The massive auditorium was full to capacity and security guards had cordened off the main seated area, standing room outside only. Despite the crowd of thousands there was no more than a low hum of chit chat. At 11:45am the triple screens burst into life with images from World of Warcraft, Diablo 2 and Starcraft to an orcestral score and two presenters stepped up to officially welcome all to the WWI 2008. Then we were introduced to all the Blizzard employees seated at the front, one by one. Then the Starcraft and Warcraft 3 pro-gamers took to the stage. They looked a tad awkward as they lined up and then were asked to stand forward, bow and say hello. Samea thing with the World of Warcraft arena teams. A few titters but mostly applause from the crowd.
Mike Mohaime has just taken to the stage. He spoke to the exceptional success of World of Warcraft silencing the critic who said that the MMO market was not mature enough to support a huge success. A video of last year’s WWI in Korea last year which looked about 4 times larger than this particular event.
He’s building up to the announcement and on comes a acoustic guitar to play theme tune of Diablo 3.
The intro to Diablo 3 is now playing, a roll-playing action title.
We are introduced to the first character, The Barbarian in some gameplay footage. We are reminded this is a work in progress so it’s far from polished. He’s dual wielding and leaping and whirlwinding as you’d expect. He just dispensed a whole group of skeletons by bashing a wall, causing it to tumble down on them, killing them all. He makes it across the bridge and to…..Deckard Cain. The camera cuts to a movie cut screen.
