Official Blizzard Quote:
Q: I suppose that you do not have a world-hysteria scoop to offer the readers of Liberation concerning the official and definitive release date of Diablo 3?
A: Alas, no. Just to confirm to you that we are full at work for the game to release this year. The development is technically completed. We are in a internal-testing and feedback-gathering phase. Yes, there are good chances of releasing before the end of 2011, but it is impossible to us, at this time, to guarantee you that.
As is standard with anything Blizzard says, there are no guarentees, but the fact that they are comfortable saying there is a good chance of release in Diablo III is good news by itself. Surely there is plenty of work left to get the game ready for release, but this quote implies that much of the game is completed and needs to be balanced and polished to Blizzard's high standards. Again, this is not a guarentee that we'll all be playing Diablo III this year, but its the best news we've gotten about it so far. Hopefully we can get our hands on a beta soon, a scenario which is seeming more and more likely.
In case you didn't know, during the financial conference call last month, Mike Morhaime told us that we would hear more about the beta during the Q1 2011 Conference Call in May. That statement, along with this interview, makes it seem like we may finally be approaching the light at the end of the tunnel.
Michael Morhaime and Frank Pearce (as well as Allen Adham) founded Blizzard Entertainment in 1991. Twenty years later, they’re still here and try to understand the future of the video game industry.
The famous Dice Summit (high end video games conferences) just ended in Las Vegas. The provoking game designer Jane McGonigal called “the gamer’s regret” this feeling, too common per her, that the gamer was wasting his time and that it was necessary to fight for a bigger pride of the gamers. What do you think?
Her conference was very important because she insists on points very true and too neglected. We should assert more that games can be very gratifying when the experience and the pleasures of them are shared. It’s of course a question of equilibrium for each person to find. And, it is not recommended for any person to spend the integrality of their free time on one activity, no matter what it is. It’s a good question for all, and in all areas. We still think that things evolve fast.
Now more mainstream, the game has recently seen its circulation again accelerated by the take off of casual gaming which has de-dramatized the perception of video games. With that, we also see new behaviors, new relationships with this media. Recently, someone told me: ”Oh no, I’m not what we call a gamer, I only play World of Warcraft a few hours, Monday through Friday.” Definitely, playing is less and less felt like a shameful or clandestine activity. We establish ourselves as gamer, we’re more easily proud of it. We notice very clearly these evolutions during the public conferences that we organize for fans of our video games.
But, paradoxically, the key of the problem of perception is in the hands of the non-players. It’s so easy, when we have never played, to think wrong. The cliché on the destruction of the social connection or the waste of time are non-players’ problems, and it’s difficult to fight against this speech when it comes from people who have never played.
We don’t waste more time in front of a game than in front of a movie or tv show, right? But you are still competing with these 2 other form of entertainment when it comes to attract more money or the time of these new same consumers.
We became a powerful industry, so strong that many games bring more money than many blockbusters. Hollywood has perfectly realized that, and the bigger challenge the gaming industry must now face is this competition to attract the attention of a public that shares its time between cinema, DVD, tv shows and video games. This forces us to invent, to imagine new ways to deepen and diversify the experiences the game can provide. We have no other choice but to be creative. Our luck is that the industry is still young and that the amazing mutations that occurred are nothing compared to what is still to come.
When you look at the landscape of the video game outside the Blizzard bubble and its products, what feeling do you have? What type of games do you like? Coming back from the Dice Summit, I actually played Angry Birds on the plane. The strong trend of the moment is unquestionably games on mobile devices and on social networks. The curve of the never ending development costs is finally stopped. That doesn’t change anything to big productions but that leaves a much larger space for small independent developers. The developments are less technically complex and cheaper. And it’s a sane thing for the industry which develop itself a bunch of ecosystems. The Blizzard model is excellent, but tons of others can be profitable as well. This trend doesn’t change anything to AAA productions but doors open for new creators.
And in 20 years, what will Blizzard look like from your opinion?
When we see the extravagant speed at which the technology progresses, it’s already hard to imagine what it will look like in 3 years. So in 20… We can graph curves, see some trends. Lots of the traditional barriers are lifting: the processors speed, the storage of data, the increase of connection speed… We only meet one true limit: our imagination!
The games are necessarily deeper, more persistent, nested in social networks which have evolved a lot and grown. Everything has gone and will go so fast! Blizzard will undoubtedly bring things to people with more casual habits. For example, make playing as easy as turning the tv on. The games that we make are big and fat. World of Warcraft, for example, takes 20 minutes to install. We would like to bring it down to the blink of an eye. That’s why we bet a lot on the “cloud”, the cloud of servers in network, but we must also guarantee the protection and integrity of our games and that data of our clients.
I suppose that you don’t have any worldwide hysterical scoop to offer to the readers of Liberation regarding the date of official and definitive release of Diablo III?
Unfortunately no. Just confirming that we’re doing everything possible for the game to come out this year. The development is technically completed. We are in phase of internal testing and feedback collection. Yes, there are good chances that it will be out before the end of 2011, but it’s impossible for us today to guarantee it.
The dates of the next BlizzCon just for released: it will be the 21st and 22nd of October at the Anaheim Convention Center (California). On the agenda: showing of the Blizzard games currently in development, conferences with the developers, contests, tournaments, etc…
I speak French, and "Le développement est techniquement achevé" is indeed "Development is technically complete"
If it said "Le développement technique est achevé" that would mean "The technical development is complete".
Edit: Blizzard uses Agile, scrum development methods (perhaps others), but they've stated in their QA job listings that experience in those development environments are plusses.
The following link might shed some light into their design methodology, what they're doing now, and what's to come:
http://www.mountaingoatsoftware.com/topics/scrum
Of note:
Scrum projects make progress in a series of sprints, which are timeboxed iterations no more than a month long. At the start of a sprint, team members commit to delivering some number of features that were listed on the project’s product backlog. At the end of the sprint, these features are done--they are coded, tested, and integrated into the evolving product or system. At the end of the sprint a sprint review is conducted during which the team demonstrates the new functionality to the product owner and other interested stakeholders who provide feedback that could influence the next sprint.
HOWEVER.
I definitely think they'll release the beta sometime this summer, and try to push themselves for a holiday season release. If they can't make Christmas, then 2012 it is.
So sayeth the Zhar.
Don't even think about doing it at the tavern.
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2011 is still alive
And depending how legal you are i got a firend that played starcraft 2 beta without the key, dont ask me how xD
But again, we don't know for sure what kind of info Blizzard needs for Diablo III (opposed to the tons of input they needed to balance Starcraft).
Either way, time will tell. We'll definitely get some and we'll definitely report on the beta, though, that's certain.
Pffft, what about used-to-be-newsies??!
I DEMAND KEYZ!
J'étais dans une programme français immersion. Donc de l'école primaire jusqu'au collège, un demi de la journée était enseigné en français, l'autre en englais. C'était une bénédiction, une éducation assez rare.
Translation: I was in a french immersion program. So from first grade until college, half the day was taught in french, half in english. It was a blessing to be educated this way, and a very rare education, especially in America.
Anyway, to put in an on-topic bit, I think it's a danger to start cooking up possible release dates, beta timeframes, etc.. although it's fun, it can lead to more disappointment and nerdrage.
Bliz uses an iterative, modular development model (based on Agile development methods, google it if interested). Just because they finished their iterations of feature content addition, doesn't mean rewrites aren't in the winds. Also, it doesn't mean all features are integrated into full working builds right now, they may be running stub API's.
They'll run through Alpha and find weaknesses. When they do, they'll enter more sprint development iterations to revamp/rewrite feature sets to improve the play quality.
Sooooo.. technically development is complete, but development is not really complete, and depending on how many more dev sprints they run due to Alpha/FF Beta feedback, the release date, and beta timeframe, will necessarily be pushed out.