Diablo® III

Those poor handling of balance / bugs in previous patches, unskilled responses of the community managers, removal of pvp at release, and various other things that people are complaining, could be engineered to make sure people won't stick with D3 for too long and go back to WoW instead.

Thoughts?

People can't "go back to Wow" if they've never played it, and I'm guessing that this applies to most D3 players. So releasing a poorly developed D3 is more likely to ensure that potential new customers never take a look at WoW, than it is to bring WoW players back sooner than their inevitable return.

After how blizzard has handled cataclysm & diablo3 it's doubtful that I will pick up another blizzard product anytime soon. They keep making changes to their games that don't benefit the players. Not to mention how they have abandoned diablo3 after making some very questionable changes. I mean we all know blizzard employees really don't play the products. If they did everyone would be complaining in house about the quality of their games.

Heck even bashiok(drysc) probably doesn't even play this game anymore and I am fairly certain he was amped up for it. That says a lot about the game when even a community manager is avoiding the forums, and probably not even bothering to play this game anymore. A game that has people on the edge of their seats for well over a decade. I have learned a lesson though companies will use nostalgic game titles to get some easy cash one more time.

Those poor handling of balance / bugs in previous patches, unskilled responses of the community managers, removal of pvp at release, and various other things that people are complaining, could be engineered to make sure people won't stick with D3 for too long and go back to WoW instead.

Thoughts?

People can't "go back to Wow" if they've never played it, and I'm guessing that this applies to most D3 players. So releasing a poorly developed D3 is more likely to ensure that potential new customers never take a look at WoW, than it is to bring WoW players back sooner than their inevitable return.

Of course many D3 players have never played WoW but what I see is there are also a lot of players who are playing or played both. Though I guess only Blizz has the precise number how many people have both games.

If you look closely at the Zapruder film you can see Jay and a few blues standing on the grassy knoll. Further, it's a documented fact that in every interview you can see Jay holding a copy of Catcher in the Rye.

@OP

You don't take into account how many people switched form WoW to D3 in the first place. Most will probably switch back to Wow when MoP gets released. Hardly a secret conspiracy....you got D3 with an annual WoW pass.

07/27/2012 04:12 AMPosted by Armanisani

we have to take down blizzard. they're becoming too powerful. where's our john connor we need to take down blizzard.

Well get to it, then! How are you planning to "take them down"?

@OP

You don't take into account how many people switched form WoW to D3 in the first place. Most will probably switch back to Wow when MoP gets released. Hardly a secret conspiracy....you got D3 with an annual WoW pass.

Right. Actually even the latest blue post was about instructing people who bought annual pass how to get the bonus WoW subscription. It is essentially an official announcement that "You people stop playing D3 now and go to WoW!" =/

07/27/2012 03:16 AMPosted by zeroxxx

What's the point of developing a game for many years only to see it so short-lived?

They can make the game real bad and sell millions. As long as it fits the bill. This is the new Blizzard we're talking about. Success to them is how much they made in sales, not about the customer experience.

07/27/2012 03:17 AMPosted by Fossor

And, they killed Deckard Cain!

With butterflies.....

Blues have been relatively quiet recently despite everyone are still waiting for the balance patch 1.04 and pvp patch 1.1.

On the other hand, Blizz announced the release date of WoW: MoP expansion a few days ago, which will be about 2 months from now. Chance is that they want to have more people going back to WoW before / when MoP is live, instead of keep playing D3. Therefore, they intentionally ignore the D3 community and slow down the speed of patching.

To take it further, it is possible that the overall fail of D3 is working as intended. Those poor handling of balance / bugs in previous patches, unskillful responses of the community managers, removal of pvp at release, and various other things that people are complaining, could be engineered to make sure people won't stick with D3 for too long and go back to WoW instead.

Thoughts?

If that was their plan then they fail at keeping WoW players as well. After the Diablo 3 fiasco I canceled the WoW subscription I had had for years and have no intention of buying Mists of Pandering. Thanks to Diablo 3 I have discovered other games I enjoy as much I had Blizzard games in the past, and I don’t feel used and abused by the companies that make them.

Nah. Maybe if they did something similar to New Coke (which the coca cola company didn't actually attempt, they said they weren't that smart) and actually made a new patch that made D3 much better (like old coke), that I can see.

Though really though, Diablo III failing is a bad idea. That is a blow to one of their franchises (they only have 3 major ones currently) and their reputation, so they need D3 to succeed.

Even if D3 was not profitable and actually lost them money, they would still work on it for it to succeed if only so they can sell future products (like Diablo IV or D3 on consoles) more easily.