when they said it wasn't solely about piracy, I called bullshit. But now I see, they are just greedy bastards. In retrospect, actually, I should have seen that.
I know, how dare a for profit organization try to increase their profit and open new revenue streams. They act as if the point of such an organization is to make money for the people holding the reins! How can they sleep at night knowing they haven't forgotten the point of their company? It's truly absurd!
The AH doesnt stop the duped item/uber cheat item chars. What it stops is you getting it for free. With all of the people on the game the items bound to be in the AH. It just means you either grind yourself stupid for uber gear, which is fair enough, or you pay for it. It doesn't stop unabalancing, it just stops you getting it for free. Worst case scenario: Paying real cash for the privelage of mowing all in your path down. Am i the only one who sees being able to pay for power being a bit wrong in this game?
I don't think you fully understand how the RMAH works. Or Loot in general in the game.
For one, everything is level restricted. So you won't be Buying any power that you can't get legitly. That, and Blizzard will not be putting anything up for sale, so they aen't making any real money off of this save for what they get in AH cuts. And you can pretty much say goodby to item duping with the online only function.
All in all this is a whole big molehill people are turning into Everest.
And really, maybe if Players were a litle more responisble we wouln't need such heay DRM in the first place. But considering how D2 ended up, tis is not unexpected now that peoples real money are in play.
No, I thought it was a little weird that Blizzard would allow you to do that. I don't know why they would let you do that, but it's there. I'm a little curious to know how much some of that loot is actually going to cost, and if it's more than I think is reasonable, I will probably go back and grind myself stupid.
I remember in D2 grinding like crazy just to get certain materials just to make better armor and whatever else I needed for my character. And you know what? I'm fine with that. Don't really need to change that because it makes the final few fights more fun that way, or frustrating depending on what was done with the armor.
That's not even argument. It's an appeal based on subjective reasoning.
Also, possible subtle Ad-Hominem fallacy.
Since you refuse to address it, here's the point: Why is Blizzard deliberately cutting features? How is this a superior product?
The answer is tricky: The product might be superior, but access to it is strictly worse than it was before, and for reasons that cannot be justified by an informed consumer.
Whether or not the consumer still accepts the product is up to them. I cannot for personal (and very practical/objective) reasons.
Business logic says that Blizzard wants more money and control over their consumer. That's it.
From the consumer's point of view, that isn't really an acceptable argument since it boils down to "We want more control over you...because it helps our bottom line."
Because of this business tomfoolery, there are personal reasons why I can't feasibly play Diablo 3. I won't bore you with the details (unless you really want me to), but for a game that's going to require a massive time commitment, I can't require it to need CONSTANT internet access.
So as I said before, I'm looking at alternatives; it's the only rational solution.
Failing to cater to your personal needs is not indicative of failure to make a good game.
Demand initiates the economy; not supply. Supply is totally useless without Demand, but Demand can exist without Supply. That's economic law, not idle suggestion.
Del-Toro said:
I know, how dare a for profit organization try to increase their profit and open new revenue streams. They act as if the point of such an organization is to make money for the people holding the reins! How can they sleep at night knowing they haven't forgotten the point of their company? It's truly absurd!
But for many reasons stated in this thread others are affected. Some people have a dodgy connection, some people don't like the idea of a real money auction house polluting their fantasy gameplay experience, some people don't like any kind of DRM, some people don't like to give up their privacy or personal information just to play a damn game, and some people don't like being marketed to.
All of your statements are either [link src="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Straw_man"]Straw Man[/link] or [link src="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faulty_generalization"]Generalizing from Self[/link] where you state "well I don't have a problem and everyone who says they do are irrelevant".
If you can't make a logical post then please stop trolling my thread.
If I can't make a logical post? You quoted the first sentence of a good page of text filled with the entire reasoning behind my thoughts, ignoring all of it.
And again, linking to articles on elementary rhetoric is not going to impress me, nor is just naming some common fallacies going to persuade anyone intelligent.
I wasn't generalising, I was answering the specific point about none of it bothering me. You know, the incredibly patronising bit where you insist that these are bad design decisions and then try to make me look ridiculous by proposing that I have some sort of masochistic desire for them.
The generalisation comes in seperately: most gamers interested in D3 have a steady connection. Not only is it immediately true looking at any extant statistics, but if they didn't, Blizzard wouldn't be doing this. If you believe, as you seem to, that it's all about the money and Blizzard clearly doesn't care about their customers if it will help the bottom line, then they must be pretty sure that this isn't going to exclude too large a segment of their audience.
And I'm not setting up any straw men. Everyone's saying that they just removed a feature to make money. My whole point is that they removed a feature to add in another feature: the auction house, which requires greater security for them to limit their liability. Once you've set up a client and closed-server architecture, it makes it prohibitively difficult and expensive to maintain a separate single player since every bit of game code needs to be duplicated and potentially modified for the two modes. My point is that saying "I don't like the auction house" is fine (even if I disagree and even if I find the "fairness" arguments to be rather weak given the otherwise tremendous advantage those with more leisure time would have). Saying "they removed single player for no reason!" is ridiculous. Nor is it reasonable to suggest that they removed it just to drive more people to the auction house (I don't imagine they mind that outcome of course) - they're obligated to try to keep the system much more secure since the auction house involves actual money.
But if anyone disagreeing with you is "trolling your thread" (I like how you maintain possession of it there), I'll leave so you can all go back to whining about how heartless and unfair those greedy bastards at Blizzare are acting.
Yes, my point was that your post started out reasonable, suggesting something like this (and of course that caution is likewise reasonable), but then suddenly shifted to the same sort of bizarre personally-attacked invective that comprises most of this thread.
Atmos Duality said:
That's not even argument. It's an appeal based on subjective reasoning.
Also, possible subtle Ad-Hominem fallacy.
Again, it was meant to point out the sudden contradictory shift in the tone of your post.
As for it being ad-hominem:
Blizzard is taking the game in a way you don't like. Initially, you sort of shrugged this off and voiced your disappointment that it was going in a way that didn't agree with you, but that it wasn't necessarily bad, just not well-suited to you personally. Then you mysteriously jumped to suggesting that the decision was bad. We're talking about your reasoning. You were the topic under discussion. Ad hominem is a fallacy about attacking people when it isn't relevant to the discussion. It isn't just an injunction against discussion of interlocutors. My point was specifically about your reasoning, so it was very definitely relevant.
Atmos Duality said:
Since you refuse to address it, here's the point: Why is Blizzard deliberately cutting features? How is this a superior product?
See above. They're not just cutting features, they're cutting a feature because it's incompatible with another feature.
Atmos Duality said:
The answer is tricky: The product might be superior, but access to it is strictly worse than it was before, and for reasons that cannot be justified by an informed consumer.
Except they can: see above. They have to implement some architecture that makes hacking items harder and more easily reversible to limit their liability (otherwise they can't really have an auction house - they could easily find themselves subject to some very valid, very costly lawsuits). That architecture has the unfortunate side effect of making development of a single-player option very difficult (since an offline mode obviously can't use that architecture, they essentially need to develop two versions of the game).
Atmos Duality said:
Whether or not the consumer still accepts the product is up to them. I cannot for personal (and very practical/objective) reasons.
As I was trying to suggest originally, that's a very reasonable attitude. No one expects that every product will be right for them and while it sucks that it seemed like it would be and they changed from the previously-announced design, that doesn't in itself make them greedy or make it a bad decision.
Atmos Duality said:
Business logic says that Blizzard wants more money and control over their consumer. That's it.
From the consumer's point of view, that isn't really an acceptable argument since it boils down to "We want more control over you...because it helps our bottom line."
They've explicitly stated that they're doing this to help deal with fraudulent transactions, to centralise the index for real-money purchases of in-game items, and to provide a legitimate means to do the sort of item auctioning that people clearly want to do. Whether those are truly their primary aims or not, it will have those effects and that's definitely something useful for a lot of consumers.
Atmos Duality said:
Because of this business tomfoolery, there are personal reasons why I can't feasibly play Diablo 3. I won't bore you with the details (unless you really want me to), but for a game that's going to require a massive time commitment, I can't require it to need CONSTANT internet access.
Like I said, this is unfortunate. I'm honestly sad that you can't play a game you were obviously looking forward to. But that isn't the same thing as saying that I think they deliberately cut out a segment of consumers for no reason other than greed - they did it to provide another desired service and all of the announced reasons are pretty noble (and the benefits mentioned in those justifications will still exist even if the true intentions are less noble).
Atmos Duality said:
So as I said before, I'm looking at alternatives; it's the only rational solution.
Demand initiates the economy; not supply. Supply is totally useless without Demand, but Demand can exist without Supply. That's economic law, not idle suggestion.
My point was that your personal demand does not initiate the economy. It isn't a bad economic decision for Blizzard because it excludes you. It's only a bad economic decision if it excludes an unreasonable number of people. Clearly it doesn't, or those greedy money-loving bastards at Blizzard wouldn't be doing it.
Edit: Sorry, forgot that I'm supposed to stop trolling OP's thread with reasoned argument. Have fun everyone!
Except they can: see above. They have to implement some architecture that makes hacking items harder and more easily reversible to limit their liability (otherwise they can't really have an auction house - they could easily find themselves subject to some very valid, very costly lawsuits). That architecture has the unfortunate side effect of making development of a single-player option very difficult (since an offline mode obviously can't use that architecture, they essentially need to develop two versions of the game).
Let me make this crystal-clear: In Diablo 2 you could NOT take your single player characters into Closed Battle.net. No exceptions.
Any hacks, dupes, or other technical wizardry that occurred on Closed Battle.net, well, it was Blizzard's job to "police" their game system EXACTLY AS IT IS NOW. Blizzard will have to police for bots and hackers just as they always had to.
The hacks made OUTSIDE of Closed Battle.net (local characters/open Bnet which was just a local-host game-finding hub) had ABSOLUTELY ZERO IMPACT on Closed Battle.net.
Because you couldn't export your modified characters to Battle.net. People tried, oh, how they tried. And they failed every time.
All online (Closed Bnet) hacks and exploits had to be done within network coding; you couldn't just mod the executable or your character file because those were stored on Blizzard's servers.
Thus, we can establish that the old Closed Battlenet 1 and Battlenet 2 ARE IDENTICAL IN NATURE. Yet, I also established that Open Bnet/Local Character hacks were a completely different beast from Closed Bnet hacks. Local Hacks only worked on Local Data, and Closed Bnet kept your character data on Blizzard's end...so only a more limited number of hacks worked online (mostly Maphack and lag hacks; most of which were patched out. Only Maphack remained because it's just a sampling program that views data; it doesn't actually change anything).
You claim that they would have to create two different versions? Why? Diablo 2 did both before, why couldn't that work now?
If Online/Offline characters were kept separate as they were before, then all Single-Player/LAN players would lose is access to the Auction House. Sure, they would be left in the Wild West again, but this is still fair because in turn, THEY CAN'T INFLUENCE THE ONLINE MARKET AT ALL since they've been cut out of it entirely!
So Blizzard is cutting offline..."to make things more convenient"? What?
Why not leave that choice in the hands of the player? Why take that option away?
It's not expensive at all to implement or design for, and if the majority of players are headed online to their servers anyway, then the Auction House was going to do business just fine anyway!
Blizzard even said that you don't HAVE to play with other players online; you can solo Diablo 3 if you so wish.
So really, there's no justification for cutting Offline and LAN play at all.
So why do this?
Because Blizzard wants their players grinding on BLIZZARD'S servers so players can sell items they find through BLIZZARD'S Auction House, thus enabling BLIZZARD to make more money without even trying. Hell, in this disgusting model, the PLAYERS are indirectly working for BLIZZARD because all of the transactions start within Battlenet 2.0 and end in Battlenet 2.0!
By forcing EVERYONE online, they create the temptation for EVERYONE to use their Auction House, and no other system.
If they had kept both Online and Offline available, you could have called it fair and I couldn't even argue against that. But that's not what they're doing.
As I was trying to suggest originally, that's a very reasonable attitude. No one expects that every product will be right for them and while it sucks that it seemed like it would be and they changed from the previously-announced design, that doesn't in itself make them greedy or make it a bad decision.
My decision and the reasoning for my decision are related, yet separate.
This is a money-grab on Blizzard's part, and as someone who supported and loved their games for years it's personally heart-breaking to see them resort to such disgusting business tactics.
They've explicitly stated that they're doing this to help deal with fraudulent transactions, to centralise the index for real-money purchases of in-game items, and to provide a legitimate means to do the sort of item auctioning that people clearly want to do. Whether those are truly their primary aims or not, it will have those effects and that's definitely something useful for a lot of consumers.
The only reason those items even have real-life value is because of obscene amounts of grind. That's right: a strictly-undesirable aspect of the game becomes the basis of value for an entire online economy.
Before, Blizzard used to fight that market, but now they've looked at the Chinese Gold Farming business from WoW and decided that they want in on the action.
Edit: Sorry, forgot that I'm supposed to stop trolling OP's thread with reasoned argument. Have fun everyone!
Any hacks, dupes, or other technical wizardry that occurred on Closed Battle.net, well, it was Blizzard's job to "police" their game system EXACTLY AS IT IS NOW. Blizzard will have to police for bots and hackers just as they always had to.
It's worth remembering here that incentive to lock down the system has gone up dramatically. Not only might hacked and duped items hurt the economy leading to lower transaction fees for Blizzard, but sale of either presents a tremendous legal liability given the probable size of the playerbase.
Atmos Duality said:
The hacks made OUTSIDE of Closed Battle.net (local characters/open Bnet which was just a local-host game-finding hub) had ABSOLUTELY ZERO IMPACT on Closed Battle.net.
Because you couldn't export your modified characters to Battle.net. People tried, oh, how they tried. And they failed every time.
All online (Closed Bnet) hacks and exploits had to be done within network coding; you couldn't just mod the executable or your character file because those were stored on Blizzard's servers.
Thus, we can establish that the old Closed Battlenet 1 and Battlenet 2 ARE IDENTICAL IN NATURE. Yet, I also established that Open Bnet/Local Character hacks were a completely different beast from Closed Bnet hacks. Local Hacks only worked on Local Data, and Closed Bnet kept your character data on Blizzard's end...so only a more limited number of hacks worked online (mostly Maphack and lag hacks; most of which were patched out. Only Maphack remained because it's just a sampling program that views data; it doesn't actually change anything).
This is exactly what I was talking about - this is why they're instituting such an architecture in the first place (the same reason they used a similar architecture for D2). Let's not get ahead of ourselves with assumptions though - D3 has a lot of things that D2 does not, so I don't think it's at all safe to assume that even a majority of the code was simply reused. Networks have changed, features have changed, and there's a lot that the old Battlenet simply couldn't do that it appears the new one will be able to do.
Atmos Duality said:
You claim that they would have to create two different versions? Why? Diablo 2 did both before, why couldn't that work now?
I don't mean two versions as in two separate programs on your computer or two separate boxes. Not two different products, but two different versions of the game's engine. Diablo 2 does have two different versions of the engine (I'm not sure, but I imagine offline single-player is an emulated version of a stripped-down modified multiplayer server that a modified version of the multiplayer client connects to locally, as this would involve the least duplication of effort). Assuming they can't just reuse the D2 code involved in the server emulation and modification of the server and client (again, I think this is a reasonable assumption), that means they need to make these modifications and create an emulated version of the server for the modified client to connect to. It is by no means a simple task.
That's not to say, however, that it's an impossible task (obviously it isn't since D2 did it), just costly. D2 did it because a very significant share of their market couldn't be expected to stay online 11 years ago. That segment has shrunk substantially since then. The amount of work just isn't justified anymore. I suppose they could take a hit and blow the time and money on developing single-player, but I don't really think they should be expected to do so. They're not making the product worse so much as they are choosing that it's not worth it to expand the potential market for the game. This doesn't seem unethical to me in much the same way that I don't expect other developers to put games out on less-popular platforms when I don't own the platforms for which they're releasing games that I'd otherwise want to play. It's somewhat more unfortunate in this case because it can be easier to get hold of another console than to find some way of securing stable internet, but I think the analogy still holds up relatively well.
Atmos Duality said:
If Online/Offline characters were kept separate as they were before, then all Single-Player/LAN players would lose is access to the Auction House. Sure, they would be left in the Wild West again, but this is still fair because in turn, THEY CAN'T INFLUENCE THE ONLINE MARKET AT ALL since they've been cut out of it entirely!
Yes. And this losing access to it and other things that can't be included in the single player are yet more things that force them to add further modifications to a single-player version (on top of emulating the server).
Atmos Duality said:
So Blizzard is cutting offline..."to make things more convenient"? What?
I didn't put this well. Blizzard is cutting offline because it costs time and money that they feel could be better spent elsewhere (I would say "or that they may not have", but then again this is Blizzard). The reason they're being forced to make this decision in the first place (the reason single player isn't extraordinarily easy to graft onto the game) is because they're using a closed-server architecture to keep things more secure (just like they did for D2).
Atmos Duality said:
It's not expensive at all to implement or design for, and if the majority of players are headed online to their servers anyway, then the Auction House was going to do business just fine anyway!
This is really the heart of the matter. It is potentially very expensive both in terms of pay and in terms of limited coder time. Maintaining two builds of the game - a single player and multiplayer as this would require - not only requires actually building the two different versions, but also increases the amount of overhead. You don't just have to try to think about how your code will fit into one game, you have to imagine how it will fit into two. That's a lot more potential bugs too. And both have to be tested separately. Bug-hunting, logistics, and testing all require more money and more time.
Atmos Duality said:
Blizzard even said that you don't HAVE to play with other players online; you can solo Diablo 3 if you so wish.
Precisely. They don't have any problem with people playing solo, they just don't want to commit the resources to duplicating that much effort when it only cuts off a small part of their market.
Atmos Duality said:
So why do this?
Because Blizzard wants their players grinding on BLIZZARD'S servers so players can sell items they find through BLIZZARD'S Auction House, thus enabling BLIZZARD to make more money without even trying. Hell, in this disgusting model, the PLAYERS are indirectly working for BLIZZARD because all of the transactions start within Battlenet 2.0 and end in Battlenet 2.0!
I agree that they are effectively working for Blizzard. If they weren't getting paid, I would agree that this is unethical. But they're working for an employer and, in doing so, making money. This doesn't seem unethical or even strange. That's usually how making money works - you're paid to do something that generates money for whoever hired you.
Atmos Duality said:
By forcing EVERYONE online, they create the temptation for EVERYONE to use their Auction House, and no other system.
The temptation sure. I won't disagree with that and I imagine they're probably not too unhappy with that being a result of this decision. That said, there is another system for getting these items: trading other items for them (completely unaffected by the auction system), buying them with in-game currency (this one is potentially subject to the economy of the auction system), or earning them in game (completely unaffected by the market system). The failsafe to the market leading to hyperinflation and preventing anyone who doesn't spend real money from getting good items is playing the game. I don't think that's very unreasonable.
Atmos Duality said:
If they had kept both Online and Offline available, you could have called it fair and I couldn't even argue against that. But that's not what they're doing.
But again, this is not a free decision on their part. That would cost them developer time and money.
Atmos Duality said:
My decision and the reasoning for my decision are related, yet separate.
This is a money-grab on Blizzard's part, and as someone who supported and loved their games for years it's personally heart-breaking to see them resort to such disgusting business tactics.
And this is the attitude that keeps bothering me in this thread. None of this is particularly shady. None of this is particularly disgusting.
Put another way: it costs money and development time to add additional graphics settings. A significant number of machines will be completely unable to run D3 at even the lowest settings (probably a larger number of people than those without a stable connection!). Are they being "disgusting" by not also developing for those computers? I mean, they could get the graphics to scale all the way down to D1 quality if they really put in the effort. Are they being unethical by having minimum system requirements that exclude a certain number of people just because it saves them money?
No. There's a certain point at which the number is relatively small and you cut them off and say sorry. This is expected and you'd be hard-pressed to call it unethical.
By not having a stable connection, you no longer meet the minimum system requirements of the game. It's certainly a shitty situation to be in, but it's not unreasonable in the slightest.
Atmos Duality said:
The only reason those items even have real-life value is because of obscene amounts of grind. That's right: a strictly-undesirable aspect of the game becomes the basis of value for an entire online economy.
I might agree with this line of reasoning if they had significantly increased the grind for especially desirable items in D3 simultaneous with the introduction of the auction house, but I haven't heard anything about that. But really, if this is a calculated move on their part, they've been secretly collaborating with game developers for the last few decades to introduce grinding for items in games before they released their auction house to take advantage of the foundations they had so brilliantly laid before.
Atmos Duality said:
Not sure if this was aimed at me, but you were being reasonable and civil with me and for that I thank you. So, uh, have a nice day?
It wasn't. If you look back a few posts, the OP responded to my rather lengthy response to him by quoting the first sentence completely out of context (bafflingly, the context he provided in a question at the end of his earlier post) and suggesting that I was just "trolling" and shouldn't post in "his thread".
It's worth remembering here that incentive to lock down the system has gone up dramatically. Not only might hacked and duped items hurt the economy leading to lower transaction fees for Blizzard, but sale of either presents a tremendous legal liability given the probable size of the playerbase.
You only have to lock down those who play on your system. If you didn't force everyone onto your system, you wouldn't be responsible for everyone. It's that simple.
This is exactly what I was talking about - this is why they're instituting such an architecture in the first place (the same reason they used a similar architecture for D2). Let's not get ahead of ourselves with assumptions though - D3 has a lot of things that D2 does not, so I don't think it's at all safe to assume that even a majority of the code was simply reused. Networks have changed, features have changed, and there's a lot that the old Battlenet simply couldn't do that it appears the new one will be able to do.
This is why I said they are identical IN NATURE. Not in the technical details or nuances, but in the form of their design.
I don't mean two versions as in two separate programs on your computer or two separate boxes. Not two different products, but two different versions of the game's engine. Diablo 2 does have two different versions of the engine (I'm not sure, but I imagine offline single-player is an emulated version of a stripped-down modified multiplayer server that a modified version of the multiplayer client connects to locally, as this would involve the least duplication of effort).
No, they were the SAME CORE ENGINE. The SOLE difference between the two is that the Closed Battlenet had the GM/debug command coding built into it, and some additional security checks/scripts that ran on top of it (that never made it to the client). The back-end Battlenet 1 programming that they programmed for Diablo 2 was later carried over to Warcraft 3 and upgraded.
Bnet 2.0 started with Starcraft 2's build (or WoW's, if you want to split hairs). All they would have to do is adapt Diablo 3 to emulate one instance on a server for offline play and that's it. They don't need to give players the whole Bnet 2.0 platform.
That's not to say, however, that it's an impossible task (obviously it isn't since D2 did it), just costly. D2 did it because a very significant share of their market couldn't be expected to stay online 11 years ago. That segment has shrunk substantially since then. The amount of work just isn't justified anymore.
It's absurd to even consider that Blizzard could not afford to create a Localized Server Platform; the cost to their budget (especially since it's linking to the CORE EXECUTABLE DATA anyway) would be minuscule compared to everything else.
Fact: The cost of actual coding is ABSOLUTELY TRIVAL compared to the cost of content generation (modeling, skinning, rendering, audio etc. Artists aren't cheap) in any given AAA game. The rising cost of game development over the years can be attributed (this is already proven) to increased graphical and audio standards. Coding reached its zenith around 2000, and has stayed relatively even.
Creating a server platform for offline requires NOTHING EXTRA in terms of content generation. It's simply a director for where the player is playing that content on.
Bloody nothing, that's what. The financial and technical success of Blizzard's previous titles contradicts your argument of it being "too expensive".
I suppose they could take a hit and blow the time and money on developing single-player, but I don't really think they should be expected to do so.
They could, but then they wouldn't have total control over their gamers' experience.
They're not making the product worse so much as they are choosing that it's not worth it to expand the potential market for the game.
This doesn't seem unethical to me in much the same way that I don't expect other developers to put games out on less-popular platforms when I don't own the platforms for which they're releasing games that I'd otherwise want to play. It's somewhat more unfortunate in this case because it can be easier to get hold of another console than to find some way of securing stable internet, but I think the analogy still holds up relatively well.
For the miniscule cost (in a budget that must be hundreds of millions by now), why wouldn't they expand their market? Because the bigwigs in suits demanded that Diablo 3 become more like WoW in terms of structure and revenue streams. Not because they genuinely thought that cutting such a staple feature would improve their market appeal.
That means forcing everyone onto their system as a form of Hard-DRM so that they can all stumble onto the Auction House. They want total control over your experience. They want you playing by their rules and ONLY their rules. They have set up Battlenet 2.0 as a form of DRM designed to ensure their bottom line; not as any sort of benefit for their customers.
This is where one might argue that the tradeoffs are offset by improvements in the experience (this is Blizzard's core argument in their PR, by the way):
Yet As I write this, I think back to my experience with Starcraft 2 and I strain to find anything that was improved compared to Bnet 1. And you know what? I can't think of anything! NOT ONE GODDAMN THING!
In fact: Bnet 2.0 has been a strict DOWNGRADE. Why should I have to log onto an online system just to play single player? It makes no fucking sense!
Yes. And this losing access to it and other things that can't be included in the single player are yet more things that force them to add further modifications to a single-player version (on top of emulating the server).
This argument of yours makes little sense to me.
Blizzard can't be responsible for maintaining the online economy or "fairness" of the game for players who are OFFLINE.
They aren't in their metagame! They aren't in their economy! They cannot influence either of those NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO! THEY ARE NOT BLIZZARD'S RESPONSIBILITY.
But Blizzard wants to make them their responsibility for no justifiable reason.
See: When the game gets patched via data changes (like item balancing, new items, content, etc) then those data changes apply to the single player experience ala-mirror logic. JUST AS THEY DID IN DIABLO 2.
They were *NEVER* maintaining two significantly different builds of the game because the online content was nearly (litearlly 99.999% similar) identical to offline! Why can't Diablo 3 work the same way?
It's certainly not due to costs: Those players who want to play offline? That's less server-load on Blizzard's end; the lowered costs right there offset the cost of deployment.
Nevermind that each person who buys Diablo 3 and doesn't play online is more profitable than those who do play online in the short run.
The Auction House helps pay for online maintenance while the offline players don't burden their system. Both are playing the same game using the same patch; the only difference is that one is policed by Blizzard and has the AH while the other is just the Wild West as it was before.
There's no excuse why one of the biggest AAA game developers/publishers can't do this on such a huge budget.
This is really the heart of the matter. It is potentially very expensive both in terms of pay and in terms of limited coder time. Maintaining two builds of the game - a single player and multiplayer as this would require - not only requires actually building the two different versions, but also increases the amount of overhead. You don't just have to try to think about how your code will fit into one game, you have to imagine how it will fit into two. That's a lot more potential bugs too. And both have to be tested separately. Bug-hunting, logistics, and testing all require more money and more time.
...Except the existence and success of Diablo 2 contradicts your argument entirely. Blizzard did it before when they were a MUCH SMALLER COMPANY USING LESS SOPHISTICATED TECH.
The rest of my argument still applies here.
I agree that they are effectively working for Blizzard. If they weren't getting paid, I would agree that this is unethical. But they're working for an employer and, in doing so, making money. This doesn't seem unethical or even strange. That's usually how making money works - you're paid to do something that generates money for whoever hired you.
True enough...but this is some shit I personally have major issues with. Feel free to skip; this isn't part of my objective argument.
It's a goddamn VIDEO GAME. Not a minimum wage job. A VIDEO GAME. ENTERTAINMENT.
I just find this completely fucking backwards: I paid money. Real money. For access to a Minimum Wage Job?? WHY??? What's the appeal in that??
If that's the direction gaming is going in, then I'm done, because it isn't gaming anymore! Gaming should be recreation; tests of skill or interesting ways to unwind in a virtual/mathematical manner (many people love math; they just don't know it). When you force grind into your game, and then you MONETIZE it, you defeat the whole purpose of playing the game in the first place because it's FUCKING BORING.
As a job, it's very inefficient. But because of the grind, it's also a worse game.
The only reason people put up with that bullshit is because it's possible, and scientifically proven, to get people addicted to these things. They don't become addicted because it's fun, they become addicted because the game model preys on human nature.
The temptation sure. I won't disagree with that and I imagine they're probably not too unhappy with that being a result of this decision.
I've been wondering if they're going to let players trade with each other tax-free. I imagine they would have to or they would lose players in droves due to the outrage. Then again, this undermines the purpose of the Auction House tax.
And this is the attitude that keeps bothering me in this thread. None of this is particularly shady. None of this is particularly disgusting.
It's shady to me. Back in 2008, Blizzard told the world that piracy never significantly hampered them financially and they weren't all that concerned about it. Suddenly, on the launch of Starcraft 2, they're at the forefront of developing the hardest, most invasive form of DRM possible, and they intend to implement it in Diablo 3 (and all future games they release).
That tells me that they are VERY VERY AFRAID of piracy. Why spend millions in developing such a sophisticated DRM system if you aren't concerned with piracy?
Call me crazy, but I think when a company starts flat out LYING TO YOU, it becomes shady.
I might agree with this line of reasoning if they had significantly increased the grind for especially desirable items in D3 simultaneous with the introduction of the auction house, but I haven't heard anything about that.
This is a point that only needs empirical data from the game, but trust me, after the absolutely mind-boggling grind in WoW made it one of the most profitable games in history, it'll happen.
Powerful/Desirable items can be equated in value because of their rarity and usefulness. Why are they rare? Because of Skinner Logic: you aren't guaranteed your reward for performing an action (random reward). So you must grind for that reward. The more time required to grind for an item, the greater its perceived value.
People pay money for convenience; in this case, for time. This logic works perfectly and is in fact the basis of the most profitable part of the entire gaming industry.
But really, if this is a calculated move on their part, they've been secretly collaborating with game developers for the last few decades to introduce grinding for items in games before they released their auction house to take advantage of the foundations they had so brilliantly laid before.
Actually, this isn't as far-fetched as you're making it sound when you look at how they employ this in WoW. What is the #1 reason people do Raids? Epics. What is the #1 reason people do dailies? To get the resources to craft better items to get into Raids.
You grind...so you can grind some more.
Try crunching the time metric on just one mid-high tier set of armor in WoW. It's absurd that anyone would waste their time doing the same exact motherfucking thing, bored out of their mind just for a superficial boost and the PRIVILEGE of going it again at a higher level.
And WoW is barely midrange in terms of games that employ Grind and Skinner logic as the primary metric for profit. There are MMO games in China that exploit Grind to terrifying levels and still get results (to the point where it LITERALLY ceases to be gameplay and resembles online gambling).
Zynga; one of the largest and most profitable gaming giants today built their ENTIRE EMPIRE on that very model via Farmville (a model they ironically stole from someone else). Grind has proven to be by far the most profitable type of game available; while paradoxically, it is the absolute least fun game to play.
That is what I mean by encouraging a "disgusting business".
It wasn't. If you look back a few posts, the OP responded to my rather lengthy response to him by quoting the first sentence completely out of context (bafflingly, the context he provided in a question at the end of his earlier post) and suggesting that I was just "trolling" and shouldn't post in "his thread".
I like how everyone forgets the game is region locked as well.
They force you to always be online but you can't even play with the majority of the world. Sounds great.
Torchlight is not a great game. It's just there to hold you over until D3 comes out. Go ahead and keep complaining that the game is online only just like countless other games (WoW).
Since when does a game have to be an MMORPG to be online only? Now who's making the strawman argument? YOU ARE. Perhaps, I should have named Team Fortress, Combat Arms, or Mag. Which are online only shooters, but then you probably would have replied "Derp, D3 isn't a shooter. LOLZ" The core gameplay of D3 centers around multiplayer, that is why it is perfectly acceptable for the game to be online only.
Torchlight is not a great game. It's just there to hold you over until D3 comes out. Go ahead and keep complaining that the game is online only just like countless other games (WoW).
Since when does a game have to be an MMORPG to be online only? Now who's making the strawman argument? YOU ARE. Perhaps, I should have named Team Fortress, Combat Arms, or Mag. Which are online only shooters, but then you probably would have replied "Derp, D3 isn't a shooter. LOLZ" The core gameplay of D3 centers around multiplayer, that is why it is perfectly acceptable for the game to be online only.
By their own admission, Diablo isn?t not really focused around a PVP experience; if you?re playing with someone who has duped items or whatever, all it means is that you will be more likely to defeat Satan. Without a means to gain advantage over another, ?cheating? as a concept becomes substantially more opaque. Who is the cheated party, precisely? Satan the Devil? Fuck him, who cares.
Who is being cheated? This is the part of the movie where, in a series of retrospective realizations cut with you looking at your own face in the rearview mirror, you come bit by bit to the heart of it. The person you are cheating is Blizzard, Blizzard in the aggregate, with your attempts to interfere with their digital marketplace. You mustn?t play offline or goof around with your files or any other naughty business because they are endeavoring to transform your putative ownership into a revenue stream.
Don't you people make enough fucking money? You're like one of the most successful companies in the industry. I'm glad I washed my hands of you. Blizzard, you're the worst damned thing for the industry. The love of money is the root of all evil, so you must be right up there with Satan's cat.
You do know that Blizzard isn't forcing you to spend anymore money after you buy your copy of the game right? I feel the need to remind you of that. In fact, Blizzard is even allowing a method through the auction house for YOU to make money and all they will take out of it is maybe $0.05 usd. Also, shame on you for calling Blizzard the worst company for trying to make money by selling their product. What company doesn't try to make money? Do you even realize that Blizzard needs money to make the games we enjoy? I must say, you sound like the only reason you hate Blizzard is because of jealousy and pride. Sins in and of themselves. Again, I will remind you that Blizzard is not forcing anyone to spend anymore money after they buy the game. Some people get a $300 allowance from their parents every week and want to spend extra money on a game to get a little ahead. Why shouldn't Blizzard allow people to spend more money if they want to? Because you would call them evil for taking money in exchange for their product?
You've actually missed the entire point. You've missed it so thoroughly and completely that I'm worried. I've no problem with them making a game, selling that game, and making money for selling that game. My problem is (if you think they're just going to take five cents you're naive, try 10 to 15 percent charitably) that they are being extremely prejudice against people who don't have stable or hard-line internet. They're saying, "Screw you if you can't be online for single player." I wouldn't actually be so mad if it were just some woefully stupid DRM, but it's to make sure a real. money auction house stays balanced why because a regulated economy make the most money. They're not happy with people buying a game, they can only sell you a game once. Why should they care about the guy who just wants to play the single player game and will probably never go online? Because he only payed and will only pay sixty bucks. They want more money. They're not even farming peoples' time for monthly fees (WoW). They want to make sure they get a real-world cut for fake items. They're not even real. They have no value outside the game. They can't even use some token or something.
They just want money. I'll bet everything in Diablo 3 is made so it gets people to pay more into it than they'll ever get out of it. That's greed. I have a problem with greed, not profit.
You're getting upset about Diablo 3 being an online game when they are offering FREE ONLINE. They said you can even use dial-up to play D3. Since it's not a competitive game, a high speed connection is not required. Blizzard isn't screwing the little guy who just wants to play the single player and not go online. Blizzard doesn't even conceive why someone would REFUSE to go online when the online is completely FREE. I doubt there is even a single person who planned on buying D3 just to ONLY play the single player campaign, because the best experience of the Diablo games comes from going online and playing. That is seriously as likely as buying the new Call of Duty game and not trying out the online. Blizzard realizes this and is focusing on creating a worldly experience in Diablo 3.
And I would only be naive if I believed your number that Blizzard is going to take 10-15% of auction house prices, because you made that number up yourself. These items don't have any value outside the game, but what does that matter? You're kidding yourself if you think these auction houses wouldn't exist from a 3rd party if Blizzard hadn't made their own. It's just safer this way and at least Blizzard gets the cut they DESERVE since it is their intellectual property.
Oh, no. I saw your point from the beginning and I still see it now. You are trying to build up this illusion that Blizzard is going to force you to keep paying for this game after you get your retail copy. That is simply not the case. You even tried to call Blizzard an "evil" and greedy company for simply trying to take a cut from other people selling their game for real money. How ridiculous? Blizzard isn't screwing anyone over. Blizzard is NOT forcing anyone to pay for anything other than the retail copy of the game, but they are leaving the option out there. Blizzard is revolutionizing video games by allowing people like me to make money by selling in-game items to kids who have an allowance similar to my paycheck.
I'm not saying Blizzard is a bunch of saints, because they're not, but what is really evil is people like you trying to make a company like THIS [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xt5KlcLEwLw&feature=channel_video_title] out to be "satanic" in some way. I would call your behavior reminiscent of hate mongering and I don't approve.
Torchlight is not a great game. It's just there to hold you over until D3 comes out. Go ahead and keep complaining that the game is online only just like countless other games (WoW).
Since when does a game have to be an MMORPG to be online only? Now who's making the strawman argument? YOU ARE. Perhaps, I should have named Team Fortress, Combat Arms, or Mag. Which are online only shooters, but then you probably would have replied "Derp, D3 isn't a shooter. LOLZ" The core gameplay of D3 centers around multiplayer, that is why it is perfectly acceptable for the game to be online only.
The core gameplay of Team Fortress, Mag, Guild Wars, Everquest, Wow, Combat Arms, Battlefield play 4 free, Star Wars the Old republic, Ultima Online, Runescape, Final Fantasy 14, Maplestory, Eve Online, City of Heroes, Lord of the Rings online, Age of Conan, and Warhammer online is multiplayer and you can't play the singleplayer mode offline. So what is your point? If it's acceptable for all those other games, why not Diablo 3?
Besides Left 4 Dead allows offline play in the sense that your team mates are controlled by bots which gets really boring after a short while. Blizzard is not trying to convey that type of experience.
Torchlight is not a great game. It's just there to hold you over until D3 comes out. Go ahead and keep complaining that the game is online only just like countless other games (WoW).
Since when does a game have to be an MMORPG to be online only? Now who's making the strawman argument? YOU ARE. Perhaps, I should have named Team Fortress, Combat Arms, or Mag. Which are online only shooters, but then you probably would have replied "Derp, D3 isn't a shooter. LOLZ" The core gameplay of D3 centers around multiplayer, that is why it is perfectly acceptable for the game to be online only.
The core gameplay of Team Fortress, Mag, Guild Wars, Everquest, Wow, Combat Arms, Battlefield play 4 free, Star Wars the Old republic, Ultima Online, Runescape, Final Fantasy 14, Maplestory, Eve Online, City of Heroes, Lord of the Rings online, Age of Conan, and Warhammer online is multiplayer and you can't play the singleplayer mode offline. So what is your point? If it's acceptable for all those other games, why not Diablo 3?
Besides Left 4 Dead allows offline play in the sense that your team mates are controlled by bots which gets really boring after a short while. Blizzard is not trying to convey that type of experience.
Because they're all online-only fucking games. If it has a singleplayer mode, it should be offline. That's not a difficult concept to get your head around.
If Diablo 3 was only a multiplayer game then of course it will be online-only. Its not though, and so you shouldn't have to be always online for the single player.
Because they're all online-only fucking games. If it has a singleplayer mode, it should be offline. That's not a difficult concept to get your head around.
If Diablo 3 was only a multiplayer game then of course it will be online-only. Its not though, and so you shouldn't have to be always online for the single player.
They aren't all multiplayer. You can play WoW by yourself online. You're so funny, trying to come up with all these rules on why a game should be accepted as online only. First you say a game has to be an MMORPG, until I point out games like Team Fortress. Now you're saying the game has to force you to play with other people. If the primary focus of a game is the multiplayer, online only should be accepted. And spoiled brats should stop QQing. The online is free and works even with lousy dial-up. The only people this effects are hackers who will have more difficulty cracking the game. I for one am all for hackers not ruining this game.
I seriously don't even understand how this effects you. This is the 21st century. Everyone has a refridgerator and TV in thier home, and everyone who buys games like Diablo 3 at least has dial-up in their home. Who does this effect? Who is getting screwed by this? Who???
*You* directly compared it to WoW at the end of your statement.
WoW is very much an MMORPG; the genre defining MMORPG of our time.
If your intention was to compare the nature of the games (without getting into specifics) you shouldn't have picked WoW.
I see you refined your statement for clarity. Good.
Uh, no. I'm not.
See, you can't change your point and then pretend that it changes the context of a previous statement. (If it did, you would have a paradox; what's said is said).
You address arguments, refine your points and clarify your position when challenged (which you have).
Perhaps, I should have named Team Fortress, Combat Arms, or Mag. Which are online only shooters, but then you probably would have replied "Derp, D3 isn't a shooter. LOLZ" The core gameplay of D3 centers around multiplayer, that is why it is perfectly acceptable for the game to be online only.
That argument would fly...except as it pertains to the complaints in this topic, it's a non-argument; a deflection of the complaints some fans have. In fact, it's similar to what Blizzard is presenting.
The problem is that Blizzard is now backtracking on their original intention to make it available as single player. Worse, they have flat-out lied (or at least have contradicted themselves) about their reasoning as to why.
Had they been honest with us or kept to their word, your argument would be perfectly rational. Gaming has turned entirely into a "Take it or leave it" business.
But that isn't what we have: so this "Because other games do it" argument doesn't work. It leaves too many questions unanswered.
That statement alone proves that you're a fanboy with no sense of intellectual honesty. You know damn well that doesn't make it a single player game, and so does anyone else unfortunate enough to have to read your drive, but like the good little sock puppet that you are, you not only support the inappropriate and meaningless comparisons to real multiplayer online games, but you say even more insipid things that make you look like Jamie_Wolf took a level in drooling.
PA are no great philosophers, as for one. And as for second ...
If you don't like Diablo 3 features: DON'T BUY IT.
Blizzard did not cheat anyone until they put text on D3 box saying "Internet not required". As long as they honestly tell you about what product does at the time of purchase ... You are not cheated.
If you feel cheated, well ... Entitlement Syndrome should be researched as a serious medical condition in that case. Like constantly claiming Diablo 3 is a single player offline game, when Blizzard are clearly saying in English it is not. You want it to be, sure. But it's not.
This site uses cookies to help personalise content, tailor your experience and to keep you logged in if you register.
By continuing to use this site, you are consenting to our use of cookies.
