Mike Huang: When I left Blizzard in '03, Blizzard North had done quite a bit of pre-production work on Diablo III, as well as some protoyping on the 3d-game engine. Today at the Blizzard Invitational in Paris, they announced the release of Diablo III. Since much of the work we had done on Diablo III was concept and prototype work, seeing the development they've done over the last 5 years was very interesting; while some of the concepts we were developing definitely looks like it made it through to the version of the game they displayed, some of the design choices they appear to have made seem counter to the decisions the original Diablo team members would have made had they remained on development of the title -- the most apparent change that I can point to is the appearance of "floating numbers" as seen in the gameplay video -- this was a feature that Blizzard Irvine continually "suggested" during development on Diablo II, which Blizzard North refused to implement -- with development now located within Irvine, the decision to add floating numbers to the game isn't one which surprises me.
One of the design choices which again shows Blizzard Irvine's hand in the changes made is the re-appearance of the Barbarian character class -- the original design documents for Diablo III included a set of all new character classes, with no reappearance of old character classes (our reasons for this was simple -- since we were enhancing and improving the skill system, we didn't want to try and adapt old skills into a new system -- we'd rather create all new skills for the new character classes. The return of the Barbarian class feels like a change that was made after development of the title was moved to Irvine 3 years ago. -- this is an excerpt only. Read the full article at
Mike Huang's blog
hey MD plzzz post the interview with the other blizzard north guy who is actually sensible and not bitter that you posted on blizzplanet
This is where his argument turns from fair criticism to almost cynicism. If leap made the Barbarian the "most broken class" of Diablo 2, then what did teleport make the sorceress? He is just making a criticism for the sake of making criticism. It seems very unprofessional and almost passive aggressively spiteful.
Ben Boos: Yes, I feel MANY emotions � some bitter and some sweet, but that is mostly my nostalgia at work, not any sort of resentment for the good people now making this game. Besides, I still have good friends who are working on it. But, I do sometimes wish all my old friends were still at it, like I remember from the pleasant days gone by. I can�t help but want to freeze time a bit, and have all those good people together, at work on something wonderful. But life doesn�t work like that, and that�s why the memories are all the more poignant.
Before I go, I�d like to say this: To those who once poured their hearts into this series, I salute you for paving the way! To those who are now bearing the torch, I wish you all the luck in the world -- and Godspeed! It looks amazing so far!
http://www.diii.net/articles/670644/the-d2-team-comments-on-d3 <-full interview
Hey MD, on blizzplanet the link refers to the bitter employee and not Ben Boos, just thought I'd let you know
in the upper right hand it says forgotten tombs
You don't have to play the game to form the opinion that the original creators the game franchise would be better off making the next installment than a different Blizzard team.
Seriously idiot.
I hate to be the guy to defend the fanbois that supposedly are immature, ignorant, and clueless, but have you ever played that POS game? You can't possibly tell me it's any good. Even after the big bug-fixing patch they threw in recently, people still fall through the world and it's only made it slightly more playable for the few that still play it. The game is definately not fit for new players.
The entire Flagship company got pink-slipped, and here you are ragging on so-called "fanbois"? lol.
I don't know, I'm a loyal Diablo I, II fan and of course I feel very loyal to the original game creators. It's just in development, there's always that weasel that wants everything cool and snazzy without any understanding of authenticity and theme...
Disappointing...
D3 could be cool, or could suck.
well see