Rob Pardo, the Chief Creative Officer at Blizzard Entertainment, took a moment today to directly respond on the topic of Jay Wilson and a few quick thoughts on Diablo 3.
This thread saddens me greatly. I know that the Battle.net forums have earned a reputation for rough justice, but I do not believe justice is being served by how people are speaking about Jay’s departure from Diablo III.
I am very proud of the Diablo franchise and what the team was able to accomplish with Diablo III. As a gamer I have enjoyed the game and played for many, many nights with friends and family. I’m not, however, going to use that as an excuse. The Diablo community deserves an even better game from Blizzard and we are committed to improving it. We have a talented team in place and have no intention of stopping work on Diablo III until it is the best game in the franchise.
I’m the only person in this thread who has actually worked with Jay. I hired Jay to head up the Diablo project and had the pleasure of getting to work with him, both in building the team and designing the game. He has great design instincts and has added so much to the franchise with his feel for visceral combat, boss battles, and an unparalleled knack for making it fun to smash bad guys. I’ve worked with many, many designers at Blizzard and Jay is one of the best. He has a great career at Blizzard ahead of him and I guarantee that you will enjoy Jay’s game designs in future Blizzard games.
If you love Diablo as much as we do, then please continue to let us know how you feel we can improve the game. If you still feel the need to dish out blame, then I would prefer you direct it at me. I was the executive producer on the project; I hired Jay and I gave him advice and direction throughout the development process. I was ultimately responsible for the game we released and take full responsibility for the quality of the result.
We have added a chat page to the top navigation bar. More features will be added in the future, and If you have any suggestions on things you would like to see to improve the chat please leave a comment.
Known issue - There is a rare chance for a message to not send
♫"Hey I just met you,
And this is craaazzzy,
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When the evil of the Burning Hells lurks and threatens, sometimes having a Scoundrel, Enchantress, or Templar at your side is not enough. Sometimes, a Crit Mass Wizard simply yearns for a steadfast Whirlwind Barb to have at their side.
This week's community spotlight shines on Archon the Wizard and his video "Add Me Maybe," which is a Diablo-themed parody of the song "Call Me Maybe" by Carly Rae Jepsen. So take a break from your usual playlist, and indulge in Archon the Wizard's creative Diablo-themed musical parody by scoping out his video below!
Can’t get enough of Archon the Wizard? Check out his official pages on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitch.TV for even more video and live-stream goodness.
We’re working on getting Vanishing Dyes for Legendary items into 1.0.7. We intend for them to have the same slot restrictions as dyes traditionally have, so you’ll be able to use Vanishing Dye on say, your Legendary shoulders or helmet, but not items such as your weapons.
We hope this change will be available for testing on the PTR in a future build, but that may not possible. We’ll keep you updated. :)
Blizzard is also working on making every dye work for Legendary Items
We’re definitely working on making all dyes work for Legendary items. It’s not a quick-fix, though; as Fearophobias surmised, our artists actually need to go back and redo the textures on all the Legendaries in order to make them dye-compatible.
Since we know this process will take some time, we wanted to make sure that players could at least use Vanishing Dye for now (it was the most-requested dye for Legendaries that we’ve seen to date).
Hey everyone,
I wanted all of you to be some of the first to know that I've made an important decision about my future, and how that decision will affect the future of Diablo.
I recently celebrated my seven-year anniversary working on Diablo III, and while it's been one of the most challenging and rewarding periods of my life, I've reached a point creatively where I'm looking forward to working on something new. The powers that be at Blizzard have been gracious enough to give me that opportunity. Over the course of the next several weeks, I will be moving off of the Diablo III project and transitioning elsewhere within Blizzard. This decision was not an easy one for me, and not one I made quickly, but ultimately it's what I feel is right.
The first thing I want to assure you all is that this will not negatively impact our ongoing support of Diablo III. The game was not made by one person, far from it, and the team that poured their passion and considerable talent into it isn't going anywhere. We have lots of things planned for the future, and those plans will carry forward as normal. I also won't be abandoning the team, and will remain available to them during the transition period while we determine who will take over duties as game director.
To that point, you shouldn't be surprised if you see a job posting for a game director on Diablo III, as we want to make sure we explore every opportunity to find the best possible leadership for the project. We're looking forward to finding this person and hearing what kind of fresh ideas they can bring to the table.
I'm proud of Diablo III, and despite our differences at times I will miss the community that has formed around it. I feel I have made many mistakes in managing that relationship, but my intent was always to provide a great gaming experience, and be as open and receptive as possible, while still sticking true to the vision the Diablo team has for the game.
I know some of you feel we fell short of our promise to release the game "when it's ready." While we're not perfect, we try to make the best decisions we can with the information and knowledge we have at the time. That doesn't mean we always make the right decisions, but if we made a mistake then I feel we've made an exceptional effort to correct it.
This is what you can always count on from Blizzard: that we will stand by our games and make every effort to continually improve them over time. We heard the feedback and suggestions from the community. For example, we agreed that Diablo III's itemization at launch was not good enough, so the team made numerous changes, including changing drop rates, re-tuning legendaries, and adding scores of new items to the game. We also agreed that the end game needed more depth, so the team added new events, and new systems like Monster Power and Paragon levels.
Our commitment to making our games as good as they can be is what has always defined Blizzard as a game studio, and that commitment never ends for us at a ship date. With your help, we'll continue to play, debate, and improve Diablo III, as we've done with every Blizzard game.
To that end, patch 1.0.7 is underway, the PTR is live, and there are many other great things brewing for Diablo in 2013. I'm leaving Diablo III in good hands, and my departure will not jeopardize the progress of the game as we continue to do what we do: listen, play, and improve.
You are the most passionate, dedicated group of gamers a designer could hope to have. I wish you all the best, and want to thank you for making this an amazing experience for me. Keep your axes sharp, your spell books handy, and that crafty devil in check.
--Jay