RipTen Videogame Blog » Diablo III

Diablo III Undergoes Further Beta Changes – Companion Pets Cut From Release

Jensen Walker — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 23:30:29 +0000

The latest beta patch deploy for Diablo III has resulted in a few more changes to the much anticipated action RPG, with Scrolls of Companion and Scrolls of Reforging being removed from the game.

Blizzard Community Manager Nethaera took to the Diablo III forums today to explain the features were cut due to the development team feeling they were undeveloped, and unsuitable for a live release. Additionally, companion pets were considered too cute and cuddly for the dark and gritty world of Sanctuary.

According to Nethaera, “Neither of those are issues we felt like we could solve without a lot of additional work, and we’re trying to close in on a solid release date for the game, not move further away. When weighing these systems against releasing the game, we decided to cut these scrolls and stay on track for the game’s release.”

Blizzard intends to redesign and evolve companion pets and reforging scrolls into a more meaningful and enjoyable system at some point in the future.

Diablo III Senior Producer Leaves Blizzard for “Bigger and Better Things”

Jacob Saylor — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 17:00:59 +0000

Steve Parker was the Senior Producer on Diablo 3 at Blizzard up until this past Friday when he tweeted:

“Hey Twitter, I’m no longer working at Blizzard or on D3. I’ve had a great 5 years there and those guys are going to kill it with Diablo.”

This leaves the company with a gaping hole in their Irvine offices, but with work mostly complete on Diablo 3, it’s unlikely that his departure will cause any major setbacks on development of the game.

The reasons behind his leaving Blizzard are currently unknown, but we here at RipTen believe that in the next few days more information will become available on the subject. While things look to be fairly mundane on both ends, you never know in this industry. In a response over Twitter to another user, he had this to say:

“Thanks! Looking forward to bigger and better things.”

Here’s to seeing Mr. Parker succeed in his future endeavors, so that he may continue to bring us all awesome games for years to come.

Diablo III Rated in South Korea; The Rest of the World Still Pending

Jensen Walker — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 20:00:24 +0000

There has been a lot of hype and a lot of anticipation surrounding Diablo III, and while Blizzard still hasn’t confirmed a release date, the game has been rated ‘R’ by the South Korean Gaming Board. An R rating means the action RPG is considered suitable for ages 18 and above.

Generally, when ratings start to be issued it means a game is within a few months of hitting the shelves, so perhaps we’re looking at a March release. Blizzard has removed the controversial real money transactions auction house from the Korean version of the game in order to gain ratings approval due to Korea’s gambling laws, and this seems to have paved the way for the game’s eventual release.

Now we wait for ratings approval elsewhere before finally getting our hands on the title. It might be interesting to see what sort of rating the Australian Classification Board slaps on the game now that they finally have an R rating of their own (and it was a long time coming). Until then, enjoy whichever game is your current vice!

Source: Dualshockers

Diablo III on Consoles? You Bet Your Ass.

Justin Carter — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 23:13:07 +0000

If you’re someone who’s shown an interest in a Blizzard game, but doesn’t have the money to shell for a high-end PC, you’re in luck. After some vague talking, Blizzard has announced that Diablo III is coming to us console kiddies. Blizzard Community manager Micah Whipple confirmed on his Twitter when asked about the possibility:

“Yup. Josh Mosqueira is lead designer for the Diablo console project.”

Mosqueira himself decided to pitch in on the talk by tweeting that Blizzard needs designers for consoles:

“Are you a game designer? Do you love Diablo? What about Diablo on console? If so we’re looking for you…”

At this time, there haven’t been any specific consoles announced, or a release date. But still, a Blizzard game coming to the consoles. Pretty sweet, right?

via IGN

Blizzard Denies Diablo III Release Date Rumors

Catherine Cai — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 16:30:34 +0000

Best Buy has recently been stirring up the rumor pot that Diablo III‘s release date is set for February 1st. A photo of a Best Buy showing off a large poster with the same release date in a retail store in Rochester, Minnesota has been floating around on the internet (shown above) started the rumors in the first place. Although the photo has since been taken down, Best Buy’s online store still shows the same release date.

Sadly, Diablo III fans, it appears that Best Buy’s release date is false. Blizzard community manager Bashiok denied the February 1st release date on his Twitter feed, stating,

“Diablo III does not have a release date. Any store or person claiming otherwise is guessing,

Retailers will not know a date until its officially announced through a press release.

We can’t really keep every individual retail shop from making up a date.”

It looks like we’re back in the waiting game boat. The best thing we can do now is pray hard for an early 2012 release.

[Via VG247]

Did You Know Diablo’s Deckard Cain Is A Kid From South Dakota?

Dave Oshry — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 20:00:05 +0000

Greetings friend. Stay awhile and listen to this tale.

Back in the early 90′s, Blizzard held a very vague contest for an unannounced game. The contest involved sending them a post card with your name on it. One father in South Dakota had a newborn baby with a such a cool name that he decided to put HIS name on the postcard and send it in to Blizzard. That baby’s name? Deckard Cain Elder.

Sixteen years later, young Mr. Elder seems to have discovered Reddit, and decided to share his tale.

According to him:

My first name comes from Harrison Ford’s character in the movie Blade Runner, my middle name is my mother’s maiden name, and my last name is my fathers family name.

I wonder if he’ll hang out with that boy named Dovahkiin when he grows up? Anyway, back to the story.

About six months after entering contest, the Elder family received a box from Blizzard.

Inside the box were several things:

A long yellow envelope, a copy of Diablo, a black hat with Blizzard in blue printed on the front, a very large Diablo T-shirt, and a blue statue of Diablo that stand a little over a foot tall.

rawr.

Also inside the envelope was a letter from Bill Roper, the producer of Diablo.

Said letter explained that young Deckard had won a grand prize. He would soon have his name in Diablo, Blizzard’s upcoming RPG. The rest, as they say, is history.

You know what else is cool about Deckard Cain? He raps:

Stay tuned to RipTen for more interesting stuff you never needed to know.

New Diablo III Trailer Is Epic

Catherine Cai — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 02:55:26 +0000

Blizzard, newly dubbed VGA Gamer Gods, showed off another Diablo III trailer, making us wonder once again Deckard Cain’s age and how he’s still sprightly enough to constantly dodge fireballs.

Here goes, in all its concept-art-demons glory:

Get More: GameTrailers.com, Diablo III – VGA 2011: Exclusive Cinematic Trailer HD, PC Games, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

Blizzard COO Says Diablo III Offer is a Show of Gratitude to WoW Players

Jensen Walker — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 18:51:27 +0000

As revealed at Blizzcon last week, players who subscribe to World of Warcraft for a period of one year will be entitled to a free digital copy of Blizzard’s action RPG Diablo III. According to Blizzard COO Paul Sams, this offer is a way to thank subscribers for continuing to support and play their flagship MMO.

“We talk about, all the time, how can we do something cool for our players that’s going to benefit them, benefit us, and that they’ll feel is a give-back of sorts,” Sams said. “That’s where this started. There’s a variety of benefits that come from it. Certainly the players get DIII, which is pretty exciting. That doesn’t mean they get the expansion sets, it means that they get DIII, right? So we get people excited about playing that … they get to touch it, feel it, experience it. And then from our perspective, it also is a situation where they aren’t necessarily going to leave WoW to play our own game.”

The World of Warcraft Annual Pass is available for a limited time and locks players in to a year long subscription, billed monthly. In addition to the free copy of Diablo III, subscribers receive access to the Mists of Pandaria beta and the exclusive Tyreal’s Charger mount.

You can read more comments from the Blizzard COO regarding the Mists of Pandaria expansion and Diablo III offer over at VentureBeat.

Five O’Clock Fan Art: Diablo III

Dylan Duarte — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 00:00:03 +0000

When Diablo III is released, I’m going to stand outside of a major retailer and scream “El Diablo!” in a Spanish accent at anybody who buys the game.

Check out the Diablo III Black Soulstone cinematic.

Check out the Diablo III Collector’s Edition.

Five O’Clock Fan Art is perfect for wrapping up the work day. You don’t want to think anymore, you just want to look at awesome things. And there’s nothing more awesome than a well crafted piece of videogame fan art. If you don’t agree, what the hell are you doing at a gaming blog?

Perhaps kunkka is El Diablo.

Behold The Diablo 3 Collector’s Edition (Details)

Dave Oshry — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 19:30:44 +0000

The Diablo III Collector’s Edition was finally revealed at Blizzcon 2011.

First off, it contains the full version of Diablo III, a Diablo Skull (sweet) and 4GB USB Soulstone which contains the original Diablo II and Lord of Destruction expansion so that you can retrace the path of the Dark Wanderer once again.

Want.

There’s also a behind the Scenes Blu-Ray/DVD Set which contains over an hour of interviews detailing how the world of Sanctuary was brought to life, The Art of Diablo III which contains art from early concepts to final 3D renderings, the Diablo III Soundtrack and finally, some exclusive in-game content for a number of different blizzard games.

Need.

Diablo Players get Aesthetic Artifacts, World of Warcraft players get an Fetish Shaman Pet and Starcraft 2 players get exclusive in-game Battle.net Portraits.

Sure.

No price or release date have been given yet. It’s done when it’s done.

Also, if you’re thinking about getting the World of Warcraft Annual Pass, you will be getting a copy of Diablo III for free, but you already knew that.

For more on Diablo 3 check out What We Love (and Hate) and Our Full Beta Playthrough!

Behold the Diablo III ‘Black Soulstone’ Cinematic

Dave Oshry — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 23:24:43 +0000

The Diablo III ‘Black Soulstone’ cinematic has finally been released upon the world. Behold the word of Blizzard:

As Deckard Cain’s niece, Leah, struggles to make sense of her uncle’s mysterious and disturbing notations, she bears witness to a dark vision. Azmodan, Lord of Sin, towers over the fragile young woman, swearing his armies of the burning Hells shall pour forth into Sanctuary, ravishing the world and all hope of resistance.

I don’t know about you, but I know that I can’t wait to kill the armies of the burning hells… and then loot them.

For more on Diablo III check out What we Love (and Hate) So Far About it.

Breaking News from BlizzCon – Diablo III FREE to 12 month WoW Subscribers

Aaron Alexander — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 18:53:51 +0000

Moments ago, Blizzard announced that upcoming action RPG Diablo III, scheduled to be released early next year, would be available as a FREE digital download to people who purchase a 12 month subscription to World if Warcraft, billed monthly.

In addition, subscribing for 12 months earns you automatic access to the beta for the next WoW expansion. You’ll also receive an in-game WoW mount, Tyrael’s Charger.

Stay tuned for more news as Blizzcon 2011 continues.

RipTen Radio Episode 9001 – We’ve Been Beta Tested

Ripten Staff — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 13:00:08 +0000

People seem to have enjoyed our reboot of RipTen Radio, so we’re back and we’ve been beta tested! Another week, another episode of nobody’s favorite podcast!

This week we discuss hot and important topics like Wonder Woman’s pants and the betas for both Diablo III and Battlefield. We also make sure to throw some DotA2 talk in for good measure and get all indie-hipster talking about The Binding of Isaac as well. All this and more, so get listening!

This week’s intro song is “The Clubbing of Isaac” from The Binding of Isaac Soundtrack <– Buy it here!! Only $0.99!!

RipTen Radio Episode 9001

(Click the play button to stream here, or click the text above to listen off-site)

Follow us on Twitter

@DaveOshry / @SigmaRue / @IamAaronAlex

Skyrim Voice Cast Announced

Wonder Woman With Pants

Homefront 2 Being Developed by Crytek

Gears 3 DLC Debate

PC Games Will Outsell Console Games by 2014

Diablo 3 Beta Impressions

Battlefield 3 Beta Impressions

84% of PC Gamers Will Want to Upgrade for Battlefield 3

Driver: San Fransisco Review

Space Marine Review

Gears of War 3 Review

Rise of Nightmares Review

The Binding of Isaac Review!

See you for Episode 9002!!

Diablo III Closed Beta Full Video Playthrough With Commentary

Dave Oshry — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 02:00:26 +0000

It’s been nearly one week since Dave and Aaron dove head first into the Diablo III beta. Somehow, they’ve managed to come out somewhat clean on the other side.

Along the way they even managed to hit the ‘record’ buttons on their respective PC’s and are now proud to present to you:

THE ADVENTURES OF TIM LAMBESIS AND TRIPLE H IN THE REALM OF DIABLO III

In this first video Dave and Aaron take on some early quests and stomp on some mobs with newfound abilities after they have already saved the legendary Deckard Cain from a deep and dark fate:

After grinding about, the boys head off in search of the crown of the Skeleton King and answers to the mysteries surround the eternally doomed town of Tristram:

Now, after a short break, our heroes have gained some new abilities and gear and are finally ready for the final challenge of the Diablo III beta:

So, there you have it. Despite their personal of professional shortcomings, Dave and Aaron managed to make it through the Beta with hardly a scratch.

Could they ever have been anything but heroes? Of course not… they were born this way.

Stay tuned for the final bit of our hands on coverage of the Diablo III beta as the guys max out every class in the game and give you a rundown of how each one works and plays.

Analysts Say Blizzard May Reveal “Titan” at BlizzCon 2011 (UPDATE)

Dave Oshry — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 15:00:46 +0000

Update: A Blizzard rep has told IGN that there will be NO Titan announcement at BlizzCon this year. Lame.

Diablo III has just been delayed and The Old Republic is set to take on World of Warcraft this holiday season. Blizzard needs to amp up not only their fans, but Acti-Blizz stockholders. What can they do?

Reveal Titan.

Not long ago, Blizzard revealed that Titan was the codename for their next gen mmo and if this leaked timetable is correct, it will release sometime in 2013.

Well, according to industry analysts, BlizzCon 2011 might be just the right time and place for the big reveal.

Just recently, M2 Research senior analyst Billy Pidgeon told VentureBeat:

“If they are holding any juicy details, it’s going to be announced at BlizzCon. The big news is probably going to be a Diablo 3 date and a possible new announcement about one or more new properties.”

Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences board member and VP of Biz Dev at Double Fine, Zack Karlsson, also told VB that Blizzard may want to move to counter the launch of The Old Republic:

“If I’m them, I park it right on top of some big (The Old Republic) announcement. I’d want (The Old Republic) to spend something big, drop some cash, and then run right over them and trump marketing dollars with PR.”

Stay tuned to RipTen as we head to BlizzCon 2011 to get word straight from the Metzen‘s mouth. We’ll be holding our breath.

Blizzard Delays Diablo III Until 2012 – Extends Beta Testing

Chris Carlson — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 02:00:01 +0000

Blizzard initially had Diablo 3 set to release this year, unfortunately that is no longer the case. The company announced today that the game would be pushed back until early 2012.

CEO and Co-founder of Blizzard Entertainment, Mike Morhaime made the announcement today:

“With every game we make, the temptation is always very strong to launch as soon as possible. However, we didn’t put so many years of work into Diablo III to release a game that was almost ready. The beta test is going very well, and we look forward to making the most of the extra time we’re taking to deliver an experience that lives up to our vision for the game and the expectations of our players. Next year is going to be an incredibly busy one for Blizzard, and we hope an incredibly fun one for Blizzard gamers.”

Of course, you know Blizzard, they’re cool guys and won’t push you under the bus. So due to the delay, Blizzard plans on using that time to extend the closed beta test.

We’ve been playing the beta all week and already have some videos and impressions for you to check out. Stay tuned for plenty more!

Blizzard didn’t announce how much of an extension, but rest assured, they will make sure you’re not entirely pissed off.

What We Love (And Hate) So Far About Diablo III

Aaron Alexander — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 04:00:44 +0000

After spending close to a full day with the Diablo III beta, both Dave and I came away feeling impressed and excited for the full release of Blizzard’s hotly anticipated action/RPG. While the gameplay largely remains the tried and true “click on dudes to destroy them”, there’s a few key changes to the Diablo formula that may sway your opinion depending on your stance. Check out our opinions below;

What we Love:

Social Interactivity

The friends functionality in Diablo 3 is easy and intuitive.

At anytime in Diablo 3, you can tap the “O” key to bring up a full featured list of your currently online friends. It’s similar to the friends menu presented in Starcraft 2 and at a glance you automatically know what your friends are doing in the demon infested world. Not only can you see a visual representation of your friends characters, but you can see their progression in the world, and though it’s not presented in the beta, undoubtedly you’ll be able to compare achievements and other various records. You can even see their time played… in real time.

Yet, it’s not only a comparison tool. At any time you can ask to join your friends crusades, or invite them to yours. It works flawlessly, even being in beta state and we’ve had no issues at all with the current system. Gone are the days of creating a lobby with a lame password such as “undertaker69goldberg”, it’s now easier than ever to enjoy your friends company.

That brings us to our next love:

Matchmaking

Matchmaking is quick and effective

If you don’t have friends to play with (I’m not judging), matchmaking is more than a viable option. As a matter of fact, matchmaking is fucking perfect. Not only can you cater the search to a specific chapter in the story, but the level of difficulty is also presented (only normal is available in the beta). To stop the guesswork, the matchmaking service also presents you with how many people are playing your currently selected options. Once you’ve selected your mode of play, the matchmaking service takes a few seconds at best to pair you with other players, and don’t worry about the latency, even playing halfway around the globe it runs silky smooth. Props once more, Blizzard!

Both the matchmaking and social interactivity make Diablo III the most addictive and easy to use multiplayer experience to come along in years.

What We (or just Dave) Hate:

The Streamlining (dumbing down) of Skills and Gameplay

Yes, they've dumbed down Diablo 3. Begin Lynchmobs

This one is purely subjective to your tastes. If you’re a pansy like me, you won’t mind the fact that you don’t have to dump a certain amount of points into strength or agility, therefore saving you from sitting up all night worrying if you’ve gimped your character.

If you’re a nerd like Dave, you’ll probably turn red at this change, and throw your D20′s square in the forehead of the person closest to you. Yes that’s right, stat points are no longer governed by you, the in game logic takes care of that every time you level up. It’s not only stat points that have been streamlined, but your abilities as well. You’ll only be able to select 2 usable abilities until level 6, then only 3 until level 12 and so forth. You’ll unlock a new ability every level early on, it just becomes a game of mix and match, catering your abilities to work well with your partners. It’s also worth noting that a number of each classes abilities are simply awesome and fun as hell to use.

Though this can leave the early game feeling quite tedious and repetitive, soon enough you’ll be tossing RPG lingo at your friend, coming up with exciting new strategies. Taking a cue from Torchlight, you’ll also have access to a Cauldron and Nephilim cube, which allows you to sell or breakdown items into crafting materials anywhere, at anytime. You will never have to walk back to town to sell anything… ever. Dave maintains that Torchlight’s pet system handled this much better and bitches at me every time we play that they’ve streamlined the looting far too much and that Diablo 1 was addictive because of blah blah blah, that’s usually where I stop listening.

Once again, this will either make you happy or furious depending on your tastes. Oh, and there’s a WoW style hearthstone as well. Fuck walking anywhere.

The Visuals Are Underwhelming

Diablo, Y U so bland

Perhaps it’s the lack of anti-aliasing (Beta!), or perhaps the wait has done no favors toward Diablo’s expectation levels, but Diablo 3 visually is truly underwhelming. Even with all the options cranked to the max, nothing pops out or helps you feel a sense of true immersion towards the game. Character models are quite bland, weapon particle effects look less interesting than that of Team Fortress 2, and the world looks like a watercolor painting – take that as you will. Despite it’s shortcomings at first glance, once you get in the heat of combat, the dismembered bodies of your enemies and constant gushes of blood look good enough to satisfy. Blizzard are known to create a distinct art style that doesn’t require high end PC’s to run at maximum and for the most part they succeed. However with Diablo 3, it feels really uninspired and bland – I hate to say it, but even Torchlight has more character in this department. This is usually when Dave will start chewing my ear off about how Diablo III doesn’t have shit on Dungeon Siege III visually and that Obsidian is the best PC RPG developer around and blah blah blah, then I mention Alpha Protocol and he gets mad and we don’t talk for two days… but I digress…

Guess what? It’s still the sequel we’ve wanted and the one you’ve been waiting for

Despite it's shortcomings, we can't stay away from Diablo III

Despite it’s obvious simplification and shortcomings visually, we’ve played this beta for damn near two days straight now. It’s still Diablo. It’s still click on shit and watch it explode into pink mist. It’s still yelling frantically at your friends when a giant boss named “Magglemaw” is chasing you erratically around the room. There’s a few subtle additions such as a new physics engine, which makes being a war-stomping barbarian even more fun – If I jump into battle, you’re flying straight into God’s domain you evil little bastard. Half the fun for Dave, was running around throwing Kunai at the various furniture we’d come across just to watch them fall into a pile of rubble, he’s literal home-wrecker. Enemies will drop health globes to keep combat going, and if you do fall in battle, a partner can run up and resurrect you on the spot. Better yet, gear that drops for one player, won’t appear on the others screen – he’ll get an entirely different drop, there is none of the loot stealing that plagued past games.

The changes Blizzard have implemented might worry some fans, but if you’re willing to let the past go, Diablo 3 is still an amazingly well crafted hack and slash. The wait has been definitely worth it and we’re already uber excited for the full retail release. Now if you’ll excuse me, the beta is calling…

Diablo III Gets A Skill Calculator – We Play With It – So Can You

Jensen Walker — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 23:00:41 +0000

You’ve read the lore, watched the videos, played the beta – now you can plot your character’s development, all without a release date in sight!

Blizzard have unleashed this latest tool upon the masses, keeping interest levels high in the wake of the closed beta. Having spent a considerable amount of time designing a defensive barbarian build, then an offensive build, then a monk (you get the picture), the Skill Calculator is quite engrossing if you enjoy pre-planning builds or simply wish to know what each class has to offer.

Without a doubt, there’s something to suit every play style amidst the plethora of builds and abilities available. The new skill system seems to be a big improvement over D2’s incremental skill trees, where I’d often keep ten or more skill points banked to avoid using them on unwanted talents.

Why not go and waste an hour of your life picking through the new skills and devising fiendish combinations? It’s like studying for a test, where the test is how awesome can you make your character!

Diablo III Cannot Be Played Offline

Catherine Cai — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 18:50:10 +0000

As an avid PC gamer, nothing makes my brows drop into the snarl of a rage face like ridiculous digital rights management on games. Take Ubisoft’s always-online DRM, for instance. Perhaps I’m on a plane somewhere and I don’t quite feel like watching the B movies or listening to the pre-recorded “radio stations” that cheap planes come equipped with. I decide to whip out my laptop so I can play some Assassin’s Creed 2… oh wait, no I can’t. Nothing makes me want to pirate more than the fact that I can’t play the games I want without internet access. Ubisoft, despite dropping the always-online DRM due to complaints, recently decided to bring it back for Driver and claimed that it did deter piracy. I don’t see how this is the case, particularly because various warez groups have figured out how to bypass the always-online DRM.

Maybe Ubisoft’s high claims have reached Activision-Blizzard’s ears, because something possessed Blizzard to make Diablo III online only. However, Blizzard claims that the online-only play isn’t just for DRM but to protect players from cheating, as Diablo III will feature an auction house where items can be paid for with real money.

Anybody else see a flaw in that logic? Why not just follow the same format that Diablo II did and separate single player from multiplayer to deter cheating? Blizzard’s response?

“We thought about this quite a bit. One of the things that we felt was really import was that if you did play offline, if we allowed for that experience, you’d start a character, you’d get him all the way to level 20 or level 30 or level 40 or what have you, and then at that point you might decide to want to venture onto Battle.net. But you’d have to start a character from scratch, because there’d be no way for us to guarantee no cheats were involved, if we let you play on the client and then take that character online.” -Rob Pardo, Executive Vice President of Game Design at Blizzard

So essentially, Blizzard feels that players are too lazy to create a second account for multiplayer. Lies and slander, Blizzard, I know that the real reason is to prevent piracy. Learn from Ubisoft’s example… always-online DRM has already been cracked by pirates. You’re not deterring anybody from pirating the game, but you certainly are deterring your fans from wanting to play. I’m one of them.

New Diablo III Details – ‘Nuff Said

Dave Oshry — Fri, 13 May 2011 08:15:00 +0000

Diablo III still isn’t out? Oh well, it will be eventually. In the mean time, come with us as we learn a bit more about the next installment of Blizzard’s beloved franchise.

If you’ve played Diablo II, you likely had a mercenary or two follow you around. They were a great help and they did a great job of soaking up damage for you even if they were a bit devoid of any personality.

This time around your followers are customizable and have backstory.

There are three types of followers: The Templar tanks, the Scoundrel misdirects and the Enchantress uses Jedi mind tricks to confuse your enemies.

You can only have one follower active at a time, although you can swap them out at any save point. Strategery abounds in Diablo 3 as you’ll certainly find certain followers are better at helping you with certain parts of your adventure.

They can also be respec’d at any time, for a price. Lord knows Blizzard loves charging us for respecs!!

Your followers will have their own talent trees and you will also be able to equip their weapons, jewelery and class specific items for teh buffening.

However, as in Diablo II, they cannot be controlled, sorry. However, Blizzard promises their AI is first rate, and I’m hard pressed not to believe them.

Check out the followers in action below:

Stay tuned to RipTen for more on Diablo III and all things Blizzard.