Not tried the D3 beta out at all yet, waiting for the main release but it's hard to stay away, I poured so many hours into Diablo 2. Got it 'free' because of my annual commitment to their other digital narcotic, but if it ends up having any kind of hold on me like #2 did I'll be wasting a subscription fee on a game I'll have pretty much stopped playing.

I'm thrilled - I ordered the collector's edition so I'm currently downloading and will be playing this weekend. Yippee!

It's actually a ton of fun!
Play the Witch Doctor, he's awesome!
Can't wait for the release.

As for all of the people with the 'new' vs 'old' Blizzard nonsense, honestly shut the fuck up.
Especially if you haven't played the games.

Tried it. Fun for a while but a little underwhelming. I don't see very many improvements compared to D2.

Am I missing something or does the game have absolutely no character building mechanics? Your attributes are allocated automatically and all skills eventually become available to switch between at any time. Seems like the only way to really improve or customize a character is through better items. Feels a little dumbed down, but I suppose the upside is allowing gameplay based on choosing the right skill for the situation.

Edit: read this. Seems like they really plan to rely very heavily on items for character customization. I suppose it can work.

Well, it certainly is dumbed down if your definition of clever is having to start a new character from zilch every time you want to try something new.

I'm not far right now but I did see you can customize the skills you have by assigning them a certain rune. (like the only one I have now allows that particular skill to teleport to the enemy too). Although I imagine you can switch them around after you unlock the others (level based it seems).

Pretty much, considering that the game hasn't been released and that I'd have to buy a new computer, I'll probably wait until I buy my new computer for Wasteland 2 and Shadow run when they come out and try the free version of Diablo 3. I may very well change my mind, although it won't erase the silliness of it all.

I'm still a tad insulted by the rather thin justification for going multiplayer only. I think that if I really want to play multiplayer that I'll either do so from the beginning or start over.

Pretty much it's definitely going to be viewed more favorably by some than others, especially the hardcore multiplay gamers.. I think that if it wasn't a sequel to the original SC and it hadn't taken a decade or so to be released that I would think much more highly of it. But, it just feels like a minor upgrade to SC as far as single player goes. And as far as multiplayer goes, SC is probably the last RTS that I'd personally want to play in multiplayer as it has become an esport for many people rather than a more friendly online game.

And yes, I definitely think the $60 for only one race in the campaign was a dumb idea. One of my favorite things about the original was the ability to progress through three very different campaigns if I felt like doing so.

Dunno if it is dumbed down, as I've not played it, but I'll take dumbing down over "you fucked up, now start from the beginning" any day.
If you use the whole package, I'll say the money is worth it. For the single player only (without multiplayer, challenges, mods), I dunno, it probably is not worth $60.

Btw, you don't have to play ranked games, you can always play on user created maps, or play ladder maps without the ranking and competitiveness going on. Hmm... I wonder if the starter edition allows people to play on user created maps... that would be great.

Somewhat related, Blizzard DOTA will be free, it will use the starter edition of SC2, unless they make it a totally new game (still free, though, it may come with microtransactions) (there have been some rumors about that).

Ouch, I don't generally like that. One of the problems I had with D2 was that there was effectively one correct set of skills for each class and only a small number of correct ways of allocating stat points. If they haven't bothered to fix that problem then they might as well just allocate the stat points for you.

Of all the things in D2 to fix, I would have thought this would be the thing. I don't really care as I'll be playing the starter version before I buy a copy and if it works it works, otherwise I'll just continue playing Torchlight.

That's probably the best word I could use too. I got in the 1st or 2nd wave of the beta, can't remember, and played it off and on since. It's alright and everything, but I just have this blah feeling the whole time while playing it. I'm hoping it is because of the severe lack of content in the beta more than anything else.

Just played through the entire (short) beta once. I can see how the new skill system can ease some frustration. It looks nice and runs surprisingly well on my crappy lappie even with everything turned way down with exception of texture and resolution. Though I did feel like just going through the motions. I was a bit bored there at the end.

I don't think I'll bite anytime soon. You know what's funny? I was missing my loot carrying pet from Torchlight all of a sudden. It certainly reduced a lot of the tediousness of dumping your undesirables. Yeah, I'll just wait for Torchlight 2, even if it may end up having absolutely atrocious cutscenes (they should have simply stuck with how they handled it in the original). Plus, it'll only run me a third of Diablo 3's asking price, I know it will run very well on my lappie on high, and it should be more than enough for my hack-and-slash needs. No online requirement silliness is a bonus, too.

I've only ever seen this work once, Crimson Alliance has no XP at all, you earn gold and buy equipment, that's your "leveling up". You can find equipment too, even good stuff. This allows you to "respec" simply by swapping out your gear... actually it was refreshingly simple, though it sounded distressing as fuck when I first heard about it.

But literally, there was NO XP AT ALL. No stat points to "assign", no levels, no skills points to "assign", etc. I don't know that going the hybrid route would make this work out nearly so well.

The Phantasy Star series had XP and basically gold, but would assign the points you got based upon the class of the particular team member and assign abilities as well. It worked, but it really takes a way from any sense of ownership of the character to have the game deciding how it gets customized.

Pretty much all you got to do was buy equipment, and that was fairly limited and you'd always choose the best you could get.

Getting ready to try it out - really impressed with the download speed. Its been solid the whole time.