I think what you are forgetting though is that they have to dedicate to Warcraft, to Starcraft and to Diablo. People demand it, they demand it even more than new titles from Blizzard. Blizzard has to supply what people demand and then when the money and timing is right, they can invest in another project.
I'm sure Warcraft 4 is in talks, I'm sure they already have plans in place for Starcraft 3 and Diablo 4. They said they are 'wrapping up this story arc' in Diablo 3... so they probably already have people working on a new story arc for another trilogy of games. They have to, because people will demand it, people will want it.
WoW is finally dying down enough and has a stable enough 'hardcore' player base to make the game still somewhat relevant even if it starts to 'die'. So they have moved a lot of the top people off of the game and onto Titan. Their resources and best/brightest are now on their new project, while they have groomed other employees to take over WoW.
I don't think people remember Blizzard when Diablo and Starcraft were being made. They weren't a huge company or anything, they were just kind of scraping by. WoW turned them from a great, but somewhat small company into probably the most known game maker in the entire world. So they HAD to dedicate to WoW and they still have to do so since 10+ million people still subscribe to the game.
If the companies that churned out Oblivion/Fallout/etc. created an online game that captivated that many people, it would be the same way. It takes time for a company to grow, to expand, to get used to being massive. Blizzard seems to have finally adjusted and like we have agreed upon the sign of their adjustment lies in the development of new games (Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2), but more specifically in their willingness to branch out and develop a new game (Titan).
I think what you are forgetting though is that they have to dedicate to Warcraft, to Starcraft and to Diablo. People demand it, they demand it even more than new titles from Blizzard. Blizzard has to supply what people demand and then when the money and timing is right, they can invest in another project.
We are basically in agreement. Blizzard has obvious demand from WoW users they need to manage. Damn right they should meet those demands.
Thing is, they can use that demand to pull current customers into their new IP. But why does that matter? What's the difference? To this question, the business end of Bliz seems to be blind. I mean, they get customer $$ either way
Well, that's where my commentary comes in. They can use that demand to maintain the current IP, which retards innovation in gaming, or they can use that demand to push WoW users into their new IP. If they wait too long, other companies will come along and steal customers to their brand. This is already happening, and Blizzard's solution is to fix the problem with price, not innovation. That's what got me up in arms.
All things being equal, it's better for customers, gaming, and the world to innovate.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
"Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions."
-Thomas Jefferson
Like I said before though Dolaiim, it isn't easy to be part of a company that goes from being a small company that's probably worth a few million dollars to being a multi-billion dollar company. I have been part of a company (not a gaming company, but a company none the less) that just went from small to medium sized and it had major growing pains.
How many people do we have to hire to support the most popular game on the planet?
How do we go about upgrading and adding to the server farm that supports this thing?
How many more developers do we have to bring on to add expansions?
What do we do about account security?
How do we set up more teams to make more games, since we've only really ever designed one/two at a time as opposed to developing one/two while maintaining the most popular game ever?
Where are we going to move to fit all of these people? Is that place going to remain big enough as we hire more people?
Do we have to grow our human resource department, accounting department, etc?
Those are just some of the questions in the long line of questions that Blizzard had to deal with... and these guys are used to just being game develops, not CEOs of a massive company.
So it looks like they finally have everything straight, they have their product development figured out again. I expect Titan to be the first in a new line of games that we see from Blizzard in the next ten years or so.
You guys are paranoid. it's an incentive to keep subscribers of WoW when D3 comes out, nothing else. It's not as bad as you think and you need to relax.
If Blizzard was obsessed about money and didn't care about their games at all:
Why is the production of their games still so incredibly long?
That's an easy one, in terms of the first part - WoW makes so much money and has such huge margins, their own releases just compete with themselves. SC2 is an exception, just because a sci-fi RTS is far enough away from a fantasy MMO.
The second part is a little more interesting - the Diablo team isn't a game dev team, it's an r&d holding tank, to keep people they don't want to compete with out of circulation, and possibly use for new design and tech. Before you accuse me of the tin foil hat, answer this - who was the hottest RTS designer in the world, that had made a string of well-received innovative games for a mid-sized budget circa 2005? And, of course, has zero credits since?
You guys are paranoid. it's an incentive to keep subscribers of WoW when D3 comes out, nothing else. It's not as bad as you think and you need to relax.
Proof that post count has nothing to do with smart posts - well done sir. Very few posts but still reasonable and non-speculative. +1
If Blizzard was obsessed about money and didn't care about their games at all:
Why is the production of their games still so incredibly long?
That's an easy one, in terms of the first part - WoW makes so much money and has such huge margins, their own releases just compete with themselves. SC2 is an exception, just because a sci-fi RTS is far enough away from a fantasy MMO.
The second part is a little more interesting - the Diablo team isn't a game dev team, it's an r&d holding tank, to keep people they don't want to compete with out of circulation, and possibly use for new design and tech. Before you accuse me of the tin foil hat, answer this - who was the hottest RTS designer in the world, that had made a string of well-received innovative games for a mid-sized budget circa 2005? And, of course, has zero credits since?
SC2 took forever to develop though too. So you can't make statements like that and say "Well there are exceptions". It's either they are delaying making games as to not create competition or they aren't. If they thought Diablo 3 was going to kill WoW, they just wouldn't have made Diablo 3 and they would have gone for another IP that doesn't create competition.
Again, I have no issue with people bringing up issues with Blizzard... but you guys have to use some common sense. I realize it's easy to rip on them and say they should kill WoW, start up other franchises, etc. But you have to realize they are a company trying to make money like EVERY OTHER GAMING STUDIO.
Their game development takes so long because that's just what they do. It goes all the way back to their original titles. They have an obsession with polishing and making sure their games are as good as they can be when released.
I have no doubt that they have suspicion Diablo 3 is going to take away some players from WoW for a while. But you guys have to realize 10+ million people (or whatever it is) still subscribe to that game. I don't care what game any company releases... WoW isn't just going to instantaneously "die". It's going to be a drawn out process with games like Diablo 3, the Star Wars MMO, Skyrim, etc. slowly pecking away at it before it finally finishes up.
The game I would say they'd delay some might be Titan just because it will be in direct competition with WoW.
I think most of you guys look at Diablo 3 and think of it as a game where the end game has great meaning and that millions of people are going to play for years to come. I know about 40 people who loved Diablo 2. But I'd say about 36 of those 40 people played through it with each of the characters and then stopped playing the game. It wasn't because they didn't like it or think it was great, it's because at the core of it, that's not what the Diablo franchise really does.
I mean, it serves that purpose for some people. But I'd say that's maybe 10-20% of the player base. A lot of people who love WoW are going to do it as something on the side, beat it, think it was cool, maybe play it a little longer and then go back to WoW (or perhaps another MMO) most likely.
I remember the outcry where people were like "OMG THEY WANT DIABLO 3 TO BE JUST LIKE WoW!!!" when really it is a lot of the people complaining about it that are trying to make it something it isn't. At the core of Diablo 3, it's a game to just play through a couple of times and then not play again, maybe pick it up a couple years later. Like most RPGs and such.
uh... no. that team was the frozen throne team - even by the longest definition, and ignoring the fact that they shifted to created much of the content of three installments at the end, it's still less than half of d3's dev time.
really? they've always taken forever? then why did they have 8 releases in three different genres in the space of 5.5 years with less than a third of the current dev staff 1995-2001?
uh... no. that team was the frozen throne team - even by the longest definition, and ignoring the fact that they shifted to created much of the content of three installments at the end, it's still less than half of d3's dev time.
really? they've always taken forever? then why did they have 8 releases in three different genres in the space of 5.5 years with less than a third of the current dev staff 1995-2001?
How long was SC2's development time as opposed to Diablo 3?
Are you going to count what Blizzard North did, considering that was a completely different game?
In addition, your theory is flawed from the start.
"They are delaying the release of Diablo 3 because they don't want to harm WoW."
If they were that concerned about it, why would they develop Diablo 3 in the first place? They could have used that development team to create something else.
There are videos out of the Diablo 3 that Blizzard North was developing.
Hilarious. I produced a link to back up my statement. You won't find a link for that. You may find the "heaven" stuff from Kotaku a few months ago - which was isolated demo stuff that tells you exactly nothing, but you won't find a video. I won't flame, but who needs to, when people make stuff up they can never document.
There are videos out of the Diablo 3 that Blizzard North was developing.
Hilarious. I produced a link to back up my statement. You won't find a link for that. You may find the "heaven" stuff from Kotaku a few months ago - which was isolated demo stuff that tells you exactly nothing, but you won't find a video. I won't flame, but who needs to, when people make stuff up they can never document.
right, as if showing the still demo shots from kotaku in sequence is a 'video'.
try showing an actual animation. just one. you won't and can't.
and, yes, I try to stick to the substance of discussions rather than wall of text. sorry.
Sure man. I said video because it was on Youtube, but they are still photos. You caught me in the biggest lie ever, apparently.
Do those photos look anything like ANY setting or content that we have seen in the current version of Diablo 3? They are absolutely nothing alike. The Diablo 3 that we see now is a completely different game.
You don't need 'videos' to put them side to side and just say "That isn't the same game. It's not even close."
You don't need 'videos' to put them side to side and just say "That isn't the same game. It's not even close."
I'm sure I could show you 100% overlit shots with absolutely no action occurring from background areas that were thrown out in the most recent version, and you would say the same thing.
But, yeah, an overlit (creditless) demo shot of a background with a single static character in the middle is what makes a game in its early phases, right? Not the kind of engine work clearly referenced in the interview link, or the concept stuff clearly labeled from '04 - both of which reference current members on the team.
You don't need 'videos' to put them side to side and just say "That isn't the same game. It's not even close."
I'm sure I could show you 100% overlit shots with absolutely no action occurring from background areas that were thrown out in the most recent version, and you would say the same thing.
But, yeah, an overlit (creditless) demo shot of a background with a single static character in the middle is what makes a game in its early phases, right? Not the kind of engine work clearly referenced in the interview link, or the concept stuff clearly labeled from '04 - both of which reference current members on the team.
Now we know, thanks.
I am tempted to draw a stick figure in Paint and put it next to an image from Diablo 3. Something tells me you'd have some ridiculous excuse as to how it could possibly be related. Just because 'concept stuff' is labeled 2004 doesn't mean that 'concept stuff' was being produced in 2004. I also don't consider drawings part of major production.
Everything from the health/mana globe, the look of the UI, potions being where skills are now and the art direction indicate that it was completely different. Just because they say "We used that sketch concept in 2004 and we are using it now in 2011." doesn't mean it was the same game.
However, like I said, your argument is flawed from the beginning. It's something you continue to avoid.
You believe Blizzard is stalling and prolonging development because they are afraid Diablo 3 is going to expedite the 'death' of WoW. The question was already proposed... why develop the game in the first place then? They could have easily developed something that wasn't a threat to World of Warcraft like you claim Starcraft 2 isn't.
Your basis is that "Blizzard's worst fear is releasing Diablo 3 because it will hurt World of Warcraft!"... so then why the hell would they develop it in the first place?
Your basis is that "Blizzard's worst fear is releasing Diablo 3 because it will hurt World of Warcraft!"... so then why the hell would they develop it in the first place?
Again... "You do not make sense".
...Just because 'concept stuff' is labeled 2004 doesn't mean that 'concept stuff' was being produced in 2004
As a matter of courtesy, try to use actual quotes when putting words in my mouth.
Try to read a little more closely, and feel free to look at much earlier posts. I've been saying that the game was delayed since '08 (don't know if was on this site then, maybe) to avoid cannibalizing WoW. The typical response from the deluded was "09 at the latest". Three years later - and about five billion in wow revenue later - you think I was right? And I wouldn't say that deciding to market it as a WoW sub freebie hurts my argument in the slightest.
Try to direct your energy in a less flaming direction, phlayed, and answer my riddle about who that RTS designer was on the last page. It may help you make a little more sense of things.
And speaking of not making sense - your comment on concept art (clearly signed by a guy still on the team) is more than a little bizarre.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
I'm sure Warcraft 4 is in talks, I'm sure they already have plans in place for Starcraft 3 and Diablo 4. They said they are 'wrapping up this story arc' in Diablo 3... so they probably already have people working on a new story arc for another trilogy of games. They have to, because people will demand it, people will want it.
WoW is finally dying down enough and has a stable enough 'hardcore' player base to make the game still somewhat relevant even if it starts to 'die'. So they have moved a lot of the top people off of the game and onto Titan. Their resources and best/brightest are now on their new project, while they have groomed other employees to take over WoW.
I don't think people remember Blizzard when Diablo and Starcraft were being made. They weren't a huge company or anything, they were just kind of scraping by. WoW turned them from a great, but somewhat small company into probably the most known game maker in the entire world. So they HAD to dedicate to WoW and they still have to do so since 10+ million people still subscribe to the game.
If the companies that churned out Oblivion/Fallout/etc. created an online game that captivated that many people, it would be the same way. It takes time for a company to grow, to expand, to get used to being massive. Blizzard seems to have finally adjusted and like we have agreed upon the sign of their adjustment lies in the development of new games (Diablo 3 and Starcraft 2), but more specifically in their willingness to branch out and develop a new game (Titan).
We are basically in agreement. Blizzard has obvious demand from WoW users they need to manage. Damn right they should meet those demands.
Thing is, they can use that demand to pull current customers into their new IP. But why does that matter? What's the difference? To this question, the business end of Bliz seems to be blind. I mean, they get customer $$ either way
Well, that's where my commentary comes in. They can use that demand to maintain the current IP, which retards innovation in gaming, or they can use that demand to push WoW users into their new IP. If they wait too long, other companies will come along and steal customers to their brand. This is already happening, and Blizzard's solution is to fix the problem with price, not innovation. That's what got me up in arms.
All things being equal, it's better for customers, gaming, and the world to innovate.
-Thomas Jefferson
Those are just some of the questions in the long line of questions that Blizzard had to deal with... and these guys are used to just being game develops, not CEOs of a massive company.
So it looks like they finally have everything straight, they have their product development figured out again. I expect Titan to be the first in a new line of games that we see from Blizzard in the next ten years or so.
That's an easy one, in terms of the first part - WoW makes so much money and has such huge margins, their own releases just compete with themselves. SC2 is an exception, just because a sci-fi RTS is far enough away from a fantasy MMO.
The second part is a little more interesting - the Diablo team isn't a game dev team, it's an r&d holding tank, to keep people they don't want to compete with out of circulation, and possibly use for new design and tech. Before you accuse me of the tin foil hat, answer this - who was the hottest RTS designer in the world, that had made a string of well-received innovative games for a mid-sized budget circa 2005? And, of course, has zero credits since?
SC2 took forever to develop though too. So you can't make statements like that and say "Well there are exceptions". It's either they are delaying making games as to not create competition or they aren't. If they thought Diablo 3 was going to kill WoW, they just wouldn't have made Diablo 3 and they would have gone for another IP that doesn't create competition.
Again, I have no issue with people bringing up issues with Blizzard... but you guys have to use some common sense. I realize it's easy to rip on them and say they should kill WoW, start up other franchises, etc. But you have to realize they are a company trying to make money like EVERY OTHER GAMING STUDIO.
Their game development takes so long because that's just what they do. It goes all the way back to their original titles. They have an obsession with polishing and making sure their games are as good as they can be when released.
I have no doubt that they have suspicion Diablo 3 is going to take away some players from WoW for a while. But you guys have to realize 10+ million people (or whatever it is) still subscribe to that game. I don't care what game any company releases... WoW isn't just going to instantaneously "die". It's going to be a drawn out process with games like Diablo 3, the Star Wars MMO, Skyrim, etc. slowly pecking away at it before it finally finishes up.
The game I would say they'd delay some might be Titan just because it will be in direct competition with WoW.
I think most of you guys look at Diablo 3 and think of it as a game where the end game has great meaning and that millions of people are going to play for years to come. I know about 40 people who loved Diablo 2. But I'd say about 36 of those 40 people played through it with each of the characters and then stopped playing the game. It wasn't because they didn't like it or think it was great, it's because at the core of it, that's not what the Diablo franchise really does.
I mean, it serves that purpose for some people. But I'd say that's maybe 10-20% of the player base. A lot of people who love WoW are going to do it as something on the side, beat it, think it was cool, maybe play it a little longer and then go back to WoW (or perhaps another MMO) most likely.
I remember the outcry where people were like "OMG THEY WANT DIABLO 3 TO BE JUST LIKE WoW!!!" when really it is a lot of the people complaining about it that are trying to make it something it isn't. At the core of Diablo 3, it's a game to just play through a couple of times and then not play again, maybe pick it up a couple years later. Like most RPGs and such.
That's how most people are going to approach it.
uh... no. that team was the frozen throne team - even by the longest definition, and ignoring the fact that they shifted to created much of the content of three installments at the end, it's still less than half of d3's dev time.
really? they've always taken forever? then why did they have 8 releases in three different genres in the space of 5.5 years with less than a third of the current dev staff 1995-2001?
How long was SC2's development time as opposed to Diablo 3?
Are you going to count what Blizzard North did, considering that was a completely different game?
http://www.blizzhackers.cc/viewtopic.php?t=402594
"I remember back at Blizzard North when..."
That and the concept art clearly dated 2004 on a couple of sites - which was obviously used in stuff already seen in the beta - might be a clue.
There are videos out of the Diablo 3 that Blizzard North was developing. It looks NOTHING like the Diablo 3 that we see today.
"They are delaying the release of Diablo 3 because they don't want to harm WoW."
If they were that concerned about it, why would they develop Diablo 3 in the first place? They could have used that development team to create something else.
Hilarious. I produced a link to back up my statement. You won't find a link for that. You may find the "heaven" stuff from Kotaku a few months ago - which was isolated demo stuff that tells you exactly nothing, but you won't find a video. I won't flame, but who needs to, when people make stuff up they can never document.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nmE5t1EvM8
try showing an actual animation. just one. you won't and can't.
and, yes, I try to stick to the substance of discussions rather than wall of text. sorry.
Sure man. I said video because it was on Youtube, but they are still photos. You caught me in the biggest lie ever, apparently.
Do those photos look anything like ANY setting or content that we have seen in the current version of Diablo 3? They are absolutely nothing alike. The Diablo 3 that we see now is a completely different game.
You don't need 'videos' to put them side to side and just say "That isn't the same game. It's not even close."
I'm sure I could show you 100% overlit shots with absolutely no action occurring from background areas that were thrown out in the most recent version, and you would say the same thing.
But, yeah, an overlit (creditless) demo shot of a background with a single static character in the middle is what makes a game in its early phases, right? Not the kind of engine work clearly referenced in the interview link, or the concept stuff clearly labeled from '04 - both of which reference current members on the team.
Now we know, thanks.
I am tempted to draw a stick figure in Paint and put it next to an image from Diablo 3. Something tells me you'd have some ridiculous excuse as to how it could possibly be related. Just because 'concept stuff' is labeled 2004 doesn't mean that 'concept stuff' was being produced in 2004. I also don't consider drawings part of major production.
Everything from the health/mana globe, the look of the UI, potions being where skills are now and the art direction indicate that it was completely different. Just because they say "We used that sketch concept in 2004 and we are using it now in 2011." doesn't mean it was the same game.
However, like I said, your argument is flawed from the beginning. It's something you continue to avoid.
You believe Blizzard is stalling and prolonging development because they are afraid Diablo 3 is going to expedite the 'death' of WoW. The question was already proposed... why develop the game in the first place then? They could have easily developed something that wasn't a threat to World of Warcraft like you claim Starcraft 2 isn't.
Your basis is that "Blizzard's worst fear is releasing Diablo 3 because it will hurt World of Warcraft!"... so then why the hell would they develop it in the first place?
Again... "You do not make sense".
As a matter of courtesy, try to use actual quotes when putting words in my mouth.
Try to read a little more closely, and feel free to look at much earlier posts. I've been saying that the game was delayed since '08 (don't know if was on this site then, maybe) to avoid cannibalizing WoW. The typical response from the deluded was "09 at the latest". Three years later - and about five billion in wow revenue later - you think I was right? And I wouldn't say that deciding to market it as a WoW sub freebie hurts my argument in the slightest.
Try to direct your energy in a less flaming direction, phlayed, and answer my riddle about who that RTS designer was on the last page. It may help you make a little more sense of things.
And speaking of not making sense - your comment on concept art (clearly signed by a guy still on the team) is more than a little bizarre.