Diablo III: Blizzard Talks About Audience Differences, Perceptions and Expectations

Comparisons between Diablo III, its predecessor and Blizzard’s other game, World of Warcraft, are often voiced on the official Battle.net discussion forums.

Somewhat tired of the disdainful and often repetitive comments that often unfairly compare the games, Blizzard community manager Bashiok lays the hammer down and he points out the perceptions that different audiences tend to have of the game.

"Well I think it's kind of easy to look at changes and advancements in the RPG genre as a whole and narrow them down to any number of sources to fit each use.

To make a car analogy (my favorite!) it would be like having issues with the newest version of the mustang because its body styling takes into account things like passenger safety and aerodynamics, and being upset by this because these are features also found in the ford focus. A clearly inferior car in the eyes of the mustang enthusiast.

These types of ideas could never have been thought of or would ever be included in the mustang, of course, had not both cars been manufactured by ford.

It's just all a bit silly. What I do think is interesting is the differentiation between the hardcore Diablo II players (most of y'all) and the majority of the rest of the game buying public. From our showing at BlizzCon and PAX a lot of the articles and off-site (non fansite) discussions are saying that Diablo III may not be doing enough to change itself from Diablo II. If those people read some of the posts here you'd think we were putting a Diablo sticker on a WoW box and calling it a day. So it's just an interesting difference between the audiences and how level of dedication changes perceptions and expectation.

And I don't mean to lump everyone together, I'd say aside from the trolls the majority of posters here are actually level headed and logical. At least able to take multiple things into consideration. Reasonable thought process and understanding that the game is a work in progress, and not someone that sees a character with a slight hunch and makes a leap of logic that we must be using model/animation assets from a different game.

That's still my favorite. Cause of it bein' so stupid 'n all.

But anyway I guess what I'm getting at is... I'd really like to read something new and original. These posts are getting tired."

It’s rather interesting to note that while some people seem to think that the game is too radically different from its predecessor, others hold to the view that it isn’t doing enough to set itself apart. After all, the last thing any of us want is a 3D version of Diablo II. Right?