Diablo III

Diablo III is an action role-playing video game developed and published by Blizzard Entertainment. It is the third installment in the Diablo franchisethat features elements of the dungeon crawl and hack and slash genres.

Diablo III was released in North America, Latin America, Europe, South Korea, and Taiwan on May 15, 2012, and in Russia on June 7, 2012.Before its release, the game broke several presale records and became the most pre-ordered PC game to date on Amazon.com. Diablo IIIsubsequently set a new record for fastest-selling PC game by selling over 3.5 million copies in the first 24 hours of its release. It received generally positive reviews from critics, although its digital rights management that required an internet connection at all times was criticized.

Players have five character classes available; the Witch Doctor, Barbarian, Wizard, Monk and Demon Hunter. New features include an online auction house, which allows players to trade virtual items with in-game gold or real life money. Artisans that craft materials gathered by the player to create new items.

Plot

The game takes place in Sanctuary, the dark fantasy world of the Diablo series, twenty years after the events of Diablo II. Deckard Cain and his niece Leah are in the Tristram Cathedral investigating ancient texts regarding an ominous prophecy. Suddenly, a mysterious star falling from the sky strikes the Cathedral, creating a deep crater into which Deckard Cain disappears.

The player character (PC) arrives in New Tristram to investigate the fallen star. The PC rescues Cain upon Leah's request and discovers that the fallen object is actually a person. The stranger has no memories except that he lost his sword, which was shattered into three pieces. The PC is tasked with retrieving the pieces, a quest during which knowledge of an ancient line of humans known as the Nephalem is discovered. It is gradually revealed that this line, the result of the union of Diablo's angelic and demonic races, has not died out as first believed, and that the PC is in fact a Nephalem as well. A dark coven run by the witch Maghda attempts to beat the PC to the sword shards; once all three have been collected, Maghda seizes them and kidnaps Cain to force him to repair the sword for her own ends. However, with an uncontrolled display of power, Leah forces Maghda to flee, and the witch kidnaps the stranger instead. Cain, dying from Maghda's torture, uses the last of his strength to repair the sword and instructs the PC to return it to the stranger. The PC rescues the stranger and returns his sword, causing him to regain his memories. The strange r is the fallen angel Tyrael. Disgusted with his fellow angels' unwillingness to protect humanity from the forces of Hell, Tyrael cast aside his divinity to become a mortal and warn Sanctuary about the arrival of the demon lords Belial (Lord of Lies) and Azmodan (Lord of Sin).

To avenge Cain's death, the PC tracks Maghda to the city of Caldeum, which is controlled by her master, Belial. The PC kills Maghda, and rescues Leah's mother, Adria. Adria tells Tyrael and the PC that the key to stopping the demons is the Black Soulstone, which can trap the souls of the seven Lords of Hell and destroy them forever. In order to obtain the Black Soulstone, the PC resurrects the mad Horadrim, Zoltun Kulle. Kulle reveals its hiding place and completes the unfinished Soulstone, but is killed by the PC after he attempts to steal it for himself. The PC kills Belial and traps his soul within the Black Soulstone, freeing Caldeum. As Leah studies in Caldeum's library to find more answers about the Black Soulstone and Azmodan, she receives a vision from Azmodan, who tells her that he is sending an army from the ruins of Mount Arreat to take the Black Soulstone for himself.

Tyrael, Adria, Leah and the PC journey to Bastion's Keep, the only line of defense between Azmodan's forces and the rest of Sanctuary. While the others stay behind to protect the Black Soulstone, the PC pushes out from the keep into Mount Arreat. The PC kills Azmodan and traps his soul in the Black Soulstone. However, Adria betrays the PC and takes the Black Soulstone with the seven Demon Lords' souls inside. She reveals that she has been Diablo's agent from the beginning, and that Leah's father is the Dark Wanderer, who conceived her while being possessed by Diablo, making her the perfect vessel for the demon's physical form. Using Leah as a sacrifice, Adria resurrects Diablo. Having the souls of all the Lords of Hell within him, Diablo becomes the "Prime Evil," the most powerful demon in existence. He begins an assault on the High Heavens, the defending angels being no match for him.

Tyrael and the PC follow Diablo to the High Heavens while it is under attack. The defending angels warn the PC that Diablo is attempting to reach the Crystal Arch, which is the source of all of the angels' power. To prevent Diablo from corrupting the Crystal Arch and completing his victory over the High Heavens, the PC confronts and defeats him. With Diablo's physical manifestation destroyed, the Black Soulstone is shown falling from the High Heavens, apparently still intact. After the battle, Tyrael decides to rejoin the High Heavens but remains a mortal, dedicated to building a permanent alliance between angels and humans.

Gameplay

Gameplay is similar to that of previous titles in the Diablo franchise. The game is classified as a tactical action game that is played primarily using the mouse to direct the character with supplementary commands provided through the keyboard.

Diablo III's inventory and HUD retain a feel similar to that found in earlier games in the series, including a viewpoint reminiscent of the isometric view of Diablo III's predecessors. The inventory has sixty slots for items. Armor and weaponry each occupy two slots and all other items each occupy one slot. It can also be expanded to include details about the character's attributes.

The proprietary engine incorporates Blizzard's custom in-house physics, a change from the original usage of Havok's physics engine,^[7] and featuresdestructible environments with an in-game damage effect. The developers sought to make the game run on a wide range of systems without requiringDirectX 10.^[8] Diablo III uses a custom 3D game engine in order to present an overhead view to the player, in a somewhat similar way to the isometricview used in previous games in the series. Enemies utilize the 3D environment as well, in ways such as crawling up the side of a wall from the depths into the combat area.

Diablo III's skills window depicting the abilities of the wizard class.

As in Diablo II, multiplayer games are possible using Blizzard's Battle.net service, with many of the new features developed for StarCraft II also available in Diablo III.^[8] Players will be able to drop in and out of sessions of co-operative play with others. Unlike its predecessor, Diablo III requires players to be connected to the internet constantly due to their DRM policy, even for single-player games.


An enhanced quest system, a random level generator, and a random encounter generator are used in order to ensure the game provides different experiences when replayed.


Unlike previous iterations, gold can be picked up merely by touching it, or coming within range, adjusted by gear, rather than having to manually pick it up.^[15] One of the new features intended to speed gameplay is that health orbs drop from enemies, replacing the need to have a potion bar, which itself is replaced by a skill bar that allows a player to assign quick bar buttons to skills and spells; previously, players could only assign two skills (one for each mouse button) and had to swap skills with the keyboard or mousewheel. Players can still assign specific attacks to mouse buttons.


Skill runes, another new feature, are skill modifiers that are unlocked as the player levels up. Unlike the socketable runes in Diablo II, skill runes are not items but instead provide options for enhancing skills, often completely changing the gameplay of each skill.^[16] For example, one skill rune for the Wizard's meteor ability reduces its arcane power cost, while another turns the meteor to ice, causing cold damage rather than fire.

Hardcore mode

As in Diablo II, Diablo III gives players the choice to make hardcore characters. Players are required to first level up a regular character to level 10 before they have the option to create new Hardcore characters.^[18] Hardcore characters cannot be resurrected; instead they become permanently unplayable if they are killed. They also do not have access to the real-world money auction house.^[19] Hardcore characters are separately ranked; their names are highlighted with a different color (red); and they can only form teams with other hardcore characters. After dying, the ghost of a hardcore character can still chat, the name still shows up in rankings, but the character cannot return to the game.

Artisans

Artisans are NPCs who sell and craft. Two types of artisans can be introduced by completing a quest for each: Haedrig Eamon the Blacksmith and Covetous Shen the Jeweler. The previously announced Mystic Artisan has been pulled, possibly to be released later on.^[21] Artisans create items using materials the player can gather by scrapping acquired items and reducing them to their component parts. These materials are used to create items which will have random bonuses. Unlike Diablo II, rare and magic items can be enhanced, not just basic weaponry and armor. Crafting can also be used to train and improve the skills of the artisans rather than create new items. When artisans gain new levels, their shop reflects their higher skill level. The process of salvaging items into materials also makes inventory management easier. Blizzard stated that this crafting system was designed so that it would not slow down the pace of the game.

Followers

Followers are NPC allies that can accompany the player throughout the game world. There are three followers in Diablo III: Kormac the Templar, Lyndon the Scoundrel and Eirena the Enchantress, who each possess their own skills and background.As followers fight alongside the player, they gain new experience, skills, and equipment as they level up. Only one follower accompanies the player at a time, creating a gameplay strategy decision. Originally, followers were only going to appear in normal, single-player mode. However, Jay Wilson stated at BlizzCon 2011 that followers would continue to be usable in later difficulty levels.^[24] Followers will not appear in co-op games.

Auction house

How the Diablo III auction house looked in the early stages of development

On August 1, 2011, it was reported that Diablo III will feature two types of auction houses; one where players spend in-game gold and another where players can buy or sell virtual items for real-world money. The real-money auction house will not be available in Hardcore mode.


Blizzard has stated that nearly everything that drops on the ground, including gold, can be traded with other players directly or through the auction house system. Aside from certain bound on account items, which include items for the secret level^{[clarification needed (What secret level and what "item for the secret level"?)]}, there will be very few items that will be bound to a particular character and therefore un-tradable.


In order to get rated in South Korea, Blizzard had to drop the real-money auction house from the Korean release of the game as the auction house violated Korean anti-gambling laws.


In the gold-based auction house, a flat fee of 15 percent will be taken from the final sale price of an auction. The real-money auction house fees will be US$1, €1 or £1 (or equivalent) for equipment (weapons and armor) and 15 percent fee for commodity auctions, which include things like crafting materials, blacksmith and jewel crafting plans, and gold exchange. There is an additional 15 percent "cashing-out" fee from proceeds gained selling items in the real-money auction house.


While the gold-based auction house is available to any player regardless of which region they play in, the real-money auction is restricted to players on their home region. If they use the global play function to play in a different region, they will not be able to access the real-money auction house. The real money auction house was opened on June 12, 2012 (June 15 in the Americas).

PvP combat

Player versus player combat (PvP) has not yet been implemented in Diablo III, but has been announced. On March 9, 2012, Blizzard announced that PvP was delayed, and that they will enable it in a future patch.^[31] Lead designer Jay Wilson said in a post on Battle.net that the PvP Arena system will arrive in a post-release patch. "As we're counting down the days until we're ready to announce a release date for Diablo III, we've come to realize that the PvP game and systems aren't yet living up to our standards," he said. Blizzard said the PvP patch will add multiple Arena maps with themed locations and layouts, PvP-centric achievements, and a quick and easy matchmaking system. "We'll also be adding a personal progression system that will reward you for successfully bashing in the other team's skulls", Wilson added.


Players will participate in PvP by choosing from their existing characters, with access to all of the gear and skill they have gathered from playing the game in single-player or cooperative mode. There will be both ranked and unranked gametypes. When participating in ranked games, players will earn points for advancement based on the number of kills, accomplished objectives, and victories they acquire throughout matches. The points earned lead to achievements, titles, and other rewards.

Character classes

The five character classes of Diablo III. From left to right: Wizard, Witch Doctor, Demon Hunter, Barbarian, and Monk

Character creation screen with the Demon Hunter selected

There are five available character classes. In the previous two games, each class had a fixed gender, but in Diablo III players may choose the gender they would like to play.

• The Witch Doctor is a new character reminiscent of the Diablo II necromancer but with skills more traditionally associated with shamanism andvoodoo culture. The witch doctor has the ability to summon monsters, cast curses, harvest souls, and hurl poisons and explosives at his enemies. To power spells the Witch Doctor uses Mana, which regenerates slowly.


• The Barbarian has a variety of revamped skills at its disposal based on incredible physical prowess. The barbarian is able to whirlwind through crowds, cleave through swarms, leap across crags, crush opponents upon landing, and grapple-snap enemies into melee range. The resource used by the barbarian is fury, which is generated through getting attacked by enemies, attacking enemies and through certain abilities. Fury is used for certain strong abilities and degenerates over time.
  


• The Wizard is a version of the sorceress from Diablo II or the sorcerer from Diablo. The Wizard's abilities range from shooting lightning, fire and ice at their enemies to slowing time and teleporting past enemies and through walls. Wizards fuels their spells with arcane power, which is a fast regenerating power source.
  


• The Monk is a melee attacker, using martial arts to cripple foes, resist damage, deflect projectiles, attack with blinding speed, and land explosive killing blows. Monk gameplay combines the melee elements of Diablo II's assassin class with the "holy warrior" role of the paladin. Blizzard has stated that the monk is not related in any way to the monk class from the Sierra Entertainment-made Diablo: Hellfire expansion. The monk is fueled by spirit, which has defensive purposes and is slowly generated through attacking, though it does not degenerate.


• The Demon Hunter combines elements of Diablo II's amazon and assassin classes. Demon hunters use crossbows as their main weapon and can also throw small bombs at enemies. The demon hunter is fueled by both discipline and hatred: Hatred is a fast regenerating resource that is used for attacks, while discipline is a slow regenerating resource used for defensive abilities.
  

The Archivist class was presented on April 1, 2009, following in Blizzard's April Fool's Day joke tradition.


The non-inclusion of several of the classic Diablo II classes has been greeted with protest by some fans.


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