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[Jira]

Apparently you aren't doing that while in combat.

It's been a while since I played Diablo II. How often are you in combat?




When Torchlight 2 is available? I think some will be able to resist it just fine and as others that are less informed buy Diablo III and see it's not for them...well...Blizzard is doing Torchlight 2 a big favour.

I'm playing right now actually and all you have to do is kill a group and you're alone for the most part. It wouldn't take much time at all to be able to "pause". Combat isn't a constant affair in D2 at least on Normal.

 

[Tacitus_]

Wait, why does an always-online game still have savepoints that can make you lose progress? Seriously, I don't get what's going on there.

Aside from some setpieces, most of the enviroments are procedurally generated. When you re-enter the game, you get a freshly generated enviroment.

 

[QisTopTier]

Not really. I wish to be able to choose when I play a game I have. What if you bought a book, but could only read it at designated book-zones? I own the book, I should be able to do what I want with it. Peter's argument of "The book can also be used as a hat" comes to mind, in regard to the multi-/single-player discussion.

Just think of diablo 3 as porn, now repeat what you just said

 

[Septimius]

Just think of diablo 3 as porn, now repeat what you just said

Nobody buys porn. And the only reason half the male population aren't furiously masturbating in the streets is because of social convention and the fact that the police would come. You're not really making a connection between masturbating and playing games, are you?

 

[Coxswain]

I'd say that if a game is designed to be played multiplayer but you can do singleplayer too, it's a multiplayer game. That's fundamentally different than this game is designed as a singleplayer game but you can do multiplayer too. Is that difficult to agree with?

You're going to have to define what the difference is. As far as I'm concerned, there's a continuous spectrum there, and if you insist on drawing a sharp line where one suddenly becomes the other, I'm going to insist that you be the one to draw it. If you'd like to do so, then go ahead.

One thing I will mention as an answer that I don't accept is "whichever the developer says it is", and that's because 1) We have no way of knowing that for the vast majority of games that are out there, 2) The developers aren't the ones who are actually playing the game and deciding how a player interprets the game, and 3) It would be pretty easy for a developer to, for instance, make another installment of their popular franchise as both a singleplayer and multiplayer game, implement some self-serving, anti-customer DRM bullshit that makes it a pain in the ass to play in singleplayer mode, throw in a quick cash grab economic system that gives them lots and lots of money for nothing, and then fall back on "Well, you see, it was always primarily meant to be a multiplayer game..."

 

[Jira]

Wait a second, people now are complaining that you have to RECLEAR content in Diablo?

lolwutpear.jpg

 

[garath]

No, but it isn't what made Diablo popular in the first place. Diablo isn't an MMORPG, so it's not really applicable. I'm sure a lot of us have great stories about the time their mate went link-dead in an MMORGP and caused a lot of frustration for everyone else, too.

I disagree slightly. Would Diablo be nearly as popular without multiplayer?

 

[QisTopTier]

Nobody buys porn. And the only reason half the male population aren't furiously masturbating in the streets is because of social convention and the fact that the police would come. You're not really making a connection between masturbating and playing games, are you?

Should I start listing all the H-games/Visual novels/other weird shit?

 

[Duki]

Wait a second, people now are complaining that you have to RECLEAR content in Diablo?

lolwutpear.jpg

seriously

the like

lack of experience with the diablo series people have is a little

disgusting

like that gamespy journalist who literally wants to be a video games journalist without having played a pc classic like this and calling for it to be in first person and the camera angle weird

like is this what is allowed in modern gaming

 

[Septimius]

Should I start listing all the H-games/Visual novels/other weird shit?

Is Diablo one of them?

I disagree slightly. Would Diablo be nearly as popular without multiplayer?

Excellent point But I think we both agree that a considerable part of the past is single-player, too, so it seems harsh to just truncate that. But again, I see what you mean, now.

 

[aggro crag]

And this is all never mind that you can’t play it on trains, planes, at your gran’s, on the day a workman cuts through your phone line, if you’re in the army, or simply cannot afford a broadband connection.

I think this was the point that stuck with me. The whole not being able to play on trains, planes and cars was always a pretty silly argument. But the fact doesn't change that there are people that are deliberately being ignored and left out.

Having to completely trust Blizzard to have their servers up and constantly up makes me uneasy. It doesn't matter how good their track record has been with Battle.net or WoW, it doesn't change that server outages can happen(Just ask EA and Ubisoft).

RPS also had an article on Path of Exile, which reminded me that were going to have a lot of choices coming soon. If people have to avoid Diablo 3 to make a point, PoE or Torchlight 2 might make the sting less severe.

 

[larvi]

I think loathing is a bit hyperbolic. It's more like apathy, or maybe even a bit of confusion; confusion from the perspective of "barring physical hurdles (internet connection, etc) why would you choose to limit yourself to single player when the online experience simply offers more to do?" The original Diablo WAS a single player game with a multiplayer component. A massively influential, pioneering multiplayer component, but it was just that: a component, an aspect of a greater whole. By the time D2 rolled around, the multiplayer component received greater emphasis and importance, as evidenced by the separation of closed b.net, the ladder, and online/ladder only features. I think the line got blurry even that early on, because in hindsight it's pretty clear that from that point forward blizzard's focus was definitely on the online side of things.

This strikes me as a bit more than apathy:

lmao diablo single player talk about doing it wrong goddamn peasants

probs made a spear amazon with poison skills or something in d2

makes me sick

And that answers you 2nd question as to why I "limit" myself to single player. I spend my entire work day dealing with narrow minded know-it-alls. I don't want to spend my free time doing the same. While I'm sure there are plenty of decent people online as well I don't have the patience nor the desire to weed through the others to find those. I can understand Blizzard's decision but I can't see why some people can't seem to see why some of us are disappointed in that direction. I loved Sacred 2 and was really looking forward to D3, but not anymore.

 

[Septimius]

I still play SNES games. Hell, I even play C64 games. What if those were DRM protected. Are you really going to tell me that those servers would be online today? What if you want to play D3 in x years?

"Well, you just need a patch at that point, probably"

Being a lover of old games, one of the things that kill the joy of an old game is when I can't simply pop it in and play. The more work I have to put in before I can play, the less likely I am to bother replaying it. And what about the day when the patch is no longer commonly available, and you only have your vanilla install disk?

 

[Belgorim]

It is OK to decide to stomach their decision, but can you really come up with an objective reason for why offline game play has to be checked? Who hasn't cheated in an offline game? I loved to change values in Driver 1's config file - drive Jaguars and modify the damage to insane levels. I loved getting 500 grenades in GTA3 and blowing everything up by using cheats. In GTAIV, I never used cheats, but I still don't hate people that did.

If I play Quake Live, I don't want people to cheat. But I really couldn't care if someone uses aim-bot while playing offline Quake 3 Arena, as long as they can't do it online. Same thing with D3. You don't have to check everything people do when they play offline. Just check them when they play online.

That's why it's nothing but an excuse. I'm OK with people deciding to believe that it isn't, but I don't think it's fair to claim objectively that it isn't. Just because you can come up with a reason for why you HAVE to be online at all times doesn't mean it's a good decision. And that's what this is all about. Either Blizzard is lying to get you to think it's not an online DRM, or they've made a very, very stupid decision in forcing people to play online for no reason other than be able to check people playing online. That's circular - you have to be online so they can check you when you're online.

Did you miss all the posts about having an offline-mode helping people make cheats/hacks for multiplayer online?

 

[bill0527]

You guys that never played WoW are going to be fuck all annoyed that you won't even be able to play single player D3 for about half a day every Tuesday because that's when they take Battle.net down for maintenance.

 

[Jira]

You guys that never played WoW are going to be fuck all annoyed that you won't even be able to play single player D3 for about half a day every Tuesday because that's when they take Battle.net down for maintenance.

The process of relaunching WoW servers will be separate from D3 bnet stuff. While there may be maintenance for it, it will likely only last an hour or so in the early morning. WoW's stuff won't affect D3.

 

[Tacitus_]

I still play SNES games. Hell, I even play C64 games. What if those were DRM protected. Are you really going to tell me that those servers would be online today? What if you want to play D3 in x years?

Well since the Diablo 1 servers are still online and will be for the foreseeable future...

 

[Lothars]

RPS also had an article on Path of Exile, which reminded me that were going to have a lot of choices coming soon. If people have to avoid Diablo 3 to make a point, PoE or Torchlight 2 might make the sting less severe.

Yes there will be lot's of choices but PoE is F2P and online only, I would think the same complaints about having to be online for that will be the same type of thing, Torchlight 2 is the only one that isn't online only out of these three.

 

[Emitan]

You guys that never played WoW are going to be fuck all annoyed that you won't even be able to play single player D3 for about half a day every Tuesday because that's when they take Battle.net down for maintenance.

You can play Starcraft on Tuesdays.

 

[Anoregon]

This strikes me as a bit more than apathy:

Well, come on. Comments like that aren't even worth having a reaction to, you just read it and pass it through your troll filter and move on to the next thing.

 

[Emitan]

Yes there will be lot's of choices but PoE is F2P and online only, I would think the same complaints about having to be online for that will be the same type of thing, Torchlight 2 is the only one that isn't online only out of these three.

I don't have issues with PoE because it's free and is basically Guild Wars. Towns have dozens of players in them, everything else is instanced. It also makes some of Diablo 3's design choices seem strange (gold? it's worthless!)

 

[Septimius]

Well since the Diablo 1 servers are still online and will be for the foreseeable future...

But do you really think they will always be online? Eventually not enough people will play it to warrant the cost of keeping it there. The rest? Well, fuck them.

 

[mavs]

If their servers go down, intentionally or otherwise, it will affect you.

Well that's the same as Diablo 2 isn't it? If Bnet went down in 2002, I didn't play single player. My characters were all stored online. If I couldn't play Diablo 2 on Bnet, I didn't play Diablo 2 period.

 

[aggro crag]

Well since the Diablo 1 servers are still online and will be for the foreseeable future...

I think the main argument is that Blizzard aren't the stewards of the entire planet. D3 DRM is basically inviting a whole host of reasons that could keep people from playing. My main gripe with it is that it's also excluding potential customers that might not be fortunate to have reliable broadband connections.

 

[The Lamonster]

Not buying unless I can pause single-player mode. That shit is inexcusable.

 

[Tacitus_]

But do you really think they will always be online? Eventually not enough people will play it to warrant the cost of keeping it there. The rest? Well, fuck them.

Well given that Starcraft 2, Diablo 3 and WoW all run on the B.Net 2 architechture, I can't see them taking it down. They'll most likely have their future games use it as well.

 

[Duki]

But the fact doesn't change that there are people that are deliberately being ignored and left out.

lmao left out

does anyone else feel like thats completely the wrong terminology

and kind of a juvenile way of looking at the world

i mean its a freaking video game, get a sense of perspective, you cant be left out of a video game

consumers have no right not to be excluded from the purchase of a product because they dont like or cant meet the requirements for using said product

if diablo 3 isnt the video game you wanted it to be too bad bros better luck next time

blizzard can do what they like with their game and you can do what you like with your money

you dont have to buy diablo 3

but people act like they have to play diablo 3, and because they have to play it, what blizzard is doing is forcing horrible drm on them

they arent forcing anything on you, you dont have to buy the damn game

if youre too weak to not buy the game despite what you find to be anti-consumer behaviour, then too bad its your own fault

literally how is this a conversation that has been repeated multiple times over the years

 

[darkpaladinmfc]

Well given that Starcraft 2, Diablo 3 and WoW all run on the B.Net 2 architechture, I can't see them taking it down. They'll most likely have their future games use it as well.

Things look even better when you realise Blizzard is still patching Diablo 2.

 

[Brannon]

Dat Activision influence. This generation has certainly made some people more coachable. I'm genuinely impressed by their success rate. Anyway, if I wasn't getting the game for free, I'd probably be just as miffed. But for now, I hope that MMOish disconnect isn't quite as bad as damn near every other MMO type game I've played. I say bring it, and let me undercut everybody in the auction house by half price.

 

[Hazaro]

Most of those just come with what Diablo II had.

When I came back to the PC, I’d been idle for too long and the game had logged me out.

That I don't like however.

 

[FStop7]

...or my little girl comes downstairs and I don't want her seeing all the violence and crazy/awesome shit.

The fact that I can't pause things?

It's crazy.

There's a reason why I don't play MMOs anymore.

Not to wander OT but this is why I like WoW vs. some other MMOs as it's so much more more forgiving when it comes penalties to character death. If you're just out questing and you die in the world it's not a terribly big deal. I could see where it would be a PITA if you were in a high level raid and had to suddenly drop, though.

But yeah, I am also a frequent pauser. So I have mixed feelings on the issue with single player Diablo 3. I'm still planning on buying the game, though.

Another turn off for me is that Diablo 3 is exactly the sort of game I would like to play on my laptop at a hotel. Most hotels have shit for broadband.

 

[Loxley]

Okay, I can understand the always-online thing, but not being able to even pause the game? That's pure paranoid bullshit.

 

[pillarofdawn]

I can see this affecting me >.< I share a house with 3 other people who are always online doing something. And as such my connection can be reliable most of the time but it gets shaky a lot. Plus there is a lot of torrenting that goes on in my house.

 

[TheExodu5]

Most of those just come with what Diablo II had.

That I don't like however.

Diablo II did that, at least until just recently.

 

[NullPointer]

If it wasn't for this stupid online-only, online-all-the-time crap buying this would be a no-brainer.

All of these headaches just to keep their player items legit? Not worth it imho. They're throwing the baby out with the bath water.

 

[cwmartin]

There is extreme difficulty in comparing an experience to property. Not everyone buys into that.

 

[DownLikeBCPowder]

Good job pirates. The game just went from must-buy to not-buy.

But hopefully it gets released on console, there is no way that it can require an online connection in that case, at least not on the 360 where you need to pay for it.

You realize pirates are the only ones that will be able to bring you offline Diablo III at this point, right? Ironic that you would blame them when it's Blizzard doing this to you.

 

[aggro crag]

lmao left out

does anyone else feel like thats completely the wrong terminology

and kind of a juvenile way of looking at the world

i mean its a freaking video game, get a sense of perspective, you cant be left out of a video game

consumers have no right not to be excluded from the purchase of a product because they dont like or cant meet the requirements for using said product

if diablo 3 isnt the video game you wanted it to be too bad bros better luck next time

blizzard can do what they like with their game and you can do what you like with your money

you dont have to buy diablo 3

but people act like they have to play diablo 3, and because they have to play it, what blizzard is doing is forcing horrible drm on them

they arent forcing anything on you, you dont have to buy the damn game

if youre too weak to not buy the game despite what you find to be anti-consumer behaviour, then too bad its your own fault

literally how is this a conversation that has been repeated multiple times over the years

From my own personal perspective, I probably won't have any problems playing Diablo 3. In fact, I'm almost certain that if I do decide to buy it, the whole constant internet access won't ever come up in my mind once I start playing.

But I've avoided games due to my own personal choice before, after a while you just stop thinking about it. I'm just saying, that people who might be potential customers might get left out for reasons outside of their own control. They can meet every requirement to play the game alone, except that you can't because they don't meet the requirement the play with others.

The article pointed out that some people serving in the military might have trouble connecting. That point stuck out to me the most, because it reminded me of a friend who couldn't play Guild Wars because of limited internet connection.

 

[Xyphie]

Always played closed b.net, wouldn't bother playing any other way so I don't care.

 

[Haunted]

or just crack it. rzr1911 finds a way

Yeah, but your hackers were so preoccupied with whether they could that they didn't stop to think if they should.

Oh wait, they should. Fuck this intrusive DRM.

 

[KKRT00]

I read your post. All I really got out of it is you feeling like Blizzard isn't letting you play their game the way you want and that's anti-consumerist. You're saying it's a single player game with online features. I disagree. It's an online game. In Diablo 3, playing solo doesn't mean no AH. AH will still be there, you'll still be connected to it. Your characters and stats will all be tied to Blizzard's servers. A lot of the code is run server side. Playing it offline would be a different game than the one they have created.

Also, I'm not assuming someone would edit their characters. As I've said in other posts - it's a multiplayer game that can be played solo. They are making decisions that improve the online play (such as not allowing character data to be stored on your computer).

No, You havent read it, because didnt write my opinion in earlier post, i wrote fact.
Fact is that the core game can be played solo and excluding offline mode hurts some players, so by definition its anti-consumer policy - that is all i said in this post.
I'm not talking about myself, but generally.

I dont care about online-only, i dont like it, but it wont stop me from buying, but i know people that wont be playing it because they wont be able be online all the time - that is my opinion.

Ps. Having stats on servers doesnt make game multiplayer, its like You would say that Bad Company 2 singleplayer was 'mutilplayer', because it affects You stats, or any stats on Steam, or COD stats, or stats in X3: Terran Conflict and that game doesnt even have proper multiplayer component.

 

[bigboss370]

my internet connection gets disconnected more often than i like, so when i'm playing single player mode on this game it will suddenly log me out at the most frustrating moments, therefore i cannot justify a $60 purchase.

 

[echoshifting]

No pause? Auto logout? Really Blizzard?

This makes me sad. Yes, I'll still be buying it...but this goes against the spirit of the game in my opinion. The ability to play in whatever size chunk of gaming time you have available, to walk away and come back whenever...that is Diablo. When I had a newborn Diablo II was a game I was always falling back on because it's so easy to hop out and hop back in by pausing or portaling. I haven't been wild about the online-only idea, but this is the first time it's really taken the wind out of my Diablo hype-sails.

This is very disheartening news. It's such a goddamn shame that we are talking about this bullshit instead of how great the game itself is. I hate what has happened to gaming this gen. Never thought it would reach Blizzard, too.

edit: smh at the "it isn't a single player game" defense. Nobody at Blizzard would ever dare suggest such a thing, and online-only does not make the game multiplayer only. That is a very disingenuous defense, guys, and I think most of you probably know that.

 

[markot]

I love how many people defending this kind of stuff cant even pretend to put them selves in someone elses shoes for one second >.>

This game does clearly have a single player component. Blizzard could have, if they were that paranoid, cordoned off 'offline' or single player accounts and given players a choice so that it wouldnt effect their economy, characters that were not able to be played online even. Instead, you have to play on their servers, online, all the time. There is no choice in how you play the game, even though they give you the choice in how to play the game. (With people or without)

If this is what the 'social' gaming and single player experiences is about, then screw that crap. Hell, make the game impossible to play single player over this kind of stuff. This isnt an mmo, this isnt a game that has a persistant world, there is nothing here that cannot be done, or shouldn't be done, offline.

 

[jim-jam bongs]

Ah fuck it, I give up.

When they announced the AH I thought "it's okay, you won't be able to cash out which should keep things kosher" and then they announce they're partnering with SatanPal and offering cash outs.

When the screens started coming out and the game looked sub-par I thought "it's okay, alpha screens and all that" and now people are posting beta shots on GAF which look like absolute shit.

When they announced the always online DRM I thought "it's okay, it will be the same as playing a singleplayer game but you'll have a bit of latency and a bunch of cool B.net stuff, no biggie" and now it's clear that your game state isn't even persistent, and they're using temporary instances.

See you all in the Torchlight 2 thread.

 

[Shambles]

I love how many people defending this kind of stuff cant even pretend to put them selves in someone elses shoes for one second >.>

This game does clearly have a single player component. Blizzard could have, if they were that paranoid, cordoned off 'offline' or single player accounts and given players a choice so that it wouldnt effect their economy, characters that were not able to be played online even. Instead, you have to play on their servers, online, all the time. There is no choice in how you play the game, even though they give you the choice in how to play the game. (With people or without)

If this is what the 'social' gaming and single player experiences is about, then screw that crap. Hell, make the game impossible to play single player over this kind of stuff. This isnt an mmo, this isnt a game that has a persistant world, there is nothing here that cannot be done, or shouldn't be done, offline.

You have to realize there's a fairly heavy industry presence in here trying to push their own agendas. Hence all the anti-consumer bullshit that gets passed off.

 

[Artadius]

I love how many people defending this kind of stuff cant even pretend to put them selves in someone elses shoes for one second >.>

This game does clearly have a single player component. Blizzard could have, if they were that paranoid, cordoned off 'offline' or single player accounts and given players a choice so that it wouldnt effect their economy, characters that were not able to be played online even. Instead, you have to play on their servers, online, all the time. There is no choice in how you play the game, even though they give you the choice in how to play the game. (With people or without)

If this is what the 'social' gaming and single player experiences is about, then screw that crap. Hell, make the game impossible to play single player over this kind of stuff. This isnt an mmo, this isnt a game that has a persistant world, there is nothing here that cannot be done, or shouldn't be done, offline.

But then they'd have to support four different versions of the game instead of two. That's an increased amount of development time, support time, and QA time. The loss of sales for folks who will refuse to play the game because of these decisions sounds like an acceptable trade off for ensuring that my using the RMAH is secure that I don't have to (hopefully) worry about item dupers, bot farmers, and hacks. Not to mention the fact that four architecturally different clients (as opposed to to two currently) will increase development time even longer than it already has.

 

[Robobandit]

Once again cements that I will not be buying this game.

I really wanted to play it, too.

Oh well.. plenty of other games to play.

 

[Open Source]

If you're playing D2 offline, you're missing the point. Thus, only people who are missing the point will be affected in D3.

 

[Psychotext]

If you're playing D2 offline, you're missing the point. Thus, only people who are missing the point will be affected in D3.

Damn, and I had so much fun missing the point.

Oh well.