

We've also recieved quite a few other theories from tipsters. For example, Evamortte of the US-Tichondrius server sees a number 3 carved into the ice on the far right side of the image. The Diablo 3 crowd also sees quite a few other things under the Ice. Some people claim that those runes are similar to ones on Frostmourne, while others claim they are runes from Diablo 2's rune system - The lower right one seems to be Shael, while the upper right is Hel, according to them. The images behind the ice, which can barely be seen, look to be some sort of runes. The WoTLK Beta camp, on the other hand, considers it to be just plain old ice - the file name of the splash images have been ice1.jpg and ice2.jpg, after all. Even he didn't know what would happen once it was broken.

You'll remember that at the end of Diablo 2: Lord of Destruction, the archangel Tyrael was forced to destroy the worldstone after Baal defiled it. The Diablo 3 camp, for its part, generally considers the image to be that of the worldstone - the worldstone is actually red instead of blue, but there's always a possibility the color could have changed due to the events of Diablo 2. Let's look at what we have after the break. Each side has some pretty passionate arguments, and are bringing the analysis to back it up. Right now, there's two major schools of thought about it: One school says that this will lead up to the announcement of the WoTLKBeta, while another says that this will be the announcement of Diablo 3. However, the question remains: What is being announced? we can probably assume that the picture will change more each day until something is announced at the Worldwide Invitational. There's already tons of speculation speeding around the web about it, and of course the pot was only stirred all the more this morning when the picture changed slightly: the light in the middle of the cracked ice became brighter, and there's some new detail that can be seen through the ice, including a rune of some sort just to the upper right of the center.


We reported yesterday about the new icy splash screen which has appeared on many of Blizzard's corporate and gaming sites.
