How do you feel about Diablo III’s drm? It knocked you and other players offline when the delivery mechanism had an issue. The same thing will happen with isp outages. As people learn more about how it works they may be able to target specific servers to stop certain players from participating (competitors in the real money market turning to hacking for competitive advantage or individuals attacking successful money market teams for various reasons).
Shouldn’t there be an option to allow for offline play but to not allow offline money to factor into the online markets for players that are willing to make that sacrifice? Either due to lack of interest, poor internet or not caring about online. I hate drm that intrudes too deeply into my experiences, especially when they require features that I dont use or need.
I don’t agree with your premise. DRM is not the reason why Diablo 3 is online. Starcraft 2’s single player was offline as an example.
The reason why Diablo 3 is online has more to do about the game than about a company policy. Since Diablo 3’s longevity revolves around loot and trading it, there is a gameplay interest in making sure it is all server side. Diablo 2 was very much hurt by the cheating involved.
Now aside from the premise, the argument itself is a fallacy. Launch day issues with the servers are being twisted into an attack on it being online only and that is not a proper argument. It would be like saying in 1994: “The telephone is down so how what do you think of that Internet? Pretty dumb isn’t it if it goes down when the telephone does?” No one says that today, and as the launch day issues get ironed out, no one will say be talking about the online component of Diablo 3 in the future.
What is unique about Blizzard, among the gaming companies, is that their rise to fame and fortune revolved entirely around combining the Internet and gaming. Let’s go through the history a little…
Warcraft 2– This game puts Blizzard on the map. One of the reasons why was because players such as Jay Cotton (who made Kali) tricked the Internet to send LAN packets over it resulting in playing games like Warcraft 2 as eight player games over the Internet. Blizzard was so impressed they included Kali on the Warcraft 2 CD.
As for DRM, Warcraft 2 had a spawning feature which allowed eight players to use one CD.
Diablo and Starcraft– Due to the rise in popularity of Internet gaming, many subscription based online gaming services start up. Blizzard starts one of their own called ‘Battle.net’ which is free. Diablo is the first game to use Battle.net.
Starcraft also uses Warcraft 2’s spawning so five people can play off of one disc.
One problem though was with the rise of E-Sports in Korea concerning Starcraft, Blizzard received no revenue from people using their game as a sport.
Diablo 2– Huge problem with people hacking and making items offline which interfered with the online dynamics of the game. This became a top priority for Blizzard to fix for the sequel obviously.
Warcraft 3– You could make the argument for DRM with Warcraft 3 since there was no spawning. One disc per player was needed. Later, once you registered the game on the Battle.net account, the disc needed no longer applied. But it was definitely DRM here.
But similar to Starcraft, cafes and other areas were generating revenue off of Warcraft 3’s network gameplay without any revenue going to Blizzard. And by revenue, I am referring to full scale businesses. And it isn’t just the revenue but the copyright issues as well.
WoW- Yadda yadda, we know how this goes.
Starcraft 2– Single player can be played offline (though you won’t get achievements). All multiplayer must be done through the Internet. This makes KESPA (those in charge of the Starcraft 1 E-Sports) not support Starcraft 2 since they must deal with Blizzard. Apparently, this issue just got recently resolved.
While people were not happy with the lack of LAN in Starcraft 2, I can see why it was necessary with the issues with Starcraft 1 and Warcraft 3. Consider, also, the Internet has vastly changed since those days. Everyone uses broadband now. Remember the problems with firewalls and joining other players’ custom games in Warcraft 3? It was maddening.
Diablo 3- Online only as all the items are generated by the servers. This extra security allows for the existence of the first ever real-money auction house in a video game (that I know about). The reason for the Real Money Auction House was to legitimize and facilitate the behavior of the Diablo 2 players as they sold items for money or for gold.
The actual reason why you hear complaining about Diablo 3 being online is only because the servers were down and people were having a blast. People are not upset that it is online only, their intensity is fueled by how much they were enjoying the game and dislike having it interrupted. Non-Diablo 3 players are trying to take this discontent over launch day with the servers and transform it into an Anti-DRM argument where the reason why Diablo 3 being online isn’t directly related to DRM.
I also don’t see these people talk about the game. It is because they likely aren’t playing it.
It is also a very weak argument to say that it being online only allows competitors to ‘sabotage servers’ where it is far easier to cheat if there was an offline mode. Diablo 3 isn’t an E-sport, and there is no intention of it becoming one.
People’s reactions to the online only vary depending on the company. EA turns off the servers as soon as the game had done its time in retail. Blizzard has earned the reputation of trust since the servers of Diablo 1 and Starcraft 1 are still on after all these years. What people are upset about Blizzard is that they think they should have been more prepared due to their history with WoW and online games, not that the game is online only.