Diablo 3 representing the future of Anti- piracy?

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52 comments, last by way2lazy2care 11 years, 10 months ago
Inspite of the annoying server problems of diablo 3, It has been turning out to be a good news as diablo 3 is going to be the future of Anti - piracy and it makes everyone buy the game.

I read this article last night
http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-reasons-diablo-iii-represents-gamings-annoying-future_p2/
And everyone believe that they are going to be following blizzard's routine of solving problems with piracy,

This is good, for us programmers as we give our hearts in making games and people crack it easily, I wonder much and just hope this is future of gaming
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It's the future of the big-box MBA-ran publishers. Ubi-soft started this kind of persistent Internet connection single player games with Silent Hunter 5...
Until there is major backlash and the masses voting with their wallets you'll see more and more big-box titles becoming "online only" with "purchasable additional content".


Is it the future of the market as a whole? Doubtful! There is always a niche market for everything, including a niche for drm free (or drm minimal) games.

It's just like consoles will never truly kill PC gaming. Sure EA might jump out of the PC market, but that doesn't mean someone else isn't willing to fill the niche no matter how small it is.
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Inspite of the annoying server problems of diablo 3, It has been turning out to be a good news as diablo 3 is going to be the future of Anti - piracy and it makes everyone buy the game.

I read this article last night
http://www.cracked.c...ying-future_p2/
And everyone believe that they are going to be following blizzard's routine of solving problems with piracy,

This is good, for us programmers as we give our hearts in making games and people crack it easily, I wonder much and just hope this is future of gaming
I honestly can't tell if your post is sarcasm or not :)

I like RPGs and might have been interested, but I wouldn't touch a game with this system with a barge pole. Aside from the server problems, and the principle, as covered in the article, there are other issues: what if I want to play in years to come when the servers are no longer running, or they pull the plug for other reasons? What if I want to play where there isn't Internet access? (PCs are no longer these things that sit on a desk all the time, and mobile Internet isn't always available.)

http://erebusrpg.sourceforge.net/ - Erebus, Open Source RPG for Windows/Linux/Android
http://conquests.sourceforge.net/ - Conquests, Open Source Civ-like Game for Windows/Linux

This kind of "anti-piracy" is harmful to the community. If people are going to use D3 as the guide for the future of PC gaming, then in my opinion PC gaming is dead except for indies. In fact, if that's the future, then I honest to God hope that PC gaming does die. I'd rather that, than see it turned into this lag-riddled, money-grubbing monstrosity. I will not support that kind of thing with my money ever again. I've learned my lesson. D3 is the only game that I've ever regretted buying.

It was only partially about being anti-piracy anyway. It's more about nurturing their precious real money auction house, so that they can get a cut from every auction.

I like RPGs and might have been interested, but I wouldn't touch a game with this system with a barge pole. Aside from the server problems, and the principle, as covered in the article, there are other issues: what if I want to play in years to come when the servers are no longer running, or they pull the plug for other reasons? What if I want to play where there isn't Internet access? (PCs are no longer these things that sit on a desk all the time, and mobile Internet isn't always available.)
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That's what this whole post is about.
Single player mode requiring online connection? Seriously? I dont see this going anywhere but the fact is it definitely stops piracy as most of the dungeons, monsters, loots are stored in server side and not client side.

This kind of "anti-piracy" is harmful to the community. If people are going to use D3 as the guide for the future of PC gaming, then in my opinion PC gaming is dead except for indies. In fact, if that's the future, then I honest to God hope that PC gaming does die. I'd rather that, than see it turned into this lag-riddled, money-grubbing monstrosity. I will not support that kind of thing with my money ever again. I've learned my lesson. D3 is the only game that I've ever regretted buying.

It was only partially about being anti-piracy anyway. It's more about nurturing their precious real money auction house, so that they can get a cut from every auction.


Feels like there's a lot of noise being generated around this, but not much actual "not purchasing the game". Either that or their record breaking sales would have been even better without the drm.

Personally, I don't really care about always online DRM. I care about my experience. My gaming pc is always connected to the internet anyway. If I go out or go away, then I can just not play pc games. No big deal. I have a smartphone to keep me amused and playing a triple A game on a poky laptop screen defeats the purpose anyway.

As for the auction house, why is that a bad thing? Given the astronomical costs of developing a triple A title, why is anyone surprised that developers are looking for a way to get extra revenue from it? Again, I really don't care as long as it doesn't negatively effect the experience.

Clearly it has negatively effected the experience here and quite severely too. But then, Steam sucked when it started too.
if you think programming is like sex, you probably haven't done much of either.-------------- - capn_midnight

That's what this whole post is about.
Single player mode requiring online connection? Seriously? I dont see this going anywhere but the fact is it definitely stops piracy as most of the dungeons, monsters, loots are stored in server side and not client side.

No it doesn't. Eventually the content needs to be sent to your PC, and once on your PC you can save it to keep it there, then upload a "DRM-free" pirated version online.
Hey, I'm not versed up in cracking games and am opposed to piracy, but even I could defeat this system given enough time... and I'm not some reverse-engineering assembly-loving hex editor guru. It'd take me (someone with general programming experience but no DRM-circumventing experience) about a month to crack it, maybe two - and most of that time will be spent learning assembly, memory scanning, and network packets. People who are experienced with this can probably do it in 48 hours. I'm sure right now there are Diablo 3 cracks available.

Did you know there are World of Warcraft pirate servers? Servers reversed engineered and up and running? They don't even have the code for the WoW servers and they can still get at least something running! When the entire code for Diablo 3 is sitting on your computer, do you really think people can't reverse engineer it, capture the downloaded content, save the content, remove the download requirements and substitute loading from disks instead? Once one person does, they just upload their one DRM-free version, and whallah! Everyone has it.

It offers no protection long-term from pirates. The _best_ they can hope for is 72 hour protection. They dream of week-long protection, hoping would-be pirates get bored of waiting and purchase a legit copy.

No, if you want real protection, complete online content+code is the only real way, just streamming video downstream and user input upstream (OnLive / Gaikai). And if that is the future (it is), I don't want it. More and more control to companies, less to consumers, and less government intervention, and when they do intervene, they intervene on behalf of those with money (i.e. the companies). Horrible. No thank you.

And everyone believe that they are going to be following blizzard's routine of solving problems with piracy,

It was only partially about being anti-piracy anyway. It's more about nurturing their precious real money auction house, so that they can get a cut from every auction.


I don't think they have ever stated that the online connection requirement was intended for anti-piracy. They did give a statement on this, and it was because they didn't want the confusing separation of single-player and multi-player characters. In Diablo and Diablo 2 you could create a single player character, not knowing that you couldn't go online with it for obvious reasons. Going from multi-player to single player wasn't possible either. I, for one levelled my character in single-player and later found out that I couldn't use it in multi-player games, which was very disappointing.
They also gave a second reason, which is that they didn't want to supply the clients with server code. This would make it harder for hackers to cheat.


This kind of "anti-piracy" is harmful to the community. If people are going to use D3 as the guide for the future of PC gaming, then in my opinion PC gaming is dead except for indies.

As long as anti-piracy is not the main goal, I don't think it'll be harmful to the community.
I pretty much agree with Servent of the Lords response about the future of this anti-piracy and where gaming is going. I honestly don't think it's limited to PC's though. As for cheaters, there are already people with 100 million+ gold. Do you honestly think they got that through legitmate game play, or even just stealing other peoples comprimised accounts?

Now, as far as the auction house goes, I'm torn.

On one hand, I like the idea of a real money auction house. It gives dedicated players (who seem to treat certain games as a second/third job), a way to increase revenue, even if for a little bit. Done correctly, yes, it should hurt the game economy to a certain extent. That itself though, should not punish players who choose not to use the AH (such as hardcore players). And it would provide a bit of revenue to Blizzard, while impairing the illicit gold/item farming sites (often which then infect the PC's with who knows what, given the amount of people complaining about having their accounts comprimised).

On the other hand, the way Blizzard has implemented it, or will implement it, is far worse imho than the always on DRM. And sadly, this is a direction I see video games going, and not just Diablo 3. It's not just about the game anymore, or even an expansion pack or two. And it's not just enough to nickel and dime players with DLC, all of which is still limited in the revenue. Now, the game is made significantly harder, that progression is less about playing the game, and more about your real life bank account. As a person on the Blizzard forums posted, it's a Zynga like strategy of progression through purchases. Make a game rely significantly more on grinding than the predecessor, and nickel and dime them continuously if they want to be able to progress through the game. After all, the auction house is an unending supply of newer and better items, and all Blizzard has to do is introduce more content, and at the same time, require some new quests to require specific, but different, skill sets, which will mean the AH has to be used even more. Sure, it's a gold now, but when the RMAH comes out, who's going to want to sell stuff for fake gold when they can earn real dollars?

Another example of this is the Tales series on the consoles. Purchase gold and experience for real money. Sure, it's one time only, but I can see MS & Sony and Namco coming to an arrangement on the next gen to give recurring DLC. JRPG's are just a magnet for this type of scheme. Make the game just a little more grindy (monsters give just that much less xp and gold, even later on), and give what seems to be cheap deals in terms of money vs time to get ahead without devoting 30+ hours. Psychologically, micro-transactions are hard to pass up, and can make what seems to be a cheap game just that much more expensive in the end.

Feels like there's a lot of noise being generated around this, but not much actual "not purchasing the game". Either that or their record breaking sales would have been even better without the drm.

Personally, I don't really care about always online DRM. I care about my experience. My gaming pc is always connected to the internet anyway. If I go out or go away, then I can just not play pc games. No big deal. I have a smartphone to keep me amused and playing a triple A game on a poky laptop screen defeats the purpose anyway.

As for the auction house, why is that a bad thing? Given the astronomical costs of developing a triple A title, why is anyone surprised that developers are looking for a way to get extra revenue from it? Again, I really don't care as long as it doesn't negatively effect the experience.

Clearly it has negatively effected the experience here and quite severely too. But then, Steam sucked when it started too.


In my opinion, the "record breaking sales" were the result of a bait-and-switch. Had I known two weeks ago what I know now, I would not have been a part of that "record breaking sales"; and I personally know several other people who feel the same. So no, I don't count the "record breaking sales" as any kind of valid measure of the worth of this game. I count it as a big scam; a flim-flam, if you will. A swindle. Had someone told me, "Hey, Blizzard is going to make you pay $60 for what you think is a complete game, only here's the rub: you'll have to nickel and dime yourself on the auction house if you want to complete it, because they are going to deliberately nerf your in-game drops based on the Auction House to force you to pony up additional cash," I would have given them a great big "Screw you, punchy" and walked away to spend that $60 elsewhere. Until yesterday, I had no inkling that they would do that; I was under the impression (as were many others) that the game I bought would be "complete", and the Auction House purely optional. To find otherwise honestly leaves me feeling like I've been punched in the stomach. It leaves me feeling ripped off. It makes me feel like I've been played for a fool.

Blizzard rode a gigantic wave of ten years' worth of goodwill, capped with an enormous white-cap of nostalgia on this thing. They rode that wave straight to my wallet and straight up my ass, with Bobby Kotick wringing his hands in glee the entire trip. As far as I'm concerned, they have used up every single ounce of goodwill I had left. I will never, ever, spend so much as a single dollar on a Blizzard or Activision product again; that is how angry I am about this. They have honestly lost a customer for life.

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