Twenty years ago, Diablo the Lord of Terror first brought his unique brand of evil to the world of Sanctuary, and today in celebration of nearly a quarter century of his reign, he’s invading a few other worlds as well. Blizzard announced today that Diablo-themed goodies will be up for grabs in its other popular franchises, starting on December 31.
“Starting soon you can experience special in-game events and goodies in Diablo III, Heroes of the Storm, Hearthstone, Overwatch, StarCraft II, and World of Warcraft to celebrate a few of the things we love about Diablo,” reads the post from Blizzard Entertainment.
Make sure you have your games updated and ready to go, the in-game items and events will only be available for a limited time, though Blizzard didn’t quite specify how limited.
True to form, Blizzard remained coy about some of the details of its cross-franchise Diablo event, and only laid out the specifics for a handful of its franchises. StarCraft II players, for instance, can expect to find a Diablo-themed worker portrait, but apparently nothing else.
Similarly, Overwatch will see some Diablo-themed in-game sprays, and a new player icon. Heroes of the Storm players, on the other hand, will be treated to a new brawl map, and a new player portrait, while Hearthstone players will be able to face off against a hooded stranger with a mysterious new deck.
World of Warcraft will also see some new events, although Blizzard only offered a cryptic clue, suggesting that certain denizens of Sanctuary will cross over into Azeroth for a short time.
What about Diablo III? Well, as we reported previously, Diablo III players will be able to re-play the original Diablo game, and revisit the classic cathedral dungeon in the Darkening of Tristram event.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.