A Long Wait and the Long Awaited

July 3, 2008 on 8:03 am | In News | No Comments

Last week, I mentioned that I felt a sense of relief from the red-hot anticipation that has been plaguing me since the trio of next-gen consoles was released. I also predicted that the lull would not last, and, damn, sometimes I hate to be right. This Saturday at an event in Paris, Blizzard decided it wasn’t enough to have people frothing at the mouth for “Starcraft II” and announced the release of hell-bent action RPG “Diablo III.” Since then, the story has been the dominant talk around the ‘net, along with a long-awaited but apparently buggy PS3 patch. Let’s take each in turn shall we…

Item #1: Just for the Hell of it

In some respects, I guess it’s good to know that the people at Blizzard are using all the phat lootz from “World of Warcraft” for more than just lighting cigars and are actually making more games. Last Saturday Blizzard held its Worldwide Invitational event in Paris, which included competitions, “Wrath of the Lich King” info and a 20-minute gameplay video of *gasp!* “Diablo III.” Don’t even ask when the game’s coming out yet, don’t even begin to guess, estimate or speculate. You will only make your life miserable ‘cause this is Blizzard, a company about as notorious for its tendency to push back release dates as it is for the quality of its games.

I found the gameplay video quite appealing but others did not. As with “Starcraft II,” some fans feel the colorful high fantasy feel of “Warcraft” is seeping into Blizzard’s other franchises. Those disgruntled claim D3 is not keeping with the series dark, satanic tradition. In my view, the problem with this opinion is that it exaggerates on both sides. The originals were hardly horror games (a la Silent Hill) and the footage shown in Paris isn’t exactly Disney. If you really think the game would be better if it was simply less bright, than turn down the gamma on your screen. Moreover, the violence that typifies the series seems still in place, enemies die in bursts of gore and the giant boss at the video’s end rips someone’s head off. Hardly sounds like it’s getting watered down to me.

The graphics engine used to render it looked lush, fluid and detailed, particularly the backgrounds in the outdoor area. The Havocs-adapted physics added even more satisfaction to cutting down a swath of enemies. Still, if you disagree with me you can always be lame and go sign this petition.

Item #2: PS3 Firmware starts, stops and then gets pulled

Speaking of things promised and then long delayed, Sony also took the spotlight this week as it announced that it would finally implement in-game access to the XMB and an Achievements-esque Trophy system with its latest firmware update. While, I downloaded the update, installed it and found everything working as promised, many others begin to experience significant problems, so much so that the patch has now been pulled and is unavailable.

It begin when PS3 users started reporting a variety of problems, large and small, after installing the update. The most egregious of these causes the start-up screen to stall and effectively bricks the system, with the only solution being a hard drive reformat. Sony has stated they are aware of the issues and are currently working to fix the problems as soon as possible, etc.

On top of that, there have been a variety of conflicting reports concerning the availability of Trophies. Initially, some sources reported that Sony was pushing developers to make Trophies available for previously released games, overriding an earlier statement that only a few games would be retro-fitted in such a way. However, almost as soon as this story started popping up online, Sony come forward and denied ever promising such a thing.

Between the bugged release and the poor message management, what should have been a milestone week for the company has become an unsightly mess. Still wondering why Sony is in third place behind Microsoft and the unstoppable Wii?

-Frank Johnson