Jay Mohr is still on stage making people dance here at BlizzCon. Normally I'd be there capturing every nerdy moment of it, but I ditched the elves for a hot date with Diablo III and StarCraft II.
I can bring you a good portion of the costume contest, however. BlizzCon attendees put in a lot of work on their costumes, and there are always a few surprises--either with the quality of their robes, or with the intensity of their pandering.
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Stuck in a day-long WoW raid on the first day of BlizzCon? We've got you covered.
There was a huge volume of news and media released today out of Blizzard's show. Here's a handy compilation of everything we covered, broken up by title:
Diablo III director Jay Wilson said today that the company does not have a great desire to charge a subscription fee for the upcoming revision of its multiplayer client Battle.net. However, the developer did note that Blizzard will likely monetize unknown features of the game.
"We are going to monetize features so that we get to make them," said Wilson. "We kind of have to."
Wilson noted that whatever the content would be, it would have an appropriate value to users.
Fans of map hacking and other Diablo II modifications have little to look forward to with the sequel, as Wilson shot down any talk of mod support.
"We don't have a lot of plans to do that. It would make our lives so much harder" he said, adding that despite the fact that he and many other designers got their start in modding, the team takes a strong stance on the hacking of their games.
Wilson also used the panel to reemphasize the trading aspect of Diablo III, saying th...
Welcome to the weekend. Before you rush into your festivities--whatever they may be--take a moment to reflect on the week you've just had. If you've been busy, we're here to catch you up. Let's get started.
Blizzard Fans Christmas comes early for the Blizz faithful as BlizzCon 08 kicks off. Expect lots more about Diablo III, StarCraft II, and World of Warcraft this weekend. Keep up with our BlizzCon 08 coverage for the latest.
Storage Solutions
The perennial PC gamer's problem of "more disk space needed" hits home consoles hard as Microsoft tackles fitting the New Xbox Experience onto Xbox 360 systems without hard drives. Plus, at the end of last week Ninten...
Ubisoft sent along a new trailer for Far Cry 2, in the works at its Montreal studio. Viewers are introduced to the Jackal--the player's primary objective--and all the shady characters one must go through in order to reach him.
In development for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, Far Cry 2 puts players in war-torn Africa on October 21.
Bungie's Halo 3: Recon (X360) has been the subject of much rumor and speculation for months, and some of that still lingers after the game was made official during the Tokyo Game Show this week. With that in mind, let's look at what's set to enter into the standalone Halo series that arrives in Fall 2009.
Destructoid attended a TGS conference where it was made clear that the game takes place "during the events leading up to Master Chief's return to New Mombasa," meaning that the game takes place between the last two Halo games. The official launch trailer shows an Earth setting, and Bungie's Luke Smith echoed that fact: Recon is "less of a galactic romp" than the original Halo 3.
Blizzard today announced that StarCraft II will be released as a trilogy of separate games, each concentrating on one of the universe's three factions.
The first game in the trilogy will consist of the Terran campaign, and is set to be titled "Terrans: Wings of Liberty."
The second Zerg-focused title will be "Zerg: Heart of the Swarm," with the third game being "Protoss: Legacy of the Void."
Blizzard designers revealed new details of StarCraft II's single-player campaign during a panel at the company's BlizzCon convention today.
Players will take on the role of Jim Raynor during the Terran campaign. The campaign begins on Mar Sara, the point of first contact with the Zerg in the original StarCraft.
"Depending on which missions you choose and which order, you may open up five planets [at once]," said Blizzard's Rob Pardo of the game's non-linear, planet-based progression.
As the game begins, Raynor is fighting a losing battle against the Terran Domninion, lead by Arcturus Mengsk. A new character named Tichus Findlay wil...
Sony Worldwide Studios head Shuhei Yoshida showed up at this week's Tokyo Game Show and, typical of a Sony executive, had quite a few opinions on his company and his competitors.
Yoshida was generous in his praise toward rival Microsoft and the Xbox 360, saying that he would "really like to see both PS3 and 360 succeed [in Japan]" in an interview with Eurogamer. He added a compliment for the upcoming New Xbox Experience: "I think it's quite nice. I like the Avatar designs they're working on."
Mirroring Nintendo's fabled storage problems for the Wii, Microsoft will soon share the feeling: the New Xbox Experience, the Xbox 360 dashboard overhaul due in November, will be too big for some systems without permanent storage.
"The New Xbox Experience will require 128MB of free space," reads a Microsoft press release. "While we expect the majority of consumers to download the New Xbox Experience without a problem, a small percentage of Xbox 360 owners do not have enough memory to accommodate the update."
In its entry-level "Arcade" trim, the console comes with no permanent storage space where...
Though Diablo 3 is currently only confirmed for the PC, Blizzard president Mike Morhaime has once again suggested that the long-awaited action-RPG may end up on consoles as well.
"Every game we have the discussion about which platforms make the most sense," Morhaime stated in an interview at BlizzCon. "As Diablo 3 takes shape, I think we'll do an evaluation."
"I think there is a pretty good argument to be made that that type of game might work very well on consoles," he added. "There might be some technical limitations though that we might need to get past."
Rock Band developer Harmonix has bestowed more DLC upon us from on high. This week's DLC is the full album from metal outfit Motley Crue, "Dr. Feelgood." The ten-song album can be purchased collectively for 1280 Microsoft Points ($16) or with individual tracks for 160 Points ($2) each.
Per console marketplace traditions, the tracks will hit the Rock Band Store on the Xbox 360 on Tuesday, October 14 and the PlayStation 3 on Thursday, October 16.
The full listing of tracks--all master recordings--is as follows:
Continuing our ongoing coverage of BlizzCon, we have compiled a complete list of the Wizard class talent trees found in the playable demo of Diablo 3.
As with World of Warcraft, each talent category has multiple tiers, requiring a certain amount of skill points to be spent in the previous tier before the next one is unlocked. For example, 5 skill points must be used in the first tier to access the second.
Along with the below skills, Diablo 3 features a new Skill Rune system, allowing more modification of the talents. For example, adding a M...
Two new videos showing StarCraft II have arrived from BlizzCon, currently in progress. Included is lots of new gameplay footage showing Zerg and Terran forces scouting one another before attacking. The second video features a larger battle between Protoss and Terran armies.
Diablo III lead designer Jay Wilson revealed the Skill Rune system of skill modification during his talk at BlizzCon.
Skill Runes are skill-modifying items that are randomly dropped by monsters and used across all classes. They can be attached to each skill like an item, often completely changing the gameplay of each skill.
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The lead designer showed off the Teleport skill with a Striking rune, turning the spell into an offensive skill that can destroy enemies. The Skull of Flame skill was modified by the Multistrike Rune, which split the single fireball into multiple splashing attacks, to the crowd's enormous delight.
The Electrocute spell was modified with Multistrike, turning it into a Chain Lightning-esque spell. The Lethality rune added an explosion effect to Electrocute, splattering enemies on contact.
Wilson first took the crowd through the evolution of the current Diablo III skill system...
Providing a break from today's continuous BlizzCon 08 coverage, publisher Activision has provided a new trailer for Shaba Games's Spider-Man: Web of Shadows, which arrives on October 21 for PC, PS2, PS3, Xbox 360, Wii, Nintendo DS and PSP.
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Shackvideo users can use the HD Stream.
My jaw literally dropped in a moment of pure gaming geekiness as I spotted the retro gaming section of BlizzCon.
Playable stations of past Blizzard titles such as The Lost Vikings, Blackthorne, Rock N' Roll Racing, and the original Diablo and Warcraft titles are set up in a prime location.
Blizzard has always imbued its event with a sense of the company's history. Last year a display of memorabilia adorned the upper floor of the floor, but this year, having playable versions of the games that founded the company is an unexpected treat for attendees.
Blizzard has opened up a page on the Diablo III website for the Wizard, the new player class announced this morning. Five videos show the class' new effects in action, which we've combined into one trailer below.
Seen in the trailer are the Disintegrate, Electrocute, Teleport, Magic Missile, and Slow Time powers.
Straight from BlizzCon, we now present you with the new Diablo 3 trailer that was shown moments ago during the BlizzCon opening ceremony.
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Shackvideo users can use the HD Stream. You can also download the original video from FileShack.
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Christmas comes early for the Blizz faithful as BlizzCon 08 kicks off. Expect lots more about Diablo III, StarCraft II, and World of Warcraft this weekend. Keep up with our 
The perennial PC gamer's problem of "more disk space needed" hits home consoles hard as Microsoft tackles 
