∞ Cheaters, not DRM, are behind Diablo III's persistent connection

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Game maker Blizzard recently caused a stir in the gaming community when it revealed that its forthcoming dungeon crawl game Diablo III would require a persistent online connection, even though the game touts a single-player mode. A Blizzard executive says they’re doing this to reduce the likelihood of cheaters exploiting the system, not because of Digital Rights Management (DRM).

Diablo III is the highly-anticipated sequel to a game series originally introduced in the mid-90s. Coming to the Mac and Windows, Diablo III will feature both single-player and multiplayer gaming modes via Blizzard’s Battle.net online service.

Diablo III isn’t an massively multiplayer online game like Blizzard’s enormously popular World of Warcraft, however, so when news that a persistent Internet connection would be required, some gamers and industry pundits saw Blizzard’s move as a potential way to reduce piracy – a more proactive system of DRM. In an interview with MTV Multiplayer, Blizzard’s vice president of Online Technologies, Robert Bridenbecker, disputes that assertion.

“Things that came up were always around the feature-set, the sanctity of the actual game systems like your characters. You’re guaranteeing that there are no hacks, no dupes. All of these things were points of discussion, but the whole copy protection, piracy thing, that’s not really entering into why we want to do it,” said Bridenbecker.

Bridenbecker noted that characters which were created and used offline would not be able to be used online, forcing Diablo III players to start over from the beginning. “Let’s just keep everything clean,” he added.

[via IndustryGamers]


  • http://www.thegraphicmac.com JimD

    I’m fine with this. Cheaters completely ruined Diablo II when playing online years ago. Duped weapons and potions made it impossible to play and enjoy the game.

    • jSlides

      That may be fine with you but some people don’t play online and have therefore never been affected by cheating.  I’ve only ever played LAN games with friends and the single player game.

      Unless they drop the restriction I will be playing different games like Torchlight 2 and Grim Dawn.

      • Nathanielcnoble

        well that just makes you weird. and rare.

        • Michał Lech

          LOL
          Well, count me in that too. No offline mode = 1 customer less. Now multiply it by the number of players who know what they want and what should and should not be required on their part by the game producer. Of course, can’t blame Blizzard for trying to cap the dangerous income overflow.

        • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_UJBZIBJ5JIHXUDEGDODZCVBHHY Richard Williams

          Guess you can count me being weird to then.  Just because you play online doesn’t mean everyone does.

        • Stupidban

          not as rare as you think.

    • http://www.thegraphicmac.com JimD

      I don’t see anywhere that Blizzard is going to “stream” an entire game over your net connection. It’s entirely possible that they’re going to verify a single tiny file listing your character attributes to their server at start and end of games and that’s it.

      Virtually every app on a modern computer pings a server (or ten) nowadays, Diablo is probably no different.

      • Stupidban

        No true, they have said that all the actions and creature behaviour as well as other interactions will ALL be controlled server side and your player actions will be authenticated with the server. The raw data such as the graphics and maps and other raw data will be on the client side.

        This means that there will be quite an amount of back and forth traffic between the server and client for a click fest like diablo 3 where there will be multiple actions, effects and creatures on screen at any one time.

        And please … this is not a simple ping to check for a return byte telling your apps whether if there are updates. This is a continuous stream of data which cannot be broken between the server and client.

        Do you even comprehend the amount of traffic it will add to your own local network, especially for those on limited bandwidth? Not to mention the lag and latency issues here. All these in a single player game? God Forbid.

    • Stupidban

      And the thing is, offline single player have NOTHING to do with the duping and botting in Close BNet in D2. So why was it removed and why does people still think that its removal have something to do with the security for online BNet character in D3?

      What I remember is that duping occur because of the way blizzard coded D2 and allow a copy of the data to be saved on the client side (yes for closed BNet character) to allow for the uncertainty of the net. So when a player was dropped, they were given benefit of doubt and data was read from the client side, thus allowing a loophole for duping.

      As for botting, people will still try and it is up to blizzard to catch them. Let’s just hope that their WARDEN program do not become even more intrusive and behave even more like a worm than an legitimate program.

  • http://www.powerwatchers.com/ Dean Lewis

    Not really liking this at all. The idea that my multiplayer games with people on my own network mean that each computer is sending and receiving the same data from the mothership down the same pipe irks the hell out of me. Not everyone has fast and unlimited bandwidth for there not to be a host computer on the LAN itself to play a local game. The fact that I won’t be able to play single-player anywhere there is not an internet connection just doubles my annoyance. No playing in the car, in the airplane, at a remote location… Seems a serious limitation on what I buy a game for: a little enjoyment during non-work downtime wherever I might be.

    On another hot Diablo III topic: The in-game auction house based on real world money bothers me a lot less. There will be two auction houses: one using in-game gold and another using real world money. You can participate in either or not as you wish. Blizzard says they will provide free listings in the real world money AH (maybe one a week? a couple a month?) so anyone can play in that AH for real cash. The money you earn can be moved to your Blizzard account to buy from their website (games, downloadable content, etc.) or to Paypal or a similar service to move into your bank account. I’ve heard people complain this opens D3 to large farming houses, but they are going to do that anyway — Blizzard might as well make some money off of those jerks and provide a safer trading space for the rest of us who want to cheat and spend our unlimited real world money on virtual fantasy items. (I’ve never had such income, and anyone who does should give the money instead to a good cause instead, but that just my own opinion :) ) An in-game real world money auction house is an interesting experiment and you can be sure every game developer and publisher will be watching to see how well it works.

    • Set

      I don’t see all the fuss about internet required, this is going to be the best game out there by a long shot in its genre and all and its called Diablo 3 NOT 2 it is an ONLINE game, NO OFFLINE MODE playable! why? because this 3 NOT 2, if you can’t play because you have no net such as car/plane/train read a magazine/newspaper instead i.e. do something else! Stop QQing over a game you have yet to play when III is going to be x100 better than last one if you can’t see that go back to all the n00bs who QQ over this, playing on 800×600 resolution. Don’t buy the greatest game on earth, and experience its awsomeness go QQ moar, it will be a better game world w/o the likes of you!

      as for RMAH best idea going, im sitting at the gold cap in world of warcraft another game by blizzard and I wish I could sell some of it to someone who could use it more so than me for a reasonable price without breaking EULA and TOS win all round, as for farmers runing the economy doubt it seriously..

      • Stupidban

        do you really really so blind as not to see the issues for other (even if you yourself have a stable connection and stay at home all the times) despite all the post here and everywhere else?

  • Ati360

    This is bad, and will encourage people to crack it so that they can play a game that they actually purchased offline. Then it’ll eventually end up in the hand of software pirates who WILL exploit it. It’s silly, there’s simply no reason to be online whilst playing single player because no one can cheat in single player but you. Their reason is terrible. The multiplayer reason almost made sense until you realise that you have to be online to play anyway. Ridiculous. I buy my games, and I don’t avoid DRM titles, I just get by them, and unfortunately this is  a gateway for piracy.

    What bothers me is the fact that they are blatantly lying and treating gamers like complete idiots. It happens so much; just find at a game with any sort of DRM or online connection required, then put it in a torrent search engine, and look at the hundreds of thousands of sales that publishers lost out on because of stupid restrictions. Even steam has an offline mode. 

    PC gamers are slowly getting pushed into a corner; we either have to buy a game full of bloatware and DRMs, which effects the quality of experience, period, or we don’t play the game (or pirate it), both of which have a massively negative impact on our games. It’s ironic, but game developers kill their PC game releases by porting them straight from consoles, and the publishers put the final nail in the coffin with stupid security restrictions not found on consoles (generally speaking, as blizzard make and publish all of their  games). I bet the (rumoured) console version won’t have the same silly restrictions, and it’ll be far easier to pirate.

  • Anonymous

    I don’t care, just give my Diablo 3 now…..

    • http://twitter.com/Brad_Strickland Brad_Strickland

      That is the feeling of most people!

  • nuj

    If someone wants to cheat offline with the copy they purchased without ruining anyone else’s game, I don’t see the problem… I think their reason is neither cheating nor DRM, it’s that WoW made them realise there’s much more money to be made from 50 people who rely on a service you provide than from 100 people who purchase a copy of your game. They want every player to go through the auction house and the updates and so on, and if that means losing other clients, oh well, they couldn’t care less as long as they can keep the logged-in ones addicted.

  • Stradivaria

    Blizzard sucks, I was really looking forward to this. My internet connection is unstable, so now they won’t be getting my cash.

  • Coverbird

    I really don’t like this because for one thing, I like using hacks on my games. I do not have the time to farm and grind and skill up to an uber character. Thus I like the character editors so I can build a powerful character and blow through the spots that are sucking up my precious time or do a speed run after I’ve completed the game once without mods. Or play on battery when the power goes out. Will I still buy the game? Probably, maybe after a few years when the price goes down. I’m not giving them full price for this rubbish.

  • Michał Lech

    My net connection is mobile and, as such, very choppy and unreliable. Additionally, I pay per quota, so Blizzard was just trying to make me pay a shitload of money aside from purchase cost. Thank you, Blizzard, for reminding me the importance of The Pirate Bay, isohunt and the demigodly heroes simply and mistakenly called “crackers”.

  • http://profiles.google.com/yeekuza not available

    most of the Diablo player base wants the game solely because of open bnet realm.  All these single players don’t care because they never had to experience the frustrations of duping, pickit, autotele, bots, etc.  This was a smart move by Blizzard in order to prevent hackers (hopefully).

    • XXL

      Hackers will get the game before us legit users, just so you know..oh and DRM free of course.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Thomas-Shea/684294645 Thomas Shea

    I won’t be buying it.  I loved D2 but not online play.  I also don’t think they should legally be able to advertise a single player component that requires a persistent internet connection to play.  There are other people in my house that like to play online console games, stream movies, and it’d just be one more thing on an already saturated internet connection.  What about people who can’t afford internet or don’t want it. (rare I know but still out there)  I know I won’t have internet at all in my new apartment for at least 2 or 3 months until I can get moved in and setup.  Sorry Blizzard… maybe you’ll get Diablo 4 right.

  • Simpledichotomy

    You guys complain so much. With millions playing World of Warcraft, millions more playing Starcraft 2… you really are the loudest minority. Crybabies with “no stable internet connection” yet you spend most of your time complaining on… online message boards? Nobody likes the gas prices the way they are, but people still take road trips and drive to the beach because it’s worth it. If you play the game and decide you like it, you’ll find time to get online. 

    Go play at starbucks, steal someone’s wireless, just please shut the F up already. First it was “The colors aren’t scary enough!” to “Where is my necromancer?” and now it’s “Online play? I still live in the 1990′s, internet is for rich people!” the wait for quality Blizzard games is even more painful having to see this mile long message log of bored internet dwellers every time I try to catch up on a friggin D3 update!I feel better now. I’ve been wanting to say that for quite some time!

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_GDX3PEWB4MWVC7MJSBG4YOV5J4 David

    My biggest hang up about always online…
    Lets not forget our friendly internet hackers who like to break into servers and steal your personal information meanwhile when the server is being fixed and modified I cant rightfully play my own purchased product.  That’s not going to happen to battlenet though…right? No battlenet is very secure, my information is safe.

  • meow

    DRM down our throats with questionable motives.
    But the worse is this “auction house” ( more like a gear-whore house ) which completely nulifies any fair effort.
    If i wanna be humiliated by the guy with the bigger wallet i can go outside and fuckingg look at his posession, in  game i wanna have fun not get the same frustration.

    Hey blizzard, i WILL play your game….from Pirate Bay you little greedy bastards! How’s THAT for a “trend” ?