Launch Station: Diablo III

There has no game that I can possibly think of that has been as highly anticipated as Diablo III.  Starcraft II comes to mind, but I personally believe Diablo III's anticipation trumps that of Blizzard's other franchises, Starcarft and Warcraft.  Some gamers have waited 12 long years for this one game that May 15th will be a significant date in their gaming lives.  It is not hard to imagine stores crowded and servers pushed to capacity as millions of gamers looking to play Diablo III.

Two decades after the events of Diablo II, a fiery harbinger of doom strikes the very ground where Diablo once entered the world of Sanctuary.  This fiery harbinger from the sky reawakens the ancient evils of the Prime Evils.  As a hero of the Sanctuary, you are called upon to defend humanity against the army of the Burning Hells once again.  At the beginning of the game, you are able to create your hero from five different classes.  These classes that you can choose from are witch doctor, barbarian, wizard, monk and demon hunter.  At Diablo's core, it is a dungeon crawler in the truest forms.  You accept quests, complete randomly generated levels, battle monsters and collect tons of loot.  With 12 years since Diablo II, Blizzard has had a lot of time to add new features to Diablo in its' third entry.  Some of these new features are destructible environments, in-game damage effects, the ability to pick up gold and loot by just touching it, replacing the potion bar with a skill bar, having enemies drop health orbs to replenish your health and skill runes.   There are two big new features in Diablo III that might possibly rub certain gamers the wrong way.  First is that Diablo III requires players to be constantly connected to the internet in order to play, even in single-player.  The second feature is the Auction House, which allows players to auction in-game items for real money.  Also Diablo III features co-op play and player vs. player battles with up to six players.

I can see why gamers love Diablo.  Blizzard created a game in which gamers could lose themselves in for thousands of hours, finding new encounters with enemies or new pieces of loot around every corner.  It is engaging, extremely gratifying and has an incredible amount of polish.  Personally I have never cared for anything Blizzard has developed.  I tried Starcraft, Starcraft II and Warcraft III.  After playing them, I found that Blizzard games just don't interest me or even appeal to me as a gamer.  Other than a few games here and there, I have never really been that big into PC gaming.  Sure, there are certain games like Dragon Age that I will only play on the PC, but I am not what you call a hardcore PC gamer.  Never been into upgrading my computer every couple of months.  While I might not care for Diablo III, there are certainly millions of gamers out there than do and have already bought the game and have been playing for the past day.  For those on the edge, give Diablo II a try or wait until Blizzard releases a demo for the game or see some reviews of the game.