UPDATE - It appears the sign has now been removed! (source)
Update 3:
It gets more interesting! When we called the Rochester, Minnesota Best Buy this morning, a manager explained that the sign has been taken down as a directive from the store's "GM" (general manager), not because the manufacturer had asked but because the manufacturer has been "not very firm" in picking a launch date. As many had guessed (per the misspelling of "February," among other things), the signage was made in-house and not sent by Blizzard. If you happen to spot any similar signage in your local big box retailer, don't hesitate to contact us!
A lot of hype is going around today about the BestBuy countdown banner at one of their stores. It is counting down to February 1st, midnight release. However, there are a few things to keep in mind. We have had many blue posts saying retailers will not know the release date before we do. We also have (read above) a blue post saying they like to give us a few months warning before a title comes out. Bashiok also replied about this on twitter today.
Official Blizzard Quote:
whats the word on this? http://t.co/dqQ8mt7G
The word is lol. (source)
yeah, but its on their website, and the forums are blowing up. ill admit i got excited for the first time in a long time.
Retailers will not know a date until its officially announced through a press release.(source)
you guys really need to let best buy know...unless im missing something here
We can't really keep every individual retail shop from making up a date.(source)
Barbarian - Runed Weapon Throw
Today we have Weapon Throw for the Barbarian. The Indigo rune has been left out in this video. Also, its very important to note that these skills may be missing some effects/graphics. PLEASE keep this in mind while watching.
Diablo 3 Not Confirmed for Q1
Bashiok posted quickly. last night. that he had made a mistake by saying Q1 and that the game is still on track for "early" 2012.
Official Blizzard Quote:
Sorry I wasn't intending to imply anything by writing first quarter, just an honest mistake. Our official target is still "early 2012". Not sure if it makes too much difference one way or the other, but I don't want people to nitpick a mistake.
Bashiok on When Beta Ends and Demo
Bashiok posted on the legacy forums last night stating that the beta probably wont be ending until close to the release of the game. He also says in this same post, that they usually try to let us know two months in advanced for release dates.
Official Blizzard Quote:
We probably won't end beta until shortly before release, and traditionally we've tried to announce release dates about two months before release. I couldn't speculate how invites might ramp up or down when the beta finally comes to a close, it definitely is not coming to a close yet though.
Bashiok did say there was a strong possibility of a demo after release
We'll probably make a trial edition at some point. It's sort of a demo I suppose, but it's a bit better because it's essentially the full game just with locks put on certain areas. So you'd be able to jump into multiplayer games with your friends, but maybe you wouldn't be able to play beyond a certain place and wouldn't have access to all the game systems (certainly not auction houses) but if you choose to buy the game all that stuff just unlocks.
[sarcasm]
So many true facts! What do we do?!
[/sarcasm]
Maybe respect their fans? by delaying the release that more than once? and yesterday it was the 2nd time for delaying but in direct way, when they correct saying the game will be released in early 2012 not in q1 2012?
Maybe there has to be a commitment for the fans about a solid window frame time?
Maybe anticipation and provoking has a limitation for every fan that he can explode or even lose interest for tracking news about game cause it is always like the previous day?
Or u cba about all that?
They could easily say nothing ever, until "Oh hey, its done"
no, instead they attempt to give us release windows. Yeah, they get pushed back, because they are maken this game the best they can.. At least we get some kind of idea...
"Blizzard, wtf? We have millions of customers depending on us. We don't deliver our product when we say we will and it makes us look bad. You fcking put this game out right now or we're gonna have some issues."
Never thought about it before, but i can see retailers getting pretty hacked off at Blizzard at this point...
LOL Diablo is far from rushed. It's taking longer than Vanilla WoW did to make and this game is no where near as big. They're just going overboard from polish.
Digital download, hundreds of other retailers. I'm sure they would rather a retailer who put out false information die in a fire. Blizzard won't even be singed by Best Buy's mistake.
Uh... because I've been waiting a decade? Because the window between their announcement of the game and when it's finally coming out is about double of what it takes to develop a game? Because they tell us nothing and treat us like children? Because the richest, most successful game company in the world can't commit to a time table? You need more reasons or are you done asking strange questions?
You know how you're standing there defending them? You're alone.
You need to quit emo raging. Threaten you? How old are you?
Reasonable? Let me show you where reasonable ends:
Diablo III was officially announced at Blizzcon 2008. In reasonable terms, that means that they had been in production for at least 1-2 years, knowing them 2. That means it started development (in its current iteration) in 2006. It is now 2012. A game with a six year development cycle? That is off the charts, especially considering the genre.
Meanwhile, World of Warcraft and its three expansions were released within a five year period. That's four games in five years, and more than a decade between the last Diablo release and the next one. Similiarly mind boggling is the fact that these four games have an enormous amount of assets required for them, dwarfing that of Diablo III easily and yet they have been rushed through production, along with multiple large content updates for each one.
As to your naivety of company responsibility to customers and retailers: No other company in the world would get away with this, not even in this specific field. When a developer of a product plans to make something, they let people know when they can expect to receive it and they get it out by that time. Blizzard has done neither. They have kept their (nonexistent?) time table to themselves without reasoning. And YES they DO ANSWER TO US. They have to answer to stockholders too but I can guarantee you that they want this game out as soon as possible just like I do. Nevertheless they do have responsibilities to us. We pay their bills, not stockholders. A company with an abundance of stock holders and no customers is not a company at all, it's a money pit.
So yes, I want a reasonable amount of communication from the company with which I plan to spend money. They owe me, and every other customer, that much. And they haven't even started to give it to us. Game features? Don't tell me they've communicated because they've given us the barest glimpses of game mechanics and screen shots. Bashiok and the rest of the Blizzard cronies have been trying to fend us off with wallpapers and gameplay videos for months now when every last person here only really wants a release date.
The reasonable thing to do would be to man up, quit feeding their customers garbage and tell us when we can really expect this game out. That's really the only reasonable thing to do, so quit defending them for doing less.
Yeah he is the one emo raging in this thread...
That was funny.
I agree with all you have said, harmonica. I see a lot of whining going on, but its all nonsense.
It's really pathetic to say that Blizzard just wants to make money, yet at the same time is just messing with its fans and not releasing the game (implying that it is already done).
Patches could help fix bugs and could easily tweak the game, this is true. But could simple patches rework the PVP system, the rune system, entire skills, and other various things they're currently working on that are major parts of the game?
Yeah, patches could do that, but they would be very big, very time consuming, and many problems could erupt from doing that [i.e. in DII people whined about how the necromancer's quantity of skeletons was greatly reduced with a patch (along with other undesirable fixes), so they went onto a private server or started modding the game themselves, which took away many players from Battle.net].
That's not a big deal, you might think, but it ruins the quality of the experience players. If they released a half-assed game (where Diablo III probably is at right now), yeah, they could patch it up like crazy and make it great, I'm sure. But on the release of the game, if everyone in the world were to buy it and see that it is crappy, they'll drop it like that and move onto another game. By the time Blizzard can patch up the game to a point that it is satisfactory, the player population will have dried up a lot and their reputation is compromised. Their future games will not be as welcomed. (Hellgate London was a fantastic game, but it was half-assed and was quickly thrown to the side).
You're mad and crying about a game that is a big part of your life, and I can understand that. I played Diablo II for an upwards of eight years, and it was a huge part of my life during high school. The game is a big deal to us, otherwise we wouldn't be on a fan site.
But, having pre-ordered Diablo III (which most of you haven't even done yet, therefore you haven't lost anything and should shut up), I want the game to come out and completely blow my mind as it should. Do I want to play it right now? **** yeah, but if Blizzard thinks it isn't satisfactory yet (and I think they know more about building games than everyone here), I'll focus on other important things to me, like school, work, my girlfriend, my small business, the family, reading books, and other random games until I can get my hands on a complete version of Diablo III, not a blasphemous less-than-adequate version of it.
Grow up, people. This game is going to be ****ing incredible, so kick back and relax and don't have a heart attack. It's coming, that is for sure.
Far from it. He's certainly not the only one who isn't caught up in all these different conspiracy theories. Reasonable people agree with him.
Their huge mistake was announce D3 in very yearly stage of development. The game was a freaking baby when they showed us. And worse, every little detail was used as hype material. They started to hype a 2012 game in 2008... The hype gets old, everyone knows a huge amount of stuff about the game before the release, some people start to get really pissed about waiting...
About the game being "done" and they are not releasing it for some bizarre reason. LOLing at your face. Blizz have extremely high quality standards. Everyone associetes their trademark with bug free, almost hack free games and high polishment. Playing D3 beta everyone can cleary see the game is not Blizz material yet. Theres a huge amount of bugs, essential systems are not working 100%, theres some nasty exploits, bnet interface are absolutly TERRIBLE and theres a huge amount of animations and other graphical stuff that must be remade.
Look at the babarian throwing a axe vertically but the spinning horizontally. THE GAME IS NOT READY YET. Stop acting like you have the right to play D3 when you want. You have no right or control over Blizz actions, sorry. Obviously Blizz is looking at your wallet above anything else, thats what companies do and thats the way resources finds the best way to be used.
I wish fans stop acting like important people. Freaking god you're just a potential consumer and nothing else.
D3Fans are a patient bunch, waiting 6-11 years for a single game. But all patience eventually runs thin, and especially if Blizzard dangles in front of your face as if its about to be released.
I was so sure it'd be out in November, then being pushed to Q1 the only way to maintain my sanity was to think that only meant January/February. Because there is no way my mental state can handle an April+ release...