In Paris, 2008, there was the "Worldwide Invitational", a Blizzard convention much like BlizzCon but much smaller scale (About ~7k people in total went).
Many rumors were going around about the announcement of a new game. Even more rumors about "Diablo III", which had been said to be in the works for almost a decade. After the opening ceremony, Mike Morhaime gave his usual speech and started dropping hints, gave a long lead up to "Blizzard's newest game".
And without saying any name, a musician came on stage and started doing the Tristram riff. Everybody immediately understands what's going on. The lights go red. Everybody yelling and clapping - unbelievable excitement.
Cinematic starts. Chills. Still no name for that "new game". The cinematic starts cutting faster and faster, hinting more and more at Diablo until we see Diablo himself in a cut. And then... three fiery claws across the screen lead into the name: "Diablo III".
There's no way I can do that story justice, but this was one of the most incredible announcement Blizzard has done - and since WWI doesn't get as much coverage as BlizzCon, not many people got to hear about it. Here's two videos:
Sadly I didn't find that D3 lived up to D2 and D1 atmosphere-wise. The ending of the first chapter put me off the game entirely -- I guess they were trying to shift the focus of the story to other characters for a new audience.
I can't put my finger on it, but somehow D3 felt less connected to D1 and D2 than D2 did to D1.
In Paris, 2008, there was the "Worldwide Invitational", a Blizzard convention much like BlizzCon but much smaller scale (About ~7k people in total went).
Many rumors were going around about the announcement of a new game. Even more rumors about "Diablo III", which had been said to be in the works for almost a decade. After the opening ceremony, Mike Morhaime gave his usual speech and started dropping hints, gave a long lead up to "Blizzard's newest game".
And without saying any name, a musician came on stage and started doing the Tristram riff. Everybody immediately understands what's going on. The lights go red. Everybody yelling and clapping - unbelievable excitement.
Cinematic starts. Chills. Still no name for that "new game". The cinematic starts cutting faster and faster, hinting more and more at Diablo until we see Diablo himself in a cut. And then... three fiery claws across the screen lead into the name: "Diablo III".
There's no way I can do that story justice, but this was one of the most incredible announcement Blizzard has done - and since WWI doesn't get as much coverage as BlizzCon, not many people got to hear about it. Here's two videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQk_CT7fY9E (from the audience)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ogXqCNkyHE