haha, that was awesome.
how do you figure that they are recycling material from 97 though? all of their games, while sharing a similar theme, have been substantially different. warcraft 2 was great, followed by starfcraft which was also great, and then wc3 which I think is the best rts ever made. even diablo 2 was way more complex than #1.
granted, I have never played wow, but I get the feeling it was pretty innovative and cutting edge too. IN fact, I'm not really sure what the fact that wow has insane fans has to do with blizzard recycling material at all.
anyway, I have found blizzard to be the best, most consistent game producers by a mile. i admit that their graphics are not always all that, but graphics aren't really important to me. strategy and interesting gameplay are the most important things to me in games, and all the warcraft games/starcraft had an abundance of both. you even had to use your head a fair bit in the diablos, which is more than I can say for 99% of the games I play these days. I don't know why diablo 3 would be any different. have you seen a demo or trailers or something?
and the only reason they have their fans by the balls is that they make such kickass games. that doesn't bother me one bit.