Blizzard Surprised by Reaction to Online-Only Diablo 3

[rapidoud]

I was annoyed when they added the DRM (sorry but it is, in the fullest sense of the word) in SC2 yet I just got called a whiney troll, looks like I was right.

I thought people would be more surprised at microtransactions.

 

[snfonseka]

I am surprised that Robert Bridenbecker is surprised regarding the reaction.

 

[WaffleCopters]

Dear god, and i thought Starcraft 2 not having offline Local Multiplayer was bad o.o

I mean, yes i do have access to the internet easily, but sometimes i just prefer to play off of it, i mean, kinda dumb to eat away my monthly limit by not actually taking advtange of it

 

[Johnny Impact]

There is definitely some sort of disconnect between the decision makers and the people who will have to deal with the ramifications of those decisions.

I understand Blizzard feels like they're wasting money trying to take down dupers and gold farmers. But for Blizzard to become the dupers and gold farmers is hardly a solution.

I understand keeping SP and MP separate. SP is easily abused. With MP's server connections you can better enforce the rules. But what's so wrong with having SP and LAN for those who want it? Every Christmas my brother, brother-in-law, and I bring our computers to my folks' house for a three-day LAN party. It's the best multiplayer I get. I look forward to it all year.

Congratulations, Blizzard. You just cancelled Christmas. Or, at least, you ensured we won't be using your product.

 

[Epona]

If Blizzard is surprised then they obviously weren't listening to all the criticism about SC2 having the primary single player mode as always online and a lack of LAN to support that model. Guess Blizzard really doesn't listen to the fans.

 

[Albetta]

There also wont be any LAN support.

 

[zehydra]

I myself was kind of annoyed at the news, being a fan of single-player rpgs (as well as other MMOs). However, when I informed my brother, who had played Diablo II and loved it back in the day (he's 25-26), he really didn't mind hearing that Diablo II was Online-only. He recalled back to when he used to play Diablo II online (and offline), and remembered that the online-only version was always better.

 

[The_Vigilant]

Nothing to do with DRM?

Being asked to believe that is just insulting. Fuck you too, buddy.

My thoughts exactly.

 

[EvilScoop]

Here's the bad news kiddo's. What you thought isn't really what you thought.

Blizzard wasn't developing a single player game for you. Somewhere along the line they decided they wanted to make a multiplayer game centered around Co-operation and they've stated this long before now.

The surprise and the hate and the anger would all be well and good if a single player experience is what they promised you, is what they strove for. But it isn't.

I can't say I know what the development process is like but I certainly know how to put myself in a creative position. It doesn't take a whole lot to take a look back at something and see what you could do different, or better. Every decision I've heard I could trace back to a key point or potential flaw in Diablo 2. Their reasoning makes sense when you think about it.

It's easy to get lost in your own world, and when everyone around you says what's happening is a good idea it's easy to get caught up in that. I can see how the developers could think that the always on would work the best, for reasons along with and including piracy protection. So when they say "We had no idea, here's why we thought it was a good idea." It certainly isn't them saying "Fuck the fans."

Is it still ignorant of the backlash, sure, but the pro's in their heads outweighed the cons.

But this is all purely hypothetical, but no more hypothetical than the thinking that Blizzard is out to get us.

But again putting myself back into that situation, if it were me I wouldn't want to make Diablo II-2. I don't want to make the same game, I want to make something better in the same style. The only way to do that is to look at the old one and see what could be done better here and now. If the most popular thing, if the funnest part about Diablo 2 was playing with your friends through hell and back again, then why wouldn't you want to make the sequel all about that? Gold farmers the big issue? What can we do about that? Let's make an auction house! But the real money guys will still be all about selling stuff. Let's make a real money auction house. Player based, moves them out, the players make money, we can make money, everyone wins! High five!

But what's worse is that you guys really don't know what you are dealing with here. As much as you don't want to deal with it, this isn't Activision, this is Blizzard and this madness has happened once before. It wasn't on such a large game changing scale, but do you recall those old Chat Channels in Starcraft? They didn't want to put it in, thought it was dumb, but some people thought that was terrible and made sure blizzard knew they hated it. Blizzard was shocked they thought it was that big of a deal. Soon after Chat Channels are developed and implemented.

Don't count your chickens until they are fully developed.

 

[Stall]

Good on you Blizzard. Good on you to defend your design choices and not back down against the waves of massive amounts of childish whining, knee-jerk reactions, and childish ultimatums. Good fucking on you to stand up for the choices you made. I might not have agreed with the direction you guys took WoW... hell, WOW has been a punching bag of choice of mine since WotLK. I haven't enjoyed one of your games since Vanilla WOW (or perhaps WOW BC), but it's great to see you guys have a spine.

You guys do what you think you have to do to make D3 great. The supporters and true fans of the franchise aren't the ones threatening to boycott your game or writing angry posts on the internet about how you, the developer, are wrong. We're the ones who have concerns about the system, but are still willing to support it and buy your game. We're the ones who are calmly listing out how we think this system can be at its best... being drowned out by the absolute childishness of some of your other "fans". Don't listen to the people who are willing to have their anticipation shaken by anything that doesn't align with THEIR vision of the game. If something like this is willing to make them not want your game, then they weren't fans in the first place.

Go Blizzard. I'm not trying to white knight or be a fanboy here, but I am damn impressed you guys are willing to stand up for the choices you made. Kudos to you.

 

[commasplice]

Here's the bad news kiddo's. What you thought isn't really what you thought.

Blizzard wasn't developing a single player game for you. Somewhere along the line they decided they wanted to make a multiplayer game centered around Co-operation and they've stated this long before now.

The surprise and the hate and the anger would all be well and good if a single player experience is what they promised you, is what they strove for. But it isn't.

I can't say I know what the development process is like but I certainly know how to put myself in a creative position. It doesn't take a whole lot to take a look back at something and see what you could do different, or better. Every decision I've heard I could trace back to a key point or potential flaw in Diablo 2. Their reasoning makes sense when you think about it.

It's easy to get lost in your own world, and when everyone around you says what's happening is a good idea it's easy to get caught up in that. I can see how the developers could think that the always on would work the best, for reasons along with and including piracy protection. So when they say "We had no idea, here's why we thought it was a good idea." It certainly isn't them saying "Fuck the fans."

Is it still ignorant of the backlash, sure, but the pro's in their heads outweighed the cons.

But this is all purely hypothetical, but no more hypothetical than the thinking that Blizzard is out to get us.

But again putting myself back into that situation, if it were me I wouldn't want to make Diablo II-2. I don't want to make the same game, I want to make something better in the same style. The only way to do that is to look at the old one and see what could be done better here and now. If the most popular thing, if the funnest part about Diablo 2 was playing with your friends through hell and back again, then why wouldn't you want to make the sequel all about that? Gold farmers the big issue? What can we do about that? Let's make an auction house! But the real money guys will still be all about selling stuff. Let's make a real money auction house. Player based, moves them out, the players make money, we can make money, everyone wins! High five!

But what's worse is that you guys really don't know what you are dealing with here. As much as you don't want to deal with it, this isn't Activision, this is Blizzard and this madness has happened once before. It wasn't on such a large game changing scale, but do you recall those old Chat Channels in Starcraft? They didn't want to put it in, thought it was dumb, but some people thought that was terrible and made sure blizzard knew they hated it. Blizzard was shocked they thought it was that big of a deal. Soon after Chat Channels are developed and implemented.

Don't count your chickens until they are fully developed.

Okay, here's the thing, though: I think we can agree that the majority of people who played Diablo 2 played it online. Why, though, would Blizzard ever fucking think that the people who played Diablo by themselves would want to play do that online? Especially when you can easily solo online, anyway. You don't need a completely separate mode for that. The outrage isn't over the fact that Blizzard focused so intently on online multiplayer, but that they castrated the rest of the game while doing it.

Edit: I mean. If they had kept the auction house, but also allowed people to play offline, there would have been grumbling, but not this immense backlash. It's not about the fact that they tried to build on the Diablo formula. It's that they're changing core parts of the gameplay and making it nearly impossible for many of the prospective customers to play the game in the first place. Sure, people would have been pissy about the LAN and auction house, but most of the people who aren't going to buy the game now would have, because they could actually play it.

 

[Kaine_Wraith]

There is no reason he should have been surprised because gamers are easily outraged, but the outrage is pretty silly.

We live in an era of mobile apps, MMOs, twitter feeds as news, and appliances that text you. The best selling games are FPS titles where online functionality is expected. Even Nintendo's casual box is fully integrated with the internet.

If you don't have full time internet and you are a gamer, rather than complaining to the game companies, it is probably time you find a way to fix the internet issue. The tech is advancing and this trend is not going away. You may as well complain that the game is not compatible with a 486 DOS box.

Would it have been nice to have an offline mode? Sure. But I would venture that the metrics showed the majority of likely Diablo players played online. At a certain point, adding game modes and features to facilitate a niche consumer base just isn't reasonable.

You might have a case if money (or lack thereof) was what kept people from getting fast, reliable internet. I have a job that requires me to move every couple of years, and while these places are hardly remote (most of them where within 30-60 min to a large city), they aren't metropolises either. Most of these places all you can get is below average speed with a download cap that is ridiculous for the current day; if you go above that be prepared to pay out tons of overcharge fees.

It's not like I am being cheap; that is my ONLY option for internet. So you can see why people could be upset that their precious limit is being drained when all they are doing is playing a single player game that requires you to check-in with Blizzard for simply stupid reasons.

 

[Tumedus]

There is no reason he should have been surprised because gamers are easily outraged, but the outrage is pretty silly.

We live in an era of mobile apps, MMOs, twitter feeds as news, and appliances that text you. The best selling games are FPS titles where online functionality is expected. Even Nintendo's casual box is fully integrated with the internet.

If you don't have full time internet and you are a gamer, rather than complaining to the game companies, it is probably time you find a way to fix the internet issue. The tech is advancing and this trend is not going away. You may as well complain that the game is not compatible with a 486 DOS box.

Would it have been nice to have an offline mode? Sure. But I would venture that the metrics showed the majority of likely Diablo players played online. At a certain point, adding game modes and features to facilitate a niche consumer base just isn't reasonable.

This whole argument is ignorant if for no other reason than the fact that there are several people in this very thread who have given personal accounts for why they would not be able to play this game. Many of these accounts are much more complex than just deciding to pay for cable.

There are plenty of circumstances that one cannot control that can keep one from being able to have internet access. You can ctrl-F my user name on this very page if you want one such example. Fact is that even if the majority of people play online, it's completely fucking ridiculous to be expected to have an online connection to play a game that is single player AND installed on your machine.

Edit: And really, the bottom line is that if I'm on such a tight budget that I can't afford internet service, it is much more realistic for me to be able to just pay a one-time fee for a game and play it by myself than to pay that fee AND pay for service. I know we're living in the future and yadda, yadda, yadda, but that doesn't fucking mean that everybody lives in upper-middle-class white suburbia, where everybody has access to a reliable and affordable internet provider. Even discounting the boycotting, Blizzard is cutting themselves out of sales this way, plain and simple, and that should matter to them, if nothing else.

I get that you're upset that, in your current situation, you cannot play it. But your situation is derived from poverty, not some internet accessibility issue. To use my previous example of the 486 DOS box, its the same as complaining that you cannot afford to buy a new computer and the requirements on this game are too high. Every game has technical limitations, and more and more those limitations are going to include internet access.

As much as there is consumer outrage over this, most of it is probably just hot air. The biggest reason this is an issue is because people view it as taking away something they had before. But this is a different game. They want to focus on the online aspects of the game that made the first one such a success.

Some 20+ million people have active subscriptions to MMOs. And this game is probably going to be happy with a few million. Some people are sure to be left out because of this requirement, but most won't. Every move a developer makes is going to upset someone. But they ultimately have to choose their market. Blizzard has just chosen to double down on their online market. Considering where the profits are coming from in the entire industry right now, I cannot say I blame them.

Do I think Blizzard is greedy? yes. Does that bother me? no. At then end of the day, I can play this game and if its good I will. When my internet or Battle.net goes down, I will go do something else just like I do with most other games I play today.

 

[Olrod]

I'd say it was a pretty objective complaint that always-online is a pretty poor decision for a game that's supposed to have single-player capability.

 

[Traun]

While I'm an opponent to constant connection there are benefits to it.

1. Constant access to the community - you are always connected to your fiends and various community groups.

F the community, i have enough community in the MMO's/Online Games i play i don't need or want another.

2. Access to online content - the AH is a prime example of this, you can always go and buy the item you wish (for gold or cash or whatever).

While i can see the AH is nice for some, again i don't give a shit as someone who plays Singleplayer i have no intrest in magic shield of bullshitium with +1 more strength than the shield i have

3. Helping make a better game - while you are online you constantly send data to the company so they can analyze the performance of gamers, see what they did and didn't do and work off that (why do you think Dragon Age 2 has only human as a race option? Over 50% of the gamers chose a human origin in DA:O. This is why the new class in ME3 is combat-orientated, instead of magic or engineering).

Commonly referred to as spying since i don't want these companies to know how i or others played. As for the Dragon Age 2 reference, seems to me like an even better reason not to allow these companies access to data. They will remove things that don't get mass appeal so they can cut corners.

I finished ME1 6 times, i finished ME2 once. Yet the change in ME2 comes from those complainers/data that said more shooty less anything else

4. Events - you can participate in events.

Don't care about event's, if anything this is the weakest on the list.

Yet i've sacrificed on the go gaming, Mods, Lan, how many characters i can create, because of my region i'll get bad ping to either the US or the SEA servers if for some reason i did want to go online.

As well as loosing my privacy, and ensuring that while playing i wouldn't be able to download other things because they might spike my connection for .1ms and fuck the D3 connection.

No game should ever require an internet connection for any segment of the game that doesn't necessitate an internet connection.(essentially only leaving MMO's/MP components)

If they are worried about me fucking the economy, Make it so that offline chars can't use the AH(wait thats there money source no wonder we aren't allowed offline) and that we can only play any sort of MP(LAN) with other offline characters.

That way we can have mods and hackity to our hearts content, without fucking with the so called competitive segments of the game

My friend you lack the foresight, nay, the vision of the future. How can you say "F the community" when Zynga build an empire on this. Soon every company will have it's own social network. EA Social, Blizzard Social, Activision Social, Square-Enix social where you will post on your walls what loot you've got and share the experience. And when you share the experience you receive Friend points which unlock special "fan" bonuses, like items.
And mods, who would use mods when you can buy perfectly good DLC. There will be anything for any budget, from 0.99$ skins to 19.99$ mission - even better, if you convince your friends to buy some you get extra friend points.
And privacy, my friend, nay, MY COMRADE, we are all united in our SOCIAL NETWORK, what privacy? What do you have to hide from your dearest and closest kin on this earth - your online friends.
And you obviously don't know how fun it is to buy stuff off the Auction House, together, with your dearest friends.

Seriously Blizzard, it is not good enough to claim "this is the way the world is going, deal with it" as a reason why we should all just roll over and accept it.

But the worst part of this, the absolute clincher, is the utter apathy they have towards even convincing us WHY this is necessary.

Blizzard just doesn't care anymore.

And you my friend, why are you disloyal to your favorite brand? Blizzard does care about you, did they not make the game you wished to have, Indeed they even made sure that you are always connected to your online friends for the best possible SOCIAL EXPERIENCE, indeed they also made sure that if you do not have the time to recieve the full content of the game, you can buy it.

 

[TheDooD]

There is no reason he should have been surprised because gamers are easily outraged, but the outrage is pretty silly.

We live in an era of mobile apps, MMOs, twitter feeds as news, and appliances that text you. The best selling games are FPS titles where online functionality is expected. Even Nintendo's casual box is fully integrated with the internet.

If you don't have full time internet and you are a gamer, rather than complaining to the game companies, it is probably time you find a way to fix the internet issue. The tech is advancing and this trend is not going away. You may as well complain that the game is not compatible with a 486 DOS box.

Would it have been nice to have an offline mode? Sure. But I would venture that the metrics showed the majority of likely Diablo players played online. At a certain point, adding game modes and features to facilitate a niche consumer base just isn't reasonable.

Its not really adding anything its just if servers crash, my online is being a *****, or im traveling I should be able to play the game I spent 60$ for. It's not gonna be a niche market when week 1 of D3's release blizzard's servers crash. Leaving millions unable to play and extremely pissed off.

 

[Vindestructable]

I'm really starting to lose faith in blizzard.

 

[mjc0961]

He also claimed that the always-on requirement has absolutely nothing to do with DRM.

That's the same line of shit EA said about Command and Conquer 4. I didn't buy it then and I don't buy it now.

There is no legitimate excuse to require an internet connection to be maintained for a single player game. None. It's called single player for a reason: because there is one single person playing. Thus no need for an internet connection.