Blizzard on Thursday announced that its highly anticipated follow-up to the hit game Diablo II will be available on May 15th. Digital copies of Diablo III can be pre-ordered starting Thursday for $59.99. The game’s story picks up twenty years after its predecessor, and a new generation of heroes must now face the forces of evil. Players will be able to choose from a barbarian, a monk, a demon hunter, a witch doctor and a wizard. Blizzard’s fast-paced hack and slash action role-playing game will be available at retailers throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, South Korea, Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau. The digital version will be available in Mexico, Argentina, Chile and Brazil as well, but gamers in Latin American countries and Russia will have to wait until June 7th. Read on for Blizzard’s press release.

DIABLO® III MAY 15

Battle.net® presales for the hottest game of 2012 NOW LIVE

World of Warcraft® Annual Pass Promotion Ends May 1

IRVINE, Calif. — March 15, 2012 — The end is nigh! Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. today announced that Diablo® III, the next chapter in its critically acclaimed action role-playing game series, will be unleashed from the Burning Hells on May 15.

Starting that day, gamers with a thirst for fast-paced action and adventure will be able to purchase Diablo III at retailers throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, South Korea, Southeast Asia, Australia, New Zealand, and the regions of Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macau. In addition, gamers in the regions above as well as in Mexico, Argentina, Chile, and Brazil will be able to buy Diablo III digitally via Blizzard’s Battle.net® website.

Players in the listed Latin American countries and in Russia will be able to purchase Diablo III at local retail locations starting June 7. Digital availability for the Russian version of the game will also begin June 7. In addition to the English version, Diablo III will be fully localized into Latin American Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, French, German, European Spanish, Italian, Polish, Russian, Korean, and Traditional Chinese.

Blizzard also kicked off global digital presales for Diablo III today. Would-be wizards, witch doctors, demon hunters, barbarians, and monks throughout the world should head to http://www.blizzard.com/games/d3/ now to reserve their digital copies.

“After many years of hard work by our development team and months of beta testing by hundreds of thousands of dedicated players around the world, we’re now in the homestretch,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “We look forward to putting the final polish on Diablo III over the next two months and delivering the ultimate action-RPG experience to gamers worldwide starting on May 15.”

Diablo III will be available for Windows® XP/Windows Vista®/Windows® 7 and Macintosh® at a suggested price of $59.99 USD for both the retail DVD-ROM version and the digital version sold directly from Blizzard. A special alabaster-white Collector’s Edition, sold exclusively in retail stores at a suggested retail price of $99.99 USD, will include the full game on DVD-ROM, a behind-the-scenes Blu-ray/DVD two-disc set, the Diablo III soundtrack CD, a 208-page Art of Diablo III book, and a 4 GB USB soulstone (including full versions of Diablo II and Diablo II: Lord of Destruction®) and corresponding Diablo skull base, as well as exclusive in-game content for Diablo III, World of Warcraft®, and StarCraft® II: Wings of Liberty®. Diablo III has received a Mature rating from the ESRB.

World of Warcraft players interested in getting Diablo III free are encouraged to join the more than 1 million players who have already signed up for the World of Warcraft Annual Pass.* Through this promotion, with a 1-year commitment to World of Warcraft, players will receive a free digital copy of Diablo III — which they’ll be able to start playing immediately on May 15 — as well as an exclusive World of Warcraft in-game mount and access to the World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria™ beta test. This offer will no longer be available as of 12:01 a.m. PDT on May 1. Learn more at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/annualpass.

In Diablo III, players take on the role of one of five heroic characters — barbarian, witch doctor, wizard, monk, or demon hunter — and engage in pulse-pounding combat with endless legions of evil. As they undertake an epic quest to rid Sanctuary from the corrupting forces of the Burning Hells, players will explore diverse and perilous settings, grow in experience and ability, acquire artifacts of incredible power, and meet key characters who’ll join them in battle or aid them in other ways.

Diablo III was built from the ground up to leverage the full functionality of the Battle.net platform, which delivers powerful matchmaking and communication tools, allowing adventurers to seamlessly join forces for exciting cooperative play. Battle.net also provides a secure infrastructure for the Diablo III auction house, a feature-rich marketplace that Sanctuary’s heroes can use to trade their hard-earned treasures. Players will be able to buy and sell weapons, armor, and other valuable items in the auction house in exchange for in-game gold. Players will also have the option to receive real-world currency for auction house sales, which they can apply to their Battle.net Balance for the purchase of a variety of digital products through Battle.net, including Diablo III auction house items, or cash out through a third-party payment service such as PayPal™ in most regions. Further details related to the auction house will be announced in the coming weeks.

For more information on Diablo III, please visit the official website at http://www.diablo3.com. To set up a Battle.net account and to opt-in to Blizzard Entertainment beta tests, please visit the official Battle.net website at http://www.battle.net. With multiple games in development, Blizzard Entertainment has numerous positions currently available — visit http://jobs.blizzard.com for more information and to learn how to apply.

*Based on internal company records.

Following one of the largest leaks in game developer history, Blizzard China General Manager Ye Weilun has left the company for reasons that have not been revealed. The leak, which occurred last week, included a bevy of sensitive information such as confidential financial data and budgets, personal subscriber data and the company’s product roadmap for the next four years. The roadmap, shown above, reveals Blizzard’s timeline for upcoming releases like the third and fourth installments of the company’s popular World of Warcraft franchise, the third Diablo game and a new title called Titan. Blizzard’s leaked financial data and its subscriber database are rumored to have been delivered to one or more of the company’s competitors. Former sales director of Nokia China Dai Jinhe has replaced Weilun as General Manager of Blizzard China.

[Via MMOGameSite.com]

Read

Yesterday was a big day for Nokia Internet Tablet owners. The N810 and N800 each got a firmware update codenamed “Diablo” and while some refer to it as a minor release, this couldn’t be further from the truth. Why? Let’s look at the change log highlights:

• SSU (seamless software updating) enabling components of the OS to be updated without having to flash/rewrite the entire operating system
• Over-the-air (OTA) updates via Wi-Fi and WiMax connections
• Update of the email client to Modest with several enhancements to the user interface and additional support of several mobile-friendly email features
• Addition of Chinese fonts to the system font list
• Miscellaneous bug fixes to OpenSSL
• Browser panning fixes
• Support for A-GPS in the N810 and N810WE
• Wayfinder GPS application updates
• Additional unspecified features

The first two entries are key. A huge annoyance with both S60 and Internet Tablet devices is the update procedure. In short, all data is lost. Backing up and restoring rarely goes smoothly and even on the rare occasion it does, it’s still time consuming and bothersome. Seamless software updating and automatic OTA application updates mean that everything – from firmware to installed apps – will be easily and seamlessly updated as new versions become available. Update your firmware without losing personal data and files; update your apps automatically over the air as soon as new versions become available. Good stuff indeed.

Read