The Unburied

"Something is dreadfully wrong. Fear is in the air; I can feel it. I was but days out of Tristram when I saw a screaming ball of flame rip across the sky. Surely enough, soon after witnessing this harbinger of doom, I stumbled upon a badly mangled traveler. He was barely able to spit out the tale of the cursed monstrosity responsible for his broken body as his life drifted away. He called his killer "the unburied".

Months ago, when I wrote of the undead blight upon our land, I thought them the gravest of threats. But they are nothing compared to the new undead creature described to me by this poor fellow.

He was a law officer of sorts, a local guard out looking into the depraved handiwork of a crazed individual, the sort we seem to be seeing more and more of in these dark days. When the guard happened upon a mass grave dug by this sick fool, a massive, horned, disgusting behemoth was digging itself out. The dying traveler described this loathsome beast – or, as he termed it, the unburied – as being comprised of bloated parts from many fetid, rotting corpses, with a multitude of disfigured heads and slobbering fanged mouths. He was fortunate that day, but when he returned with several men to help him deal with the creature, they found to their horror that the undead spawn was too much for even their combined efforts. They fought valiantly to the last man, sacrificing themselves to keep the beast from rampaging across the countryside and taking who knows how many innocent lives. He was the last survivor, and before he passed on, he proudly told me that they were successful in eradicating the foul unburied creature.

Being born out of pits of human misery, these beings feed on human suffering. Wherever bodies are dumped together unceremoniously, the unburied may rise. I cannot help but wonder if this be some sort of cosmic justice for our inhumanity to our fellow man. But what is the catalyst? What animates these things? What makes them so horrendously different from the run-of-the-mill zombies or "normal" skeletal undead?

Some days I truly feel that the end of humanity must be at hand. Certainly our world is home to assorted disturbing and unsettling creatures, but every dawn seems to bring news of more wretchedness we must endure as a people. The darkness is coming, my friends: mark my words."
-From the writings of Abd al-Hazir


Bashiok: The Unburied is formed by the fusion of soil, rock, human bodies and angry souls. The spikes that jut from its body are shards of stone ripped from the earth during the development of the creature.

Looks awesome. Wouldn't want to be that guy in the middle of em':

Blizzcon 2009 Has The Green Light

BLIZZCON® 2009 ANNOUNCED

Blizzard Entertainment® gaming celebration to return to Anaheim Convention Center on
August 21-22


PARIS, France -- February 17, 2009 -- Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. today announced plans for its fourth BlizzCon® gaming convention, to be held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California on Friday, August 21 and Saturday, August 22. BlizzCon is a celebration of the global player communities surrounding Blizzard Entertainment®’s Warcraft®, StarCraft®, and Diablo® universes. In response to the festival’s increasing popularity, this year’s event has been expanded from three convention halls to four.

“We’ve been amazed by the incredible response to each of our previous BlizzCon events,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “We’re pleased to be bringing the convention back to Anaheim this year, and we look forward to this new opportunity to meet Blizzard gamers from around the world.”

BlizzCon will offer a wide variety of activities throughout the two-day event. In addition to serving as a gathering place for Blizzard Entertainment gaming communities, attendees will be able to enjoy:

• Hands-on play time with upcoming Blizzard Entertainment games
• Discussion panels with Blizzard Entertainment developers
• Competitive and casual tournaments for players to showcase their talents
• Community contests with great prizes
• Commemorative merchandise based on Blizzard Entertainment’s game universes
• A silent auction
• More exciting activities and attractions to be announced
Further details, including ticket availability and pricing, will be announced on the official BlizzCon website, http://www.blizzcon.com, as the event draws closer.


To keep pace with the continued growth of World of Warcraft as well as development on other Blizzard Entertainment games, the company is currently hiring for numerous open positions. More information on available career opportunities can be found at http://eu.blizzard.com/en/jobs/.


Pretty exciting. They're having it early so I would imagine that there will be a release date for SC2 (November / December?). Could also have new class(es) for Diablo 3. Maybe even a new WoW Xpak. Should be fun!

Blizzard's Nice Little Gift for $14.99

It has taken months but Blizzard has finally given us some Diablo 3 merchandise! From Small to 3XL, you can get your own Diablo 3 T-Shirt (Mens & Womens). I know I'll be getting myself one. If only they would sign some more posters and put them up... hehehe.

A direct link to the Mens T-Shirt

Bashiok on Auction Houses

"Foremost - spamming is bad. I think trade channels usually suck because of the requirement to spam. The amount of time and effort spent just to get your items noticed borders on brain-explosiony. Throw in the lack of easily gauged economy and you’re usually left out in the dark, laughed at, ripped off, etc. Your suggestion seems to mix the idea of an auction house and trade channel, in that you can use a channel in-game to spam, and then have some sort of UI to trade the item. That definitely solves one issue, which is needing to leave the game and just sit in a chat channel. What it doesn’t solve is needing to sit in a chat channel and spam. Sure, you could probably play and spam the channel every once in a while but it’s really not the cleanest approach. You’re still spamming a chat channel, you’re still limited to the people that want to see that spam (ie not many).

Since you brought it up let’s move on to the World of Warcraft’s auction house. World of Warcraft did not invent the auction house trading system. It may have certainly refined it, but an irrational hatred of the game that some of you seem to have really shouldn’t translate to game systems that aren’t original to it. There are some major advantages to an auction house similar to WoW’s. You don’t have to be present being the biggest and best. You can be playing with friends, PvPing, asleep, at school or work, and someone has the ability to see your items, and you have a greater chance to sell/trade them. You don’t have to spam a channel, you don’t have to even be online and playing. That’s HUGE, and really the main reason so many people use trading systems such as websites and forums for Diablo II. You want to focus on playing the game or not playing the game, not sitting around hoping someone wants your item.

It also helps form a visible and easily identified economy. I’m a new player, I got a sword I think it’s probably pretty nice, I can go on an auction house and search for it or similar swords and get an idea of how much it should sell for. In this case being in a trade channel is no better whether it’s in-game or out of game. What you’d probably end up with is people still going to forums and more static styles of trading found on websites, but even then any unified sense of economy is spread thin. Maybe that’s not such a bad system in itself, and an official trading site could work. Of course what you lose either way though, auction house or website, is in-game player interaction. Which is what I assume you’re striving to keep.

When it comes down to it, any change or addition or removal of any systems have to be weighed. Do the positives outweigh the negatives?

I’ll go back to what I said at the beginning and state we don’t know what if any types of trading systems will be in the final game. Maybe there won’t be, it may be that eventually we settle on leaving it Diablo II style. We have some ideas of what would be cool, but at the end of the day we’re not going to do anything that isn’t far and away a more positive change for the game."


Seems like he either likes the auction house style or just plain hates the Diablo 2 style. I hope it does enter play in D3 but they would need to make sure that gold is used more in trades than items.

Tyrael Has Moved

Blizzard has updated their Diablo3.com website. Tyrael has moved closer to us and his wings have become more like silly string.

Before

After

Looks more evil, don't he? The first think you see when you enter the website is Tyrael. It's not everyday your major logo changes. But maybe this tells us something is coming.

I sawwwy...

I know, it's been a month since the last update. But there is a reason. More like excuses but we'll go with that.

1. Holiday seasons are always busy. I think everyone can agree with that.

2. There has been no new. None, zip, nada. Unless you want Wrath news but I've given up on keeping up with that.

3. Any free time has been spent on the Diablo 2 realms.

So, if you wanna do some Hell Baal runs, hit me up! US-East, Non-Ladder. Whisper *neflight2 or my characters:

Aticus
Whoa_ASorceress
Whoa_ANecro
Whoa_APaladin
Whoa_AHammerdin

When more news come, I'll have it posted.

Can't Quit? Epic Fail.

Here's a little tid-bit for those who want to leave WoW for other MMOs:

1. People who said that they were leaving WoW for another MMO and they left for Age Of Conan, 68% of the players re-subscribed to WoW.

2. People who said that they were leaving WoW for another MMO and they left for Warhammer, 48% of the players re-subscribed to WoW.

It just proves that WoW is like drugs: you can't stop... j/k. But it does ponder the question to those WoW leavers that if these people were tired of WoW and wanted something new or just... well, wanted something new. I knew I didn't want to play anymore but 68% of people returning to a game they left is astonishing.

But, this isn't your typical MMO. Leaving EverQuest was never really an option unless you wanted to stop playing MMOs all together. I mean, it really was the only one out there at the time. And usually, in EQ, you were replaced once you left (in the high end guilds). In WoW, there are so many players that if you were to leave, and lose your spot in a guild, you could find an equal guild doing the same raids.

All of this just proves that this isn't you grandfather's MMO... or for some of you, your older sibling and/or father's MMO.

Vote 08!

Tomorrow is election day in the US. That means that it's now our time to use our right as US citizens to go out and vote for whomever you believe should be our leaders. No matter whether you are a Republican or Democrat, it's time to spend 5 minutes of your day to go and vote.

As much as I would love to spend more time playing Fable 2 for the 2nd time through, I know I'll be spending a few minutes of my day at the polls.

R.I.P. Hellgate London

It only took a year (give or take a few months) but Namco Bandai has announced that as of January 31st, 2009, the game's online servers will be shut off.

It's not like we all saw this coming. The over-hype killed this game. People went into the game thinking it was going to be the best RPG since WoW, but they were only to be hit with bugs. The concept was there and the Diablo guys did a good job with the RPG elements of the game. The problem was technical.

For those who still want to play online, it's free of charge until N/B shuts off the servers. Two good things come out of this: 1.At least there's single player, and 2. You will be able to find it in the bargain bin for $10 pretty soon.

The Top Ten Dumbest Things In Diablo 2.

Been busy this past week so here's a little list that HellForge created. It's the top ten dumbest features of Diablo 2. I don't believe the Great Marsh should be on the list because of the experience we get from single player games. In any case, it's a pretty accurate list.

I'd also like to add the Assassin character class to this list. It should be #3.

10. Attack and Stamina Potions
Honestly, did anyone ever use these? For anything? Ever? They had barely enough power to clear out the Stony Field, why did they even bother to include them? The most ridiculous and useless items in the entire game, without a doubt.

9. The “Thief” Monster Ability
An interesting, if disastrous feature, that lasted all of one patch. I wonder who thought that ripping items off a player’s character and dropping them onto the ground for all to see was an awesome idea? Still, it was worth it just to hear the screams of panic.

8. Nihlathak’s “Corpse Explosion”
Hmmm… oh, I know! Let’s give him the ability to cast a spell that does massive damage from two screens away! And make it kill you in one shot! Yeah, that’s a great feature! Hardcore players will LOVE the “challenge”.

7. + Light Radius
Useless little modifier that would appear on every freakin’ thing you didn’t want it to. What’s it going to do? Blind the monsters with its luminous shine? More like attract them from half a thousand miles away to figure out what this giant glowing bug catcher is.

6. Isenhart’s Set
Isenhart, I think I speak for every player when I say “F*** off, you useless w****y piece of c**k cheese”. We’re sick of your set turning up twelve times in each game; it’s as effective as a semi-defrosted mackerel. And smells about as good too.

5. The Great Marsh
Probably the least visited area in Diablo 2, most of the time we don’t need to go near the Great Marsh at all. Whether it’s a bug, or just made that way, it rarely generates as a part of the main Kurast path, instead appearing as a sort of dead end detour. Why would we want to spend twenty minutes exploring a pointless midget filled area that goes nowhere? Meh.

4. Loot Drop Glitches
This can occur at any time, but most notably in the Level 3 Durance of Hate’s Council Members. How many times have you killed those guys on the way to Mephisto and had them drop nothing? Also known to happen with Duriel, who may drop no more then a town portal. I’ve even personally solo-slain Hell Baal… only to have him drop a few yellow items. Curse you Blizzard for your buggy drops!!!

3. Druid’s “Spirit of Barbs”
A level 30 ability for the Druid, the Spirit of Barbs with 20 points in it does close to 100% damage return to attackers. Meanwhile, the Paladin’s “Thorns” aura - a level 6 ability – does 100% damage return… with one skill point in it. The Druid’s suckage doth make us ROFL.

2. Making Hell ‘Durance of Hate’ 10x Bigger
A classic example of trying to force gamers to “play the game the way it’s meant to be played”. The idea was to make running Hell Mephisto a tad harder, or perhaps abolish running him altogether. Instead, 75% of Diablo 2’s playerbase suddenly became acquainted with the time saving “map hack”. Longevity lies in being able to speed through the monotonous nowadays; remember that, developers. We’re happy to take things slow for the first few play throughs, but it very quickly becomes “been there, done that”. Trying to draw out the pain (coughcoughHellgate1.3dcoughcough) will not be appreciated.

1. Nerfing “Whirlwind”
Whirlwind was the ability of Diablo 2. It was the skill that almost single handedly marketed the game to all fans of the warrior class. And for a few patches, it was good! Then BAM! Nerfed harder then the American economy. At -50% damage right off the bat, Whirlwind needed a massive amount of points just to reach “useful” let alone “devastating”. Take a mental note people, if some skill seems insanely powerful to you: shut up about it!

All I Want For Christmas Is...

This



You can buy it for me here. Thanks :-)

Seriously? WoW.

I know that there's a lot of Blizzcon 08 news and stuff to critic but I have to rant on this guy.

One World of Warcraft player has a complete set up for his Warcraft needs. And those need are 36 accounts and 11 computers. And I thought cosplayers were the ultimate geek.

I used to multibox Diablo 1 and 2 because rushing and trading were easier that way. But 36!? Come on. Oh, and here's his defence:

"It costs me exactly $5711 in subscription costs per year with 36 accounts on the 6 month pay schedule. Not bad considering I’m looking at it like it’s a hobby and there are more expensive hobbies out there than World of Warcraft," claims Bradster.

Yeah, I can see some hobbies being more expensive; like buying old cars. But there are other cheaper hobbies which people can actually praise you for. Such hobbies include: Hiking, biking, reading books, model railroads [from experience, seriously. My grandfather still gets praises for his train layouts], woodworking, volunteering at you local community center, and yo-yoing. How many people do you meet swinging those yo-yos around? Next to none - we need more of them.

Look, having 1, 2, or even 3 Warcraft accounts is fine by me. Some people enjoy that. But this man needs a real hobby... one that isn't addicting but just fun to do. And one that gets you out of the house.

BlizzCon 08!

Stay tuned tomorrow for more Diablo 3 information right here!

I'll be posting frequently tomorrow evening on whatever we hear.

*Update - 11:00AM EST*

It is official: There will be a PLAYABLE DEMO OF DIABLO 3! Also, you will be able to play a new class! Damn you, you lucky SOBs. :-P

"Among these brave champions stands the enigmatic witch doctor, a spiritual warrior from deep within the Torajan jungles. At BlizzCon 2008, the witch doctor is yours to command for the first tim ever. Stop by the Diablo area on the show floor for your chance to lead this fierce new hero into the catacombs beneath the Tristram Cathedral.

While you're there, revisit the raw strength of the barbarian - a Diablo series classic - or try your hand at Sanctuary's newest champion, who will be revealed at the event."

*Update - 2:00PM EST*

Blizzard has release a new class! THE WIZARD! I'm pretty excited about this class - love the name too. I find it better than Sorceress but not as cool as if they were to bring back the Mage.

It is said that the Wizard will have Charged Bolt, Magic Missle, Blizzard, Tornado, and Frost Nova.

The description follows: Youthful and headstrong, the upstart Wizard manipulates the primal forces of the universe to vanquish foes.


There is also news that the playable demo's final boss is the Skeleton King! No, not Jack. He's the Pumpkin King. Is it Leoric? I mean, we killed him when he was already dead so I guess he could still be there in Tristram's Cathedral.



*Update - 5:00PM EST*

Blizzard has updated Diablo3.com with a full page on the Wizard including some new spell trailers as well as a cinematic trailer for the class! There are also numerous screenshots updated on the website. It's a great read.

I am also VERY convinced that the Skeleton King is King Leoric himself. It's just too weird to have a 'Skeleton King' in the Tristram Cathedral when in Diablo 1, the Skeleton King was Leoric. In any case, he looks badass!

D3 Website Update

I've been sick this past week with this fall cold that is going around all of Connecticut. With that said, I am getting better but I have much work to get caught up on. A good friend of mine is getting married this weekend so no more updates this week.

Here's a link to Diii.net's article about the Oct 2nd Diablo3.com update and a new monster too. Looks like a Leaper from Act2 but instead of jumping, it'll be burrowing.

Will Teleport Be A Skill In Diablo 3?

There has been some crazy forum posts over the last few months about having Teleport in Diablo 3 or to not have it. There's very valid arguments on both sides.

Pros
- It makes the game faster.
- Gets you around monsters that are immune to your skills.
- The ability to rush lower players at a quicker pace than walking.
- Mana cost is cheap.

Cons
- It shortens the game.
- Boss runs become grinding.
- The ability to rush lower players at a quicker pace than walking.
- Sways PvP battles to one side (at times).

My stance: I hope they keep it out of the game. Give the Mage class (cause we all know there will be one) a skill like Levitation. An ability to fly over ground monsters; leaving casters and ranged monsters to hit you. You will also be able to go over broken bridges (see gameplay vid) but not through walls. Give it a 5-20 second duration and a decent mana cost.

The mistake they made was in 1.10 when they release Enigma. The ability to have every character in the game teleport was a cheap and, in my opinion, a half-ass way of balancing the game. In balancing though, they gave the game a quicker pace and ruined a lot of fun in exploring the levels. You can say all you want that 'we've been through it dozens of time. Why do we have to do it again?' Well, it is a RPG after all. It's supposed to be a long process to make your character the best he or she can be.

Jay Wilson has already said that they want to get away from the Boss grinds. This will be one way to help with that cause.

If they were to make it available in the game, I hope they would put a 5 second cooldown or a very high mana cost. Maybe a percentage of your total mana. Start out at 20% and move down to 10% by level whatever.

The Alt Key

We've all thought about it: Why do we have to hold down the Alt key in Diablo 2? Well, Blizzard thought about this too. And Bashiok answers:

"The way it works now is that when an item drops the name shows for about 5 seconds and then they fade out and disappear. Pressing Alt shows all dropped item names for again about 5 seconds and then the names fade out and disappear. I actually didn't like it at first, I liked the on/off state of pressing or not pressing Alt, but with the names showing immediately after drop and having a sort of "grace period" after just tapping Alt, it's really grown on me and is a lot more intuitive. It's a lot easier to see what just dropped quickly and decide if you care, and it isn't necessary to constantly hold down Alt while scavenging after a large fight. I still want to see -nopickup return but I haven't really asked anyone what the possibility of that is. I don't think it would work well with the current system, so options may have to be a possibility."

This makes sense. There are plenty of occasions where if I see something drop, I stop everything I'm doing and pick it up. I don't however enjoy the idea of battling a group of monsters, checking the drops and then having 5 seconds of items being shown leading to accidentally clicking on Bolts, Arrows, Cracked Boots, etc etc, while you're trying to take down a cultist.

The pickup system should be 3 options.

1. Hold down Alt to see the items (as in Diablo 2)

2. Always show the items that drop.

3. No pickup option.

It cannot be that hard to let the user choose how he or she views the items on the ground. But, as I said above, I like the Alt key in Diablo 2. I would put Ring, Middle and Index finger on 123 keys and my thumb on alt. Very comfortable; very easy. I wonder if they'll add anything else to the pickup options.

Wrath Release Date

Matt Graham beat me to it so I'll just post what I was going to post in the first place. (I've been kinda dead this week so there won't be anymore posts this week).

'Nuff said.

Bad News Always Comes With Good News

The Bad News:

Bashiok: "Well, health and mana leach may not come back. There's balance issues, and they may not make it into Diablo III"


The Good News:

I went into my D2 Account and when it said my characters have expired, I clicked on them and I was able to go into the game and they weren't expired anymore!


How that happens? I haven't a clue.

Diablo 3 Theory Hour

I wanted to bring your attention to something I remember reading and thinking about years ago back when this article was first written in 2003. Diii.net (formally Dii.net) posted this article in the aftermath of Lord Of Destruction and back when the Diablo 3 speculation first started to arise. This is exactly what I had envisioned with D3 as well as Tyrael's deception (more on that after the article).


"We are given a lot of information throughout the game on the power and plans of the Three Brothers, Diablo, Mephisto, and Baal. We are told that if they unite they will be invincible. We are told that no one is certain of their plans, but it probably involves something really bad for Sanctuary. We are told they must be stopped. And many more besides. Even though the archangel does not speak all these dire prophecies, he would have been the source for many through the knowledge of the Three he gave the Horadrim way back when the whole soul stone fiasco began. Tyreal was also the primary drive behind finding and catching the Three before they united. Also, his prot�g�, Deckard Cain, was the main instigator for the smashing of the soul stones. In other words, the actions our heroes took in Diablo 2 were largely along the lines of Tyreal�s own thought process. And, I suspect, also exactly what Diablo and company wanted us do to. Perhaps the archangel has been used like a sock puppet for a really long time. Or, perhaps, he helped Diablo write the script. His actions do have some interesting contradictions.

Look first at the claim that if the three unite, they would be invincible. They united, all right. They opened the gate, and sent Diablo through it. Then Mephisto died. We chased down Diablo. He died too. The only hope was Baal. Who eventually died. Some invincibility. On the other hand, perhaps they intended that we kill them.

There is precedent. Diablo (back in Diablo 1) lured a nice, strong, juicy hero down through the caves so he trade in the body of the boy for stronger one. That is, he planned his own �death.� Why would the three do the same? Mephisto himself answers. �You are the harbinger of our return� he tells Diablo. As Diablo heads for hell. Return... to hell? Yes. So, the three were not plotting massive mayhem across Sanctuary? Well, I would not go that far.
But Diablo needed to go to hell, and I think Mephisto did to. Mephisto, more than the others, needed to die. It seems that the soul stones bound the three to the mortal plane. They could not leave, but nor could they regain their full hellish powers while those stones were in existence (is my guess). They had to get rid of those stones, which they controlled anyway. At the same time, they had to rally the legions of hell for a nice little invasion of mortality. The losing the soul stone thing was most important for Mephisto, and least for Baal. Why? Mephisto�s stone was fragmented. Each council member had a piece, and the largest piece was in the palm of the guy that took the form of Mephisto. He could not reach anything close to his full power, because his soul stone was scattered about. That is why the oldest brother was such a weakling. His power was also divided among the six other unique council members.

So, the plan went like this. Diablo goes to hell to get armies ready for Baal. Baal goes to find his soul stone, after which he picks up the armies from Diablo and attacks the World Stone, and Mephisto stays behind to by the other two a bit of time. Which means he is the first to lose his soul stone and thus the first to return to hell in full power. Diablo is second. So by the time the World Stone falls, there are two prime evils at the height of their strength waiting to charge back into the mortal realm. There is no reason to think that breaking the soul stones killed the three. Instead, it may have only made them stronger. Let us assume Tyreal knew all this. Then, by breaking the World Stone, he may have opened up a hole for the massive invasion that Izual warned of."


So, Tyrael would be working with Izual and the 3 brothers to help destroy the Worldstone so Hell could invade. Think about it: In the end of Act 2, the cinematic shows Tyrael telling Marius to go to Zakarum Temple. However, we do not know what happened after that. For all we know, he was fighting with Diablo. However, because Diablo was in his weaker human form, how was he able to escape? Cain said it himself that Tyrael had defied the heavens to "help" the mortal men. Also, see how he is portrayed on Diablo3.com? He's in a black silhouette. Dun dun dunnnnn.

I wish I had my PDF file of all the character conversations of Diablo 1 and 2 but I seem to have misplaced it.

The image we see of Diablo in the D3 teaser trailer could be the true form of Diablo. We've noticed that in Diablo 1, he stood tall and skinny. In Diablo 2, he was more hunched over but more muscular. Now, in Diablo 3, he looks like he's gigantic and full of fire (the fires of hell?) with a big head and a look like he's full of power. Is this what Luke has foreseen?

Another thought just came to me: In recent years, we've been able to fight an "Uber" Diablo, Mephisto and Baal. Has the light bulb gone on yet? Maybe this is foreshadowing what Luke has suggested of the brothers being more powerful now that their stones were destroyed.

Of course, this is all speculation.

New Artwork Released By Blizzard

I've been waiting to see the island Skovos for a while now and I really wanted to be able to go play there in Diablo 3. However, that isn't going to happen. They release the image as a way to show how large the world of Sanctuary is and here is what Blizzard had to say:

It isn't a location that you'll visit in Diablo III, but the artwork is a good example of the work and thought going in to fleshing out the world of Sanctuary. It's already a very complex world with a lot of locations and events, but a lot of it still isn't visually or contextually realized. As we want to create the feeling of a world outside of your immediate view it's important to create or expand upon the locations and stories of that world.

As we're working to create Diablo III we're also working to create a more visually complete Sanctuary.

The second image: I can imagine is Kehijstan because we know we're heading to Caldeum. However, I've also heard that it could be the impact site of the Meteor or near the Dry Steps / Scosglen.

The other concept arts are of a sloth beast and a cultist.

And, if you want a nice wallpaper of Skovos, you can go to www.diii.net and download this wallpaper (which is now my wallpaper).