Diablo's Still Always Online Despite Auction House Removal

[Karloff]

Diablo's Still Always Online Despite Auction House Removal

The auction house was never the reason for always online, says Blizzard.

Yes, the Diablo III [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/127881-Diablo-III-Auction-House-Closing-Down] auction house is no more, but does that mean the game will drop its always online policy? No, Blizzard tells Rock Paper Shotgun, dashing the hopes of those eager for a single player offline experience. In fact, the auction house wasn't the reason why Diablo III had to be always online; there were other compelling arguments, like Real ID and BattleTag social features.

The full statement reads:

We do not have plans to implement an offline mode. While the always-online requirement made the auction house possible, the auction house was never the driving factor in our decision to make the PC version of Diablo III require an Internet connection. The game was built from the ground up to take full advantage of Battle.net, which provides a number of important benefits, including persistent server-side character saves, a seamless PC multiplayer experience, cheat prevention, and Real ID and BattleTag social features.

So there you have it: the seamless PC multiplayer experience, cheat prevention and other fascinating bits and bobs is why always online is your lot in life, PC gamers. Never mind; at least the console crowd can play without a constant internet connection.

Source: Rock Paper Shotgun [http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2013/09/18/despite-auction-house-removal-diablo-staying-online-only/]


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[Aeshi]

Thank god for that small mercy at least.

Sure grinding gear may be tedious as hell now, but at least you won't have to worry about being permanently inferior to some guy with a "+99999 to every stat & skill" piece of gear like D2

 

[CriticalMiss]

Real ID and BattleTag social features

Are these things really important to Diablo 3 players? It also appears that none of those things are especially good for people who might want to play a single player game.

 

[Buccura]

Yeah well let's see what they say in a month or so, or at BlizzCon.

 

[Kross]

Real ID and BattleTag social features

Are these things really important to Diablo 3 players? It also appears that none of those things are especially good for people who might want to play a single player game.

Well, they might be, but they've expended approximately zero effort ON actual social features.

The chat window has terrible scrollback, you can't break out multiple windows or customize the settings beyond what "channels" you are in. The channels are limited to something like 20 players max, there's no clan features (of course - though the expansion has some promising things) or anything beyond your basic friends list.

The only real feature is sending tells to friends and quick joining their games. Then you can talk to them in party chat, which isn't even the default chat target - if you just type a message, you'll lose it unless you set your chat channel to party first (because it defaults to chatting to... nobody)

Real ID lets you see your friends who aren't playing D3, so they can send you tells saying "Lol you're still playing Diablo?!"

Just lazy.

I can see the cheat prevention side of the argument, but not even a little bit on the social side.

 

[EbonBehelit]

I call bullshit.

It's seriously questionable that I have to make do with a 250ms delay (Australia, yay) for absolutely no discernible benefit. Didn't Diablo 2 only enforce always-online for ranked ladder play?

 

[gibboss28]

With the announcement of the removal of the AH I was hopeful, but I was betting they would say this. Oh well. I've gone from possibly buying the expansion to not buying it.

 

[Sabrestar]

The game was built from the ground up to take full advantage of Battle.net, which provides a number of important benefits, including persistent server-side character saves, a seamless PC multiplayer experience, cheat prevention and Real ID and BattleTag social features.

I think this is what they meant. Oh, and probably tracking, in case they implement ads or something similar.

I'm all for stopping cheats in multiplayer environments, but I'd also like to play alone, offline, and not have to worry about any of that. Oh well. I've got plenty of other games to play.

 

[Snotnarok]

Translation: We're interested in monitoring user information still for better updates for the console version, we would like to trust you but we know with the DRM removed it would be pirated because you're all scum and need blizzards battle.net to maintain your moral grounds.

It still annoys me that the PC version was a beta test for consoles that we had to pay for, and then the console version winds up the better version because of it; local co-op, no AH/better chance for good loot, better mobs since they don't rely on servers for enemy locations.

 

[ironfist86]

It still annoys me that the PC version was a beta test for consoles that we had to pay for, and then the console version winds up the better version because of it; local co-op, no AH/better chance for good loot, better mobs since they don't rely on servers for enemy locations.

Agreed. I'm even more buggered that I discovered Torchlight 2 about two weeks after picking up D3 and to my personal tastes, it was superior in every way. Oh, and I got it on sale for $5 versus the $60 for D3. I think Blizzard owes PC-copy owners a free or a steeply discounted version for console.

 

[Snotnarok]

It still annoys me that the PC version was a beta test for consoles that we had to pay for, and then the console version winds up the better version because of it; local co-op, no AH/better chance for good loot, better mobs since they don't rely on servers for enemy locations.

Agreed. I'm even more buggered that I discovered Torchlight 2 about two weeks after picking up D3 and to my personal tastes, it was superior in every way. Oh, and I got it on sale for $5 versus the $60 for D3. I think Blizzard owes PC-copy owners a free or a steeply discounted version for console.

That's what happened with me, my friend lives the Diablo series and bought 4 copies of it, 1 for him and 3 friends, so that's $240+Tax, we beat it, his account got hacked and they set him back 15 levels :| never played it again.

Torchlight 2 comes out, for $60 we got the 4 pack and played it twice through and more playthroughs to come. Larger mobs, more players, better loot, more minibosses, more interesting skills, larger areas, and it's ignored still by some because it's not called Diablo...even if the Torchlight team is composed of the Diablo team down to the music composer.

 

[Manthraxx]

well this is just proof of what we knew from the start... they are full of shit

 

[Glaice]

Unless they drop the always-on thing, I will remain with Torchlight 2 and Path of Exile instead. On top of that, Diablo 3 doesn't have proceedurally generated lands like the 2 games I've listed, so it makes me less inclined to play it because I have a geek boner for randomly generated worlds/content.

 

[JediMB]

Yet no one would lose anything if they implemented an optional offline mode that didn't come with all those listed features. They'd just have to make it so that offline characters couldn't be used online, except maybe in a special "open" online mode.

Just like in Diablo II.

*gasp*

 

[Aeshi]

Yet no one would lose anything if they implemented an optional offline mode that didn't come with all those listed features. They'd just have to make it so that offline characters couldn't be used online, except maybe in a special "open" online mode.

Just like in Diablo II.

*gasp*

Well, except for all the people who play multiplayer and would have their gameplay suffer as a result because adding an offline mode would make it pretty easy to develop hacks for the game (Just like in Diablo II *gasp*) because it'd be giving them the game code on a platter.

But hey, who cares about multi-players? Screwing them over is a-ok, amirite?

 

[weirdee]

torchlight, path of exile...who needs the game that isn't what we wanted? yeah, yeah, you got the sales actiblizzard, but you also dug your own grave. hope it was worth it!~

 

[JediMB]

Yet no one would lose anything if they implemented an optional offline mode that didn't come with all those listed features. They'd just have to make it so that offline characters couldn't be used online, except maybe in a special "open" online mode.

Just like in Diablo II.

*gasp*

Well, except for all the people who play multiplayer and would have their gameplay suffer as a result because adding an offline mode would make it pretty easy to develop hacks for the game (Just like in Diablo II *gasp*) because it'd be giving them the game code on a platter.

But hey, who cares about multi-players? Screwing them over is a-ok, amirite?

I'm afraid you'll have to explain to me how adding an offline mode would affect the integrity of the online mode.