Dead Island

Dead Island is a first-person survival horror video game developed by Techland and published by Deep Silver for Microsoft Windows, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3. It is centered on the challenge of survival on a zombie-infested open world island with a major emphasis on melee combat. It was originally announced at E3 2006, but was pushed back to 2011. It was released on September 6, 2011 in North America and September 9, 2011 for PAL regions (excluding Germany).
Dead Island features open world roaming, played from a first-person perspective. Most of the gameplay is built around combat and completing quests.

Dead Island is a role-playing game and uses experience-based gameplay and character customization. The player earns XP by completing tasks and killing enemies. Upon leveling up, the player gains health and stamina, and can invest one skill point into a skill tree.

Combat is carried out through the use of melee weapons and firearms. Melee weapons are emphasized to the point that firearms are not available for the first quarter of the game, and consist of blunt and bladed weapons. Weapons are randomly generated and positioned in predetermined locations as well as found on some enemies; they have unique stats which are generally based on the player's current level. Each weapon can be upgraded four times to increase its stats, and most weapons can be "modded" - customized based on a blueprint to add special features, such as nails or electrified blades.

There is also a stamina bar, meaning that after a set amount of physical action, such as running, jumping, or swinging a weapon, the character needs to stop to regain his or her stamina before continuing to attack. The game features "special class" zombies, which are more powerful than the standard zombie. Players need to use flashlights in dark areas and during night-time sections, adding suspense.

A Promo film featuring the transformation of a young girl into a zombie, played in a nonlinear sequence, was commented upon by Ben Parfitt of MCV. Parfitt praised the trailer itself, but criticized the online reaction to it, writing "It's a video that uses an image of a dead girl and images of her dying to create an emotional bond with a product." Wired exclaimed, "It may be the best video game trailer I’ve ever seen; gorgeous, well-edited and emotionally engaging." However Wired urged caution, stating that Techland did not make the trailer and that "everyone is hyped up about a short film, not the game itself."

Dead Island was originally stated to be released in 2008, developed by Techland and produced by Adrian Ciszewski, but was delayed. An official teaser trailer, titled "Part 1: Tragedy Hits Paradise", was released on May 17, 2011 featuring various gameplay aspects. A follow-up trailer, titled "Part 2: Dead Island Begins", was released on June 6, 2011 along with the announcement of the game's release being set for September 6, 2011 for the US, and September 9, 2011 for the worldwide release. The game's zombies were rendered to have fully modelled layers of meat and muscle, meaning they have a multi-layered damage system with real-time injuries. On August 9, 2011, Deep Silver announced that Dead Island's development had finished and that production had begun.

Dead Island has received mixed to positive critical reception since its release, according to Metacritic. Metacritic scores were 80/100, 71/100 and 71/100 for the Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions respectively. The Italian PlayStation Magazine has given the game a rating of 8.0. praising its outdoor environments, realistic combat, and co-op mode but criticizing the indoor graphics and lack of split-screen multiplayer. IGN gave the game an 8.0, criticizing the game presentation, glitches, various bugs for the consoles, and texture loading, but praising the atmosphere and overall feel of the game and stating that the game's pro-points are significant enough to outweigh its cons. Game Informer gave Dead Island an 8.5, saying, "Just shy of the open-world zombie apocalypse you've always wanted."Official Xbox Magazine (UK) gave the game a score of 7.0, stating that while it falls short of its potential, there is more than enough to make up for the in-game issues, while the US version gave it 8.0. CVG awarded the game a more negative score of 6.5, stating "This budget zombie thriller ain't too pretty but could manage to capture a cult following." However, Edge magazine gave Dead Island a 3/10 score referencing a very large number of gameplay and technical issues. Screwattack gave the game a 6, mostly for technical flaws.

The PC version of the game has initially received many negative reviews from magazines and websites due to an accidental release of the development version of the game on Steam. This included features such as no-clipping and the ability to toggle third-person perspective. Rock Paper Shotgun also noted that the code revealed references to Xbox 360 version. The developers, Deep Silver, released a first-day patch seeking to address as many as 37 issues. A patch for the console versions has been released and fixed many issues, including corrupted savegames. MMOMFG stated "This is one zombie experience worth playing all the way through. Just be sure to sharpen those blades and aim for the head."

L.A. Noire

L.A. Noire (pronounced [ˌɛl ˌɛɪ ˈnwaʁ]) is a 2011 neo noir crime video game developed by Team Bondi and published by Rockstar Games. It was released for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows. L.A. Noire is set in Los Angeles in 1947 and challenges the player, controlling a Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) detective, to solve a range of cases across five crime desks. Players must investigate crime scenes for clues, follow up leads, and interrogate suspects, and the players' success at these activities will impact how much of the cases' stories are revealed.

The game draws heavily from both the plot and aesthetic elements of film noir – stylistic films made popular in the 1940s and 1950s that share similar visual styles and themes including crime and moral ambiguity. The game uses a distinctive colouring-style but in homage to the visual style of film noir includes the option to play the game in black-and-white. The post-war setting is the backdrop for plot elements that reference the major themes of gumshoe detective and mobster books and films (such as Key Largo, Chinatown, The Untouchables, The Black Dahlia, and L.A. Confidential, such as corruption, gambling and drugs, with a jazz soundtrack.

L.A. Noire is notable for using Lightsprint's real-time global illumination technology, as well as Depth Analysis's newly developed technology for the film and video game industries called MotionScan, where actors are recorded by 32 surrounding cameras to capture facial expressions from every angle. The technology is central to the game's interrogation mechanic, as players must use the suspects' reactions in questioning to judge whether they are lying or not.
L.A. Noire is the first video game to be shown at the Tribeca Film Festival. Upon release, the game received wide acclaim for its advances in storytelling and facial animation technology. As of June 2011, the console versions has shipped over 4 million copies combined.

The game takes place in 1947 Los Angeles, a city of glamour, fame, and wealth, but also where crime, vice, and corruption are rife. The player assumes the role of Los Angeles Police Department Officer and later Detective Cole Phelps. The game starts with Phelps as a uniformed patrolman, and follows his career as he advances through the police department bureaus of Traffic, Homicide, Vice and Arson. Instead of missions or levels, each new bureau gives the player a new partner who will help Phelps in his investigations. After each case, the player will receive a rating of 1-5 stars depending on their performance in both interrogations and searching for clues. When searching an area for clues to the crime, in some cases, players can also find newspapers. Besides reading the story, the newspaper give access to a short cinematic that covers a part of the game's overarching plot or a flashback to Phelps' war memories.

The game blends investigative elements such as mystery and crime solving, with fast-paced action sequences, including on-foot and car chases, hand-to-hand combat, interrogations and gunfights. In addition to the storyline missions, the player can work on optional side-investigations known as Street Crimes. The player can travel on foot, as well as in various vehicles. The player also has a total of ten detective suits available; an initial six, plus another four downloadable ones. The suits are equipped with special abilities, such as increased damage protection.

If the player is having trouble completing an action sequence, after three failed attempts, they will have the option to skip past and continue through the narrative.
Players are allowed to commandeer civilian cars. Weapons are only allowed in appropriate circumstances and only when a player is working on a case where a weapon is warranted. The game features a free roam mode called "The Streets of L.A.", which is unlocked on completion of a desk. In this mode, players can solve street crimes, search for gold film reels, landmarks and badges (some of which contribute to 100% completion of the game) or just drive around the city.

Prior to its release, L.A. Noire was marketed and promoted heavily through the use of numerous Internet and TV trailers. Rockstar ran a competition to win a trip to Los Angeles to attend the Festival of Film Noir at the Egyptian Theatre (which is actually featured in-game as a location), take an Esotouric Black Dahlia bus tour, and play the game a month before its official release. Take 2 Interactive announced that L.A. Noire had been selected to be shown at the Tribeca Film Festival, the first videogame to be recognised by the festival. L.A. Noire was screened as a sixty minute long film on 25 April, 2011, followed by a question and answer session on the game's story and the technology used to make the game.

Rockstar collaborated with several retail outlets on preorder bonuses available through store chains throughout the world. The pre-order bonuses were the bonus case The Naked City, the side quest The Badge Pursuit Challenge, the bonus detective suits "The Broderick" and "The Sharpshooter" and the traffic case A Slip of the Tongue. The official online Rockstar Games store, the Rockstar Warehouse, offered a L.A. Noire T-shirt as the pre-order bonus. Target offered a $5 Gift Card, and a free Rockstar Games t-shirt if the game was purchased in-store during launch week.

In addition to the pre-order bonuses, all new North American copies of the PlayStation 3 version of the game came with an extra traffic case, The Consul's Car. The Consul's Car traffic case became available to download from PlayStation Store for £3.99 on 27 July, 2011, for European players. On 6 June, 2011, Rockstar published L.A. Noire: The Collected Stories, a collection of short stories from noted crime authors, all based on the L.A. Noire universe. The Rockstar Games Social Club is a website that displays the gameplay statistics of registered users and feature competitions and awards based on player activity within the game.

On the day of the game's U.S. release, shares in Take-Two Interactive, Rockstar Games' parent company, closed up 7.75% on the day; a three-year high for the company. The rise was attributed to the positive reviews that L.A. Noire had been receiving. As of June 2011, the game has shipped over 4 million copies.

According to NPD Group, L.A. Noire was the best-selling game in the United States in May 2011, at 899,000 copies across the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Through a comparable time period, Red Dead Redemption had sold 1.5 million, which means L.A. Noire tracked behind Red Dead Redemption by about 40%, and it is believed that L.A. Noire will not reach Red Dead Redemption sales, but will still sell "handsomely."
L.A. Noire went straight to top of the UK games chart and became the fastest selling new IP ever in the UK. It stayed top of the UK game chart for three weeks. In Australia, the stores that had the game for sale reported that it was going out of stock after a week. L.A. Noire debuted in Japan for the week of 4–10 July and sold a combined 71,057 units on Playstation 3 and Xbox 360. The Playstation 3 version topped the chart, with 58,436 units sold, and the Xbox 360 version moved 12,621 units.

On 22 May 2011, Team Bondi's Brendan McNamara told GamerLive.TV that a sequel to L.A. Noire would take less than the five years it took to develop the first as the technology already exists. McNamara also stated that they are considering using the MotionScan technology for full body performances rather than only faces. In an investor conference call, Take-Two Interactive CEO, Strauss Zelnick, said that L.A. Noire was "a very successful release" and that they "have every reason to believe thatL.A. Noire is another strong franchise for this company". He reiterated that they "do see L.A. Noire as a powerful new franchise". During an investor call in November 2011 Zelnick re-iterated the importance of the game to Take-Two, stating that the game "has become an important franchise for the company." Zelnick announced that the game was Take-Two's "most successful new release" in the past fiscal year and has become a key property in its portfolio.

In November 2011, it was announced that McNamara's next game would be titled Whore of the Orient, which is described as "one of the great untold stories of the 20th century". It will be published by KMM Studios. 

Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City

Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City is an upcoming 2012 third-person shooter video game for Microsoft Windows,PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, co-developed by Slant Six Games and Capcom, and currently scheduled for a release on March 20, 2012 in North America and March 23, 2012 in Europe. It is part of the Resident Evil series, being set around the same time as Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil 3: Nemesis and the two Resident Evil: Outbreak titles.

The game takes place during the events of Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, and is set in Raccoon City, whose residents have been turned into zombies after an outbreak of the t-virus, a biological weapon developed by the pharmaceutical company Umbrella. Players will take the role of an officer of the Umbrella Security Service (USS). They have a vastly different objective compared to the Spec Ops opposition: Members of the USS are tasked with destroying evidence of Umbrella's illegal activities, including killing survivors of the outbreak, while the Special Operations team has to expose the actions of the company. Operation Raccoon City will allow the player to make major "what-if" decisions such as killing Leon Kennedy, one of the main characters of Resident Evil 2 and the protagonist of Resident Evil 4.

There are six playable characters in the game, Vector, Spectre, Beltway, Four Eyes, Lupo and Bertha. Each have their own unique abilities; Vector (real name unknown) is the team's recon expert and is equipped with a cloaking ability, Beltway (real name Hector Hivers) is proficient in the use of explosives, Bertha (real name Michaela Schneider) is the team's medic, Spectre (real name Vladimir Bodrovski) is the team's surveillance class and sharpshooter, Four Eyes (real name Christine Yamata) is the scientist of the group with the ability to program the bio-organic weapons (BOWs), and then there is Lupo (real name Karena Lesproux) who is an Assault class/Team Leader as shown in a recent trailer. Alongside the single-player mode, the game will also offer four-player co-operative gameplay, which pits the USS against the US Special Operations task force.

The zombies in the game will be able to attack the player in a multitude of ways. A zombie that gets too close to the player will usually attempt to grapple the player, prompting the player to rapidly shake his analogue stick to avoid infection. Players who are unsuccessful in doing this will be "invisible" to nearby zombies for a limited amount of time whilst they are infected before their death in game. If a player is successfully bitten and later runs out of time after becoming infected, the player will lose control of their character and begin attacking their former teammates until shot in the head, allowing the player to respawn.

The game also utilizes a bleeding mechanic, meaning characters who have been badly wounded will be deemed "bleeding out", giving their screen a blood red hue and making them a higher priority target to nearby infected than the others.
There will be additional enemy types in the game besides zombies. BOWs that can be confirmed from E3 are Hunters, Lickers and Tyrants. Furthermore, the player will be able to control them under certain circumstances.

In December 2011, Capcom unveiled 'Heroes Mode', an online multiplayer feature allowing you to play classic hero characters such as Leon S. Kennedy, Claire Redfield, Jill Valentine and Carlos Oliveira, plus the villains Ada Wong, HUNK, Nicholai Ginovaef and an all-new character, called Lone Wolf.

The idea for the game came about during the development of Lost Planet 2. The May 2011 edition of the Official Xbox Magazine, released on April 5, shows an image of an individual in a gas mask along Umbrella, Inc. logo on the issue's cover. On November 1, 2010 Kotaku reported on a rumor that Slant Six Games, developer of SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation, was developing Resident Evil: Raccoon City. On its website, Slant Six Games wrote that it was currently developing "an amazing new project" that was unannounced, which was developed in conjunction with a "new publishing partner on a world class franchise."

As of March, 2011, Masachika Kawata estimated the game to be 45% complete. According to Kawata, there are currently discussions on introducing new "bio-organic weapon" enemy creatures into the game. Unlike previous iterations, Operation Raccoon City will allow players to run and shoot simultaneously.

Postal III

Postal III is a third-person shooter video game developed by Running with Scissors Inc.. It is the third game in the Postalseries. The game was released for Microsoft Windows, and is going to be released for Linux, and Mac OS X, making it the first Source based game to be released for Linux. PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 ports were announced in later stages of development, but it has recently been revealed that a lack of budget is holding these ports back.

Postal III continues and expands upon the sandbox-style design of its predecessor, Postal 2 (no sandbox only missions), as well as including motion captured performances by a wide array of minor celebrities, including Ron Jeremy, Jennifer Walcott, Sergei Mavrodi and Randy Jones, and appearances by Uwe Boll (director of the Postal film), Osama bin Ladenand Hugo Chávez.

In Postal III, The Postal Dude emigrates to Paradise's sister town of Catharsis as he previously blew up Paradise with a nuclear bomb. Due to the economic meltdown, the Dude drives into town and becomes stranded because he can not afford a tank of gas. He must then find work and do various odd jobs to escape the town.
Through the course of the game, the player can chose one of two paths: the "bad path", which includes joining in on the schemes of Mayor Chomo and Uncle Dave, or the "good path", which involves the Dude joining the Catharsis Police force. The game will play out in a fairly linear and cinematic way, although the player's actions will affect the outcome of the story and the game. Although the "good path" will be more difficult to play, it will offer more story line and a longer campaign.

Gamespot gave the game 3/10.
In a more positive review, QJ.Net stated that the game was "one of the most interestingly written, psychotic and harmful games I've ever played" and that the developers had "ended up with a product that looks good, sounds great and is often funny", but also complained that their "experience was marred with constant crashing and a lot of graphical glitches" as well as complainig that it often comes off as "mean spirited and lacking in heart".  

Street Fighter X Tekken

Street Fighter X Tekken (Japanese: ストリートファイター X 鉄拳 Hepburn: Sutorīto Faitā Kurosu Tekken?)(pronounced Street Fighter Cross Tekken) is an upcoming crossover fighting game being developed by Capcom. The game was announced at the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con International by Capcom producer Yoshinori Ono. The game is set to release on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, Microsoft Windows and PlayStation Vita sometime in March 2012. The game will feature characters from both the Street Fighter franchise and Namco's Tekken series. As the game is being made by Capcom, with Namco being involved more in the licensing of the Tekken cast, the gameplay will be based on the 2D gameplay of Street Fighter as opposed to the Tekken series, and will feature projectile moves such as the Hadouken. Namco is currently producing their own take on the crossover, Tekken X Street Fighter, which will follow their own style of gameplay.

Being developed by Capcom, the core gameplay is similar to that of the Street Fighter series, incorporating elements such as Super Combos, as well as EX Attacks from Street Fighter IV. Players each choose two fighters from the Street Fighter and Tekken series, both sets of characters are controlled using the Street Fighter 6-button system, however it has been revealed that the Tekken characters will be able to perform Tekken style combos using the primary four buttons in a similar fashion to the Tekken 4-button system. These fighters can be switched out normally, or during certain combos. As fights go on, players build up power in a three sectioned meter at the bottom of the screen referred to as the "Cross Gauge", which allow the player to perform various techniques depending on how much of the gauge is filled, such as EX Attacks, Cancels, Super Arts and various Cross techniques detailed below. As opposed to the other crossover fighting games released by Capcom, in which the player must eliminate all the opponent's fighters to win, victory conditions are more similar to Tekken Tag Tournament, in which the first player to have one of their fighters' health bars reduced to zero loses the round, the player who wins the most rounds winning the match.

The tag team element of the game is heavily emphasized, with players being able to switch between the two characters in their team in a variety of manners. Switch Cancel allows players to switch partners in the middle of a combo, whilst Cross Rush combos involve launching the opponent into the air before swapping partners and continuing the combo. Cross Arts, which require a full Cross Gauge, allows players to chain together each character's Super Combo in one straight attack, whilst the Cross Assault mechanic allows players to simultaneously control both characters in their team until the Cross Gauge runs out.

Street Fighter X Tekken features two new game mechanics: the Gem System and Pandora Mode. Players equip up to three gems to their characters, which provide different stat boosts depending on the type of gem. Six varieties of gems exist: attack, defense, speed, vitality, assist, and Cross Gauge. Each gems and its effects are designated by a specific color, and will activate as the players fulfill certain conditions during battle. When a character on a player's team has less than 25% health remaining, that character can be sacrificed in order to activate Pandora Mode, which gives the remaining fighter increased strength and an infinite Cross Gauge. However, this state has a time limit and the player will automatically lose if he/she cannot defeat the opponent before the Pandora state runs out.

The game will feature various online options. Two players can battle on the same team, one controlling each character, and face off in four player matches. Scramble mode allows four players to fight simultaneously in pairs of two. The game will also support online training modes which can be played competitively or cooperatively with two players, as well as support the Fight Request feature.

Other Capcom games will be referenced in the game, such as Dino Crisis, which has a stage based around one of its levels.

Prior to tournament EVO 2010 at Las Vegas, Nevada, producer Yoshinori Ono was teasing a yet announced game which were initially believed to be a new Darkstalkers entry. Before EVO 2010's Super Street Fighter IV finals, Ono was confronted byTekken producer Katsuhiro Harada on stage after teasing more of the game that would officially be announced at the 2010 Comic-Con.

During the Super Street Fighter IV panel at Comic-Con, Harada appeared out of the crowd and went towards the stage while handing out free copies of Tekken 6, which was met with cheers and boos. Ono and Harada then confirmed the existence ofStreet Fighter X Tekken.[16] Both the teaser trailer and early gaming footage of Street Fighter X Tekken was also shown at Comic-Con. During the announcement, Harada also revealed that he has a related project under way, which is being developed by Namco. As Namco is in charge of production of this game, the gameplay will be similar to that of Tekken.

This is not the first time Namco and Capcom have made a game together as they released a Japan-only crossover game in 2005 for the PlayStation 2 titled Namco × Capcom. However, this game did not exclusively consist of characters from the Street Fighteruniverse and Tekken universe, but instead included various characters from the entire Capcom universe and entire Namco universe. Namco × Capcom was a role-playing game, thus making Tekken X Street Fighter and Street Fighter X Tekken the first games in the fighting game genre to be made by Namco and Capcom. It has been stated by Yoshinori Ono that a 3DS version of the game "should happen" but nothing has been officially revealed, information will be provided at Captivate 2011. The game was announced for PlayStation Vita at E3 2011, and will feature Cole from Infamous as a playable character. Downloadable content will be cross-compatible between both the PlayStation 3 and Vita versions of the game.

Capcom expects to sell 2 million copies worldwide by March 31, 2012.

Diablo III

Diablo III is an upcoming dark fantasy/horror-themed action role-playing game in development by Blizzard, making it the third installment in the Diablo franchise. The game, which features elements of the hack and slash and dungeon crawl genres, was first announced on June 28, 2008, at the Blizzard Worldwide Invitational in Paris, France.

The game takes place in Sanctuary, the dark fantasy world of the Diablo series. This world was saved twenty years prior by a handful of unnamed heroes in Diablo II, heroes who, having survived the onslaught brought by the armies of the Burning Hells, have gone mad from their ordeals. It is up to a new generation of heroes to face the forces of evil threatening the world of Sanctuary.

Players will have the opportunity to explore familiar settings such as Tristram.The only confirmed NPCs are Deckard Cain, who has appeared in both of the previous games, and his niece, Leah, a new character who accompanies the hero in quests from time to time. The plot will revolve around two surviving Lesser Evils, Azmodan and Belial, and an artifact known as the Black Soulstone. Diablo's world map is composed primarily of two main continents with several small islands in the Northwest region. The world of Sanctuary has been dramatically changed by the events of Diablo II: Lord of Destruction, for the destruction of the World Stone underneath Mount Arreat has reshaped the world's geography.

Diablo III is similar in style to its predecessor, Diablo II. The proprietary engine will incorporate Blizzard's custom in-house physics, a change from the original usage of Havok's physics engine, and feature destructible environments with an in-game damage effect. The developers are aiming to make the game run on a wide range of systems, and have stated that DirectX 10 will not be required. Diablo III will use a custom 3D game engine in order to present an overhead view to the player, in a somewhat similar way to the isometric view used in previous games in the series. Enemies will utilize the 3D environment as well, in ways such as crawling up the side of a wall from the depths into the combat area.

As in Diablo II, multiplayer games will be possible using Blizzard's Battle.net service, with many of the new features developed for StarCraft II also available in Diablo III. Players will be able to drop in and out of sessions of co-operative play with others.
An enhanced quest system, a random level generator, and a random encounter generator are slated for use in order to ensure the game provides different experiences when replayed. Overall, the game will include both static and randomly generated levels. Additionally, there will be class-specific quests to go along with the main storyline quests. Blizzard originally planned to have in-game cutscenes, but decided these would divert from the gameplay and decided against them. Three new armor pieces will be available: shoulder plates, arm-guards and leggings.

Unlike previous iterations, gold can be picked up merely by touching it, rather than having to manually pick it up. One of the new features intended to speed gameplay is that health orbs drop from enemies, replacing the need to have a potion bar, which itself is replaced by a skill bar that allows a player to assign quick bar buttons to skills and spells; previously, players could only assign two skills (one for each mouse button) and had to swap skills with the keyboard or mousewheel. Players can still assign specific attacks to mouse buttons.
Skill runes, another new feature, are skill-modifying items that are randomly dropped by monsters and used across all classes. Rather than changing equippable items as inDiablo II, they are instead attached to skills, often completely changing the gameplay of each skill. Skill runes also have the ability to make one particular spell in each class more powerful, and give the player options as to how the rune will enhance a particular spell. For example, investing skill runes on the wizard's "lightning" can allow the players to make the lightning jump onto additional enemies, or, alternatively, adding the runes with explosion effect blows the enemy up and causes damage to the surrounding area.

Development on Diablo III began in 2001 when Blizzard North was still in operation. The original artistic design differed from that shown at Blizzard Worldwide Invitational 2008 demonstration, and had undergone three revisions before reaching the standards felt necessary by the team behind Diablo III.

Diablo III's lead designer is Jay Wilson, a former Relic Entertainment designer credited with work on Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War and Company of Heroes as well as Blood II: The Chosen for Monolith Productions. Its lead world designer is Leonard Boyarsky, one of the six co-creators of Fallout.
The game is being planned for a simultaneous release on both Windows and Mac OS X platforms. Blizzard is considering a concept design for consoles, reportedly even hiring staff for a console version, while stating this concept will not affect PC/Macintosh release dates. The project’s lead designer Josh Mosqueira said that Blizzard is "very, very serious about bringing the Diablo 3 experience to the console". It was also revealed that the game would require a constant internet connection to play, even for single-player mode.

Russell Brower composed the music for Diablo III. When composing for the orchestra, he tried to respect the Wagnerian style from the expansion to the second game in the series, Lord of Destruction. The Overture is considered the main theme of the game and it has been performed by the Eminence Symphony Orchestra. A similar composition was used in the cinematic teaser trailer of the game. The Tristram theme from the first Diablo videogame, also used in the second game, is present in Diablo IIIwith few changes.