Why's everyone mad about no offline Diablo 3 single player?

[ethaninja]

Oh how I miss the old days where all it required was to have the CD in the whole time. Sure, it's not as bad as other DRM (Yes Ubisoft, I'm looking at you, you retarded monkeys), but for those who say, just moved out of their folks home and don't have the money for internet or, maybe they live in a part of country that can't get it... then dayum.

 

[ethaninja]

If I'm going to be playing Single Player, by myself, why do I need to be connected to the internet to play? :l

You don't... you need to be connected for thirty seconds every two weeks.

Okay, even assuming that this won't inconvenience the user in any way (big assumption, but let's just bear with it for a second) the question still remains: why should I condone with my purchase of their product a decision by a company to alter their product in any way that does nothing to make it a more desirable product to the end user?

Sure we can accept that, ultimately, it's their product and they as a company can sell it with whatever reservations they can legally get away with but this does nothing to answer my question; I do not doubt that they can do whatever they wish with their product, I question why I should condone their doing anything with the product that in no way adds to its ability to sate my demands of it.

The immediate, and insufficient, retort to this argument is 'why should you care if the changes do nothing to negatively affect your gaming experience?'. This argument does not work because even if we assume that any changes to the product do nothing to negatively nor positively impact my experience of the product, the fact still remains that when I purchase a product I am purchasing the entire project, not just those aspects of it that I like, and in doing so I express my approval of a business strategy which wastes time and money doing things that in no way improve the end user's experience. I do not approve of such a business strategy: everything the company does should be an attempt to improve the end user's satisfaction with the product so time spent creating facets of the product which do not fulfil this goal is time (and ergo money) wasted.

The next retort to this argument is that the decision by Blizzard to monitor, however briefly, our game is done in our best interests as an attempt to prevent cheating. I do not consider this an improvement. I do not consider a more limitedly accessible game an improvement over a less limitedly accessible game. If I want to change a facet of the game, be it hexing my character or changing the texture of something that gives me a headache, then forcing me to choose between doing this and passing an integrity check is not a benefit to me. I would far rather have a game full of cheaters than accept limited access. Yet this dichotomy is false: Valve has already shown that it is possible to allow users to host their own servers with any combination of security checks provided by VAC, from integrity checks to application monitoring. Blizzard wants to unnecessarily homogenise my gaming experience and centralise control over content, this is not something I wish to condone.

I simply think it's foolish to not protect one's product in some way. Blizzard's DRM is much less intrusive then any other (including Valve's). Therefore, I approve.

That doesn't change the fact that it will annoy legitimate customers, and will have no affect on pirates of any kind once they crack it in all of 3 days after launch.

It annoys you minimally, and give Blizzard three days of non-hacking.

Yes, it annoys me for the rest of the games existence just so Blizzard gets...nothing that matters. Hey I know, I'll pirate the game, then I won't have to put up the the pointless and annoying DRM.

That's exactly the road everyones going to take when all the games require stable internet connectivity. (Again, I'm pointing the finger at you Ubisoft. You're going to be broke and I sha'll laugh)

 

[Elf Defiler Korgan]

Do not want. Will wait for 'sea-salvage expert' version.

 

[MikailCaboose]

I just prefer to play my games by myself, and not to some nameless stranger who I really don't know at all.

 

[Zorpheus]

Here we go again. Let's all hop on the "Hate the DRM" bandwagon.

I think people are making a bigger deal out of this than they should be. Honestly, who doesn't have an Internet connection these days that doesn't at least work once every two weeks? Even if you're traveling, most hotels/cruiseships/airplanes/airports/restaurants have Wi-Fi these days, so unless you plan on shipping out to a third-world country, it's really not that big of an issue to check in every two weeks.

I suppose the only real point is that it's not going to do jack to pirates in the end. But as DRM goes, this is very unobtrusive.

 

[Ken Sapp]

I shouldn't have to be online ever for single player. In any game. Wouldn't have bought it anyway, now its going on my "wouldn't piss on it if it was on fire list" along with everything recently from Ubisoft.

It's blizzard, not ubisoft

Yeah... pirates wont have to authenticate every 15 days. Or you know... ever.

Yea, that's really the issue. Whenever a company does some arbitrary loose DRM like this, it just ends up hurting the paying customers, while pirates aren't inconvenienced in the least.

Paying blizzard customers know that it will take the internet and already have battle.net accounts so it won't bother them in the least. Look at Starcraft 2.

Thing here is that it's not so much for the DRM factor is that it ties in to achievements and such that hit your online battle.net account, it also allows blizzard to track and ban cheaters and pirates.

This form of DRM is the LEAST intrusive as most if not all players now have some form of internet access. Hell, you can go to the local coffee shop and authenticate, you don't even have to be inside lol. A company has to protect it's profits and this seems very very reasonable to the other alternatives out there.

I'd venture to say that 99% of blizzard's existing fanbase has internet full time.

Two flaws with your argument. The only reason anyone cares in the least about cheaters in a single player game is because of achievements. Single-Player gamers should not have to fear the ban hammer due to the use of a trainer. And pirates are going to be playing a version which has been cracked so that it doesn't even touch the Battle.net authentication servers so it won't affect them anyway.

 

[Bullfrog1983]

When a company arbitrarily decides to track your gameplay, and appears to assume you are a pirate by default it makes me less enthusiastic about their products.

I am reminded of a quote from the movie Demolition Man every time something like this happens: "Why don't you just shove a leash up my ass!?!"

I am also reminded that pirates will find the command that requires you to authenticate and just flick the switch to make the game always authenticated... therefore the only ones being inconvenienced are the paying customers - unless the pirates want to play online.

All things considered I won't be buying Diablo 3 because it looks boring... and if companies start doing shit like this all the time I'm just going to stop buying games because if I wanted to be treated like a criminal I'd go steal a TV.

 

[Aesthetical Quietus]

My problem with it is that it attempting to do things this way will never ever work. Pirates will have this cracked and out of their way in a couple of days. Apart from that I don't really have a problem, although I can practically guarantee it's going to screw over at least a few people.

 

[Ken Sapp]

Here we go again. Let's all hop on the "Hate the DRM" bandwagon.

I think people are making a bigger deal out of this than they should be. Honestly, who doesn't have an Internet connection these days that doesn't at least work once every two weeks? Even if you're traveling, most hotels/cruiseships/airplanes/airports/restaurants have Wi-Fi these days, so unless you plan on shipping out to a third-world country, it's really not that big of an issue to check in every two weeks.

I suppose the only real point is that it's not going to do jack to pirates in the end. But as DRM goes, this is very unobtrusive.

While I was in the Navy I would regularly deployed for stretches of up to seven months. Seven months wherein I could not connect my computer to the internet in order to authenticate because non-military owned computers are not allowed to be connected to the ship's network and I don't trust open wifi hotspots in foreign ports.

 

[Chewster]

When I see stuff like this, I am reminded of why I'll never buy an iPod: Steve Jobs has openly said that the DRM controls they place on all iPods do little to nothing to actually curb music piracy, but they do it anyway. So on principal, I'll never buy an iPod, however hip or cheap they may become. Sure I can get a hack, but why should I, especially when it is known that the DRM does none of what it is supposed to?

Similar story here, it seems to me. All this Blizzard nonsense about banning single player trainer users and having to constantly authenticate seems like a token, band-aid "solution" to a problem that will probably never cease completely no matter how strict they get and all it does is annoy those who play the game legitimately. It is like having to go sit in the corner for getting an "A" on an assignment.

 

[Digitaldreamer7]

I shouldn't have to be online ever for single player. In any game. Wouldn't have bought it anyway, now its going on my "wouldn't piss on it if it was on fire list" along with everything recently from Ubisoft.

It's blizzard, not ubisoft

Yeah... pirates wont have to authenticate every 15 days. Or you know... ever.

Yea, that's really the issue. Whenever a company does some arbitrary loose DRM like this, it just ends up hurting the paying customers, while pirates aren't inconvenienced in the least.

Paying blizzard customers know that it will take the internet and already have battle.net accounts so it won't bother them in the least. Look at Starcraft 2.

Thing here is that it's not so much for the DRM factor is that it ties in to achievements and such that hit your online battle.net account, it also allows blizzard to track and ban cheaters and pirates.

This form of DRM is the LEAST intrusive as most if not all players now have some form of internet access. Hell, you can go to the local coffee shop and authenticate, you don't even have to be inside lol. A company has to protect it's profits and this seems very very reasonable to the other alternatives out there.

I'd venture to say that 99% of blizzard's existing fanbase has internet full time.

Two flaws with your argument. The only reason anyone cares in the least about cheaters in a single player game is because of achievements. Single-Player gamers should not have to fear the ban hammer due to the use of a trainer. And pirates are going to be playing a version which has been cracked so that it doesn't even touch the Battle.net authentication servers so it won't affect them anyway.

Im sorry I assumed two things, that the player was legit and that he wasn't breaking the eula

 

[Autofaux]

I can see the issue people would have with this, but its not nearly as horribly constricting as other DRM models out there. Authenticating every fifteen days is a lot easier to work with than having to have a constant connection.

I'm willing to let Blizzard slide on this occasion und this occasion ONLY.

 

[Jadak]

As long as that's all it is, I'm fine with it.

A constant internet connection for single player? Fuck that. Multiplayer only? I'm out.

Simply connecting for a few minutes twice a month? Not a big deal.

 

[cprs_]

With Diablo 2, I think lots of people liked the single player because they could use mods and hacks to their hearts content, without worry of temp or permabans from battle.net. Thats one reason they may complain about no single player mode.

I liked it because I was guaranteed there wouldn't be any hackers/griefers/dupers et cetera...

 

[Cid Silverwing]

Some people don't want to compete with 15 other people over who gets to kill the next monster that respawns?

THIS.

Also the concept of forced online connections on ANY game that's meant to be both single and multiplayer needs to be banned.

 

[Mercsenary]

Also the concept of forced online connections on ANY game that's meant to be both single and multiplayer needs to be banned.

I dont entirely disagree with this.

Yes first always on is a bit... D:< but its a way for drm that doesnt force you to install a third party software (SECUROM)

That said I support one time online connection activation. and well multiplayer... I would like to see LAN support come back.

 

[Coldie]

Why on earth do you need a 15 day repeating authentication?

I mean, have I suddenly stumbled into a reality wherein legitimate copies of games periodically just become pirated copies, and so need to be checked every 15 days to make sure they're still legitimate?

Yes, you did. You can install the game on as many systems as you like, but you have to flag each copy as legit by logging into your legit account once in a while. If you have the client and do not have the account, it's a pirated/borrowed/etc copy.

This is probably the simplest, least intrusive flavor of DRM out there. I'd rather have online authentication than a disc check. Besides, you wouldn't want to play offline anyway, as (at least) achievements will be Battle.net-only.

 

[-Samurai-]

And how does this affect people with no internet connection at all? Hell, I'm not even sure if I'll have internet access for much longer.

Should I not be allowed to play a single player game because I can't pay for the internet? Surely I can't have pirated the game without an internet connection.

Diablo 3 is looking less and less like the sequel I was hoping for.

 

[Epictank of Wintown]

OH NO! An apparently minor inconvenience in my gaming lifestyle that may or may not affect my purchase of this game! Clearly, Blizzard is a money-making monster that seeks to nickel and dime every penny they can get out of the people that call themselves their fans! They are an evil entity for such an obtrusive, evil thing!

For fuck's sake, people, grow up. Connect to the internet once every fifteen days and verify the damn game. It's not a big deal, will probably take a whopping thirty seconds, and will help (perhaps) to cut down on rampant piracy or at least cheating. It's a step in the right direction and is not at all a massive inconvenience or as heavy handed as Ubisoft's approach.

Blizzard, I applaud you for trying this. It's a step in the right direction for DRM that has, so far, been rather Draconian in its implementation. Everyone that's been opposed to this that I have seen in this so far is coming off as a whiny, self-important, entitled asshat. Keep crying, please. I need your precious, salty tears to fill the moat around my fortress.