If anything, all of the Blizzard employees conveniently dropping the “early” from “early 2012” (like Zarhym yesterday) are giving quite the opposite indication. Given where we are on the calendar, we either need Blizzard to give us something far more specfic to believe in for a release date time frame or just officially disappoint us again and delay the game further. "We will release it when it's done" is becoming a euphemism for "we're just not meeting our own expectations of being able to get our jobs done or meet realistic deadlines". People who miss deadlines (especially when they’re setting the deadlines for themselves) get criticized for it. That’s a fact of life everywhere in the real world (not just for Blizzard and Diablo 3). You can't miss the first deadline, show little indication that you're not about to miss another deadline, and expect that everyone who's anticipation you've built up will just sit, twiddle their thumbs, be patient, and quiet. This is 2012. The monster they created needs to be fed. That's the bottom line. Deal with it, Blizzard, Deal with it, Blizzard marks.
That's what a lot of the community is asking from Blizzard. We haven't had an update in a long time.
What the hell are you talking about? This guys tweet got blown way the hell out of proportion because a bunch of children salivating for years over every little piece of news or information they can twist into something bigger than it is. It's like these kinds of fans won't be happy unless every detail about development is revealed to the point that the game has been spoiled before it is even released. Then they'll bitch because they already know about the whole game, so nothing "feels new".
The only thing that is going to "go down as a massive black eye for their reputation" is the relentless fickleness, selfishness, and immaturity of the D3 community.
Yup! Those stinkin employees at Blizzard are out to get you!!
The problem is that you aren't thinking for yourself. You read what Daeity puts on his website and take it as the gospel truth, for some unknown reason.
Love this conspiracy theory you keep throwing around. Good stuff.
The items aren't even finalized yet, if you recall the lackluster uniques and sets they had at a stage, and the lack thereof on the D3 site at the moment. Plus, we don't even know the state of the later acts. When the beta was released, some textures were missing, some stuff didn't work properly, and the AH was released in the meanwhile. There has also been larger changes due to feedback, like followers and the Demon Hunter.
We don't really know what's going on behind the scenes, and why would you want to know what went wrong for whatever reasons?
People heard from Blizzard that the beta will be short if everything goes smooth. The projected date was end 2011, IF they had no problems. Blizzard said that their beta periods may last up to six months, and D3 is no different. They never promised Nov/Dec 2011.
The current incarnation of Diablo 3 only started in 2005 when Blizzard North was disbanded. They announced it in 2008 and the game will come out this year, 2012. Development cycle: 7 years.
Blizzard started development on Starcrat 2 Wings of Liberty in 2003, after Warcraft 3 The Frozen Throne. The game was announced in 2007 and released 2010 after more than five and a half months of beta. Development cycle: 7 years.
Diablo 3 is quite in line with Blizzard development cycles.
You know, I don't think it will really matter what Jay Wilson has to report, people will still berate him for whatever reasons they can contrive. If he says they have made large sweeping changes, they'd be angry. If he explains in minute detail all of the fine tuning that they're doing, they'd be angry. If he decided to tell us nothing at all, they'd be angry. Some people just enjoys being angry at life, and gleen some form of pleasure out of hating things for no better reason that just to nitpick and hate.
I don't understand why some people would be thick enough to make comments like: 'Blizzard is intentionally holding back the finished game to spite me personally.' Why exactly would a company intentionally delay a finished product that would make them millions? Yes, it sounds that stupid when you actually think about it.
I honestly hope he helps out a lot with the project behind the scenes, because I haven't seen exactly what he contributes as a community manager. He's rather incompetant. I've mostly seen him trolling or writing walls of text like the ones above. If he knows what kind of fan base he is dealing with, he would know better and say very little in response to legitmate concerns. He should just reply with a few threads and be brief. He should stick to the point. Any of the diablo fan mods could easily do his job and do it in a more professional manner.
It's ok for celebrities to have a little fun with their twitter, but even they know better. Celebrities don't post on twitter for the sole purpose of getting their rocks off on writing pointless walls of text replying to people that want whatever they're selling. This is his actual job. The other Blizzard CM's do a pretty damn good job in comparison. Karune anyone? Remember his endless Q&A's he supplied to the starcraft 2 fanbase before it was released? He was excellent and professional. This Zarhym guy is a complete joke.
At least Bashiok has been somewhat forcoming and honest about the game not being ready yet and i'm not a big Bashiok fan in the first place. He deserves some credit for being professional.
word.... another thing people are forgetting is simply that Blizzard is no longer the "small" company that we knew. They have oodles of cash from WoW and are part of a much bigger company group. For all we know, the game is finished but someone further up the pecking order is asking them to hold off a bit to make a strategic play for the bigger company. Face it, that's the relaity of the business world out there. Only when the article comes out then (hopefully) we'll get some clarification
Most RPGs take years to create:
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning - 3 years (not including all the previous work done on Copernicus)
Elder Scrolls Skyrim - 3 years+
Mass Effect 2 - 3 years+ (only counting from the date it was announced)
Borderlands - 3 years (shares many quilities with the Diablo franchise, even though it uses an FPS perspective)
And D3 took longer than 4 years to develop. But we all know Blizzard can get quite anal when it comes to release date, even Warcraft 3 was delayed like mad. SC2 took 7 years to develop and D3 is at that stage now.
1. They want to make sure they get least amount of cancellations from warcraft deal so postponing.
2. Their reaping ideas off Torchlight & Possibly Torchlight 2 forcing us to another Blizzcon announcement on the Diablo 3 surprise where we all sigh and say.... WTH release this hack n" slash already and be done with it.