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219 Comments
- FalseRemedy, on 07/06/2009, -7/+124Activision really screwed up Blizzard. Say goodbye to those 1ms pings...
- FervinsUlterius, on 07/06/2009, -3/+117It will be pirated, cracked, and available on the internets before it's even released - regardless of what DRM techniques blizzard uses. All they will accomplish with this technique is reducing legitimate sales, and cause more customers to turn to piracy
- fwertz, on 07/06/2009, -2/+109Mass suicides in Korea.
- Cybrwolf, on 07/06/2009, -4/+93That's CRAP! You don't add or remove features for the pirates, which you will never stop.
You add or remove features for the users, like me who will be buying multiple copies of this game! - cosmotic, on 07/06/2009, -4/+91I'll just use a pirate copy with built in LAN support.
- Cybrwolf, on 07/06/2009, -7/+79That's crap! Drive 20 miles outside of ANY major city in the US, and you will find that High-Speed internet options are slim to none, and slim left town!
Drive 30 miles out, and find that you may not even be able to get dial-up that gets better than 28800Kbps!!!
1) 2009 estimate US population = 304 Million =
http://www.usnews.com/articles/opinion/2008/12/31/ ...
2) Roughly 76% of that 304 Million people own a computer, as of 2006. Though I'm willing to bet that in 3 years that number is closer to 80% = 231 Million people own computers.
http://www.economist.com/markets/rankings/displays ...
3) 63% of "adult Americans" have broadband in the US. Note that the age of a LOT of gamers may not fall into whatever the age range was for this survey. = 191.5 Million have "broadband" This also doesn't address the QoS!!!
http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2009/10-Home-Br ...
So Blizzard is willing to ignore possible sales from 39.5 Million people??? That's just crazy talk I tell you!
This is bad for Customers, it's bad for Blizzard, and most of all it is bad for the Starcraft franchise! - Stemnin, on 07/06/2009, -2/+64I started play SC at school LAN room. It was ***** awesome. I've bought 3 copies of SC & BW (two separately, one anthology) since then (for my sis, lost one). I doubt I'll ever play at a LAN again (haven't in about 5 years), but it feels like I got kicked in the nads with the exclusion of it.
- doshindude, on 07/06/2009, -2/+49You must be new to the internet. No online connection EVER has 1ms ping unless you're on a LAN. Don't believe me? Play a Valve game where they show the pings of every player connected.
- twiztidsinz, on 07/06/2009, -0/+42@pathy: Battle.net emulators.
They already exist. - CaffieneMan, on 07/06/2009, -0/+40put LAN back in
I'd even be willing to wait a bit longer while you take care of that - 7m7uf, on 07/06/2009, -1/+34@lzzmo & @Cosmotic --
Internet -- means being routed through a few pcs in between the origin and destination.
Lan -- directly connected.
I don't care how good your internet connection is -- it will never beat the lan in terms of speed. And really, you shouldn't have to get a better internet connection to play a game -- you should be able to play like these with your buddies without any internet connection. - jrm125, on 07/06/2009, -1/+32LAN patch in 3...2....1......
- Bulletbillx, on 07/06/2009, -3/+33They aren't making me resort to piracy, but they did lose my sale. That money will now go towards another game by a company that doesn't treat everyone like crooks such as stardock.
- newerakb, on 07/06/2009, -1/+30The pirate community will just release private battle.net servers to host for LAN parties.
- motang, on 07/06/2009, -20/+44Majority reason for LAN not being in SC II is piracy. By making people log on to Battle.net it ensures them to have a legal copy.
- 7m7uf, on 07/06/2009, -1/+25If they can't they might be able to emulate the battle.net server -- and just mod the game to point to a new (local) server IP.
- j035u5, on 07/06/2009, -0/+24It shouldn't need to be done
- Cybrwolf, on 07/06/2009, -7/+29That's crap! Drive 20 miles outside of ANY major city in the US, and you will find that High-Speed internet options are slim to none, and slim left town!
Drive 30 miles out, and find that you may not even be able to get dial-up that gets better than 28800Kbps!!!
You still have only just better than 50% of the US population that has broadband. While a greater than 70% own computers. Throwing away the possibility of 20% difference of 305 Million is a lot of sales to just ignore!
This choice hurts customers, it hurts Blizzard, and it hurts the Starcraft franchise! - astrixx, on 07/06/2009, -4/+25This is my theory. Blizzard wants to start charging for battle.net. My guess is that battle.net will cost $15 a month and will include all blizzard games including world of warcraft. That is the reason why blizzard is going to require people to turn their warcraft accounts into battle.net accounts.
- PrinceCaspianX, on 07/06/2009, -2/+22According to this article, losing at least 21% of their sales "won't affect the bottom line"
- ShadowMarth, on 07/06/2009, -5/+24Dugg down for replacing Zs with dollar signs. You can insinuate that they are becoming greedy without doing nonsensical ***** like that.
- xutopia, on 07/06/2009, -1/+19I didn't purchase the original Starcraft until after my first LAN party with friends who had a copied version of it to lend me. Now that I'm older and willing to purchase SC2 they might not get it because of this BS.
I want future generations to enjoy gaming without having to put all their money into it. When they're old enough to pay let them pay. - chockster, on 07/06/2009, -6/+24"So Blizzard is willing to ignore possible sales from 39.5 Million people??"
I think they're excluding a large number of those people by:
- setting it in space
- making it a strategy game
- requiring the use of a mouse, and a computer
- not making it a new version of Nintendogs
- or just making a movie sequel to Marley and Me instead
...you get the idea. By all means be peeved about this stuff, but don't throw out random figures like they mean anything.
"Note that the age of a LOT of gamers may not fall into whatever the age range was for this survey."
And a lot of the people who do fall into that age range are not gamers. My parents aren't going to be sitting down to a game of Starcraft II whether it has LAN play or not. - djnforce9, on 07/06/2009, -1/+18@lzzmo & @Cosmotic:
Simply put,
1. If your internet connection is down, you can't play multiplayer. End of story.
2. If your internet connection drops in the middle of a game, everyone on your LAN gets disconnected and nobody can play.
3. If you have a large LAN party, you risk using ALL your bandwidth accommodating all the players because it has to bottleneck through a single internet connection out to Battle.net. This means it'll lag like crazy for everyone making the game unplayable. It doesn't help that many ISPs limit and throttle bandwidth like there's no tomorrow.
4. If there are no spawns supported on Battle.Net, then all your friends you invite over for a LAN party will have to own a unique CD Key.
ALL the above issues could be avoided entirely if LAN support was added. Plain and simple. Now they may not be so bad if Battle.Net is used for LOBBIES ONLY and during a game, players connect directly to eachother without going out to the internet. Still though, internet connection should not be needed when all players are on the same LAN. - MWeather, on 07/06/2009, -2/+17I heartily disagree. There is no better way to teach a company about the futility of DRM than to pirate their games.
- phpirate, on 07/06/2009, -0/+15Except SC2 will be infinitely less complex then WoW. WoW is an MMO, requires a connection all the time. SC2 is a peer to peer game, no dedicated servers, the communication is between the players, meaning all you have to do is point the copies of the game to the right computers and the game takes over.
- ShadowMarth, on 07/06/2009, -2/+17They also have LAN cafes where Starcraft became absurdly popular. LAN is directly responsible for Starcraft's success as an esport.
- jrm125, on 07/06/2009, -1/+15People hack games all the time to not check for CDs, cut out the videos, modify the shaders and lighting, etc.
Never underestimate the hacking community. - 7m7uf, on 07/06/2009, -0/+13I've found out if you have beer and pizza they will come. It's kinda a ***** up Field of Dreams.
- kingp, on 07/06/2009, -2/+15Playing Sins of a Solar Empire made me forget all about Star Craft 2. Seriously. It's a good game.
- Vegabondsx, on 07/06/2009, -1/+14Did Blizzard / Activision forget that Starcraft is one of the most popular LAN games that there has been? They're really taking their fans for granted when they remove one of the most popular features of their game.... probably what has brought SC to the fame that it is. It really seems like they're shooting themselves in the foot. They better still continue to sell the original StarCraft, because I bet a lot of people will still buy it for their LAN tournaments instead of SC2.
- Pinkertinkle, on 07/06/2009, -6/+18They know you'll buy it either way. We have given them too much power.
- Cheesepuffly, on 07/06/2009, -0/+12What about air support? Need that too right?
- dchaffin, on 07/06/2009, -1/+12@FervinsUlterius - I wish I could digg you up 1000 times ... these companies just don't get it.
- Eikon89, on 07/06/2009, -2/+12I'm sure the pirates will add the ability to play LAN.
- RemyDuron, on 07/06/2009, -0/+9This is to combat piracy, but the thing is, pirates will find a way around it. Only legit purchasers of the game will be required to go through this crap.
Screw them, not buying it, won't pirate it either though, just not gonna play it. Instead I'll buy a Stardock game, or two. I encourage you to do the same. Support developers who don't burden their games with DRM which only effect legit customers. - MWeather, on 07/06/2009, -0/+9"Try telling that to the 11 million World of Warcraft subscribers. Unauthorized, private servers are widely available, but the quality of them is so horrible that everybody would rather just pay the $15 a month for quality,"
Yes, but that's remotely hosted private servers. I'd imagine a dedicated local server would work great if the logistics of getting all the players in one place on a regular basis could be figured out.
Thankfully, Starcraft requires far fewer players, so a local battle.net server is perfectly feasible. At a LAN party, without a very, very expensive pipe, it's far less trouble and money to build a reliable dedicated battle.net machine than getting a connection than can handle a hundred players at a time. - Koushiro, on 07/06/2009, -0/+9We still do a LAN every now and then. You can't emulate the experience of playing at something like that with on-line play.
That'd be like saying playing Dungeons and Dragons over the internet is the same as playing in the same room with all your friends! - ecoop3r, on 07/06/2009, -0/+8Seriously you guys don't get that when he said make some room EA he was talking about his douchbag list of game developers? Seemed pretty obvious to me.
- Hraes, on 07/06/2009, -0/+8I'm pretty sure the WoW private server scene completely disproves everything you've said. Do you have any idea how many people are playing WoW for free? And that's a game with massive disadvantages to not playing with the legit community.
StarCraft games, however, run between twenty and sixty minutes. The only disadvantage to playing on a private server is the inability to play PUGs, which are painful at even the best of times. As an RTS, it would make sense for a private server to be far easier to create and maintain than that of a sprawling MMO; I give it two months after release, tops, before instructions on how to make your own private SC2 server in under an hour show up on Youtube. - computerkiller, on 07/06/2009, -0/+8I agree on this one it a way for blizzard to make more money and a local friend said the same. they will probably charge for battle.net eventually
- DankBuddz, on 07/06/2009, -1/+9Battle.net was, and still is free. You've got to give them that much at least.
"Paying monthly for World of Warcraft was unheard of when WoW came out."
No, it went along with every other mainstream MMORPG other than Guild Wars. Everyone pretty much expected it since MMORPGs have been charging monthly since Ultima Online hit the scene back in like '95 or '96, whenever it was. - taibo, on 07/06/2009, -0/+8WHOSE IN CHARGE HERE
WHERE IS THE AIR SUPPORT - yocouchdigga, on 07/06/2009, -1/+8and that's a fact.
- MrCheerios, on 07/07/2009, -0/+7This might be the first game I pirate. Blizzard is just inconveniencing pirates, while hurting legitimate customers forever. I don't even play LAN that much, but it's a matter of principle. What's next, requiring an internet connection to play single player?
- PrinceCaspianX, on 07/06/2009, -1/+8If Starcraft 2 were the only game in the world, yes, you'd be correct. However, the game's target release date is near the holiday season. It won't be a question of whether they want to play the game or not. It's a question of whether or not they're going to choose to pay $50 for Starcraft 2 when they won't be able to play it with their friends IRL like they can with the original Starcraft, or buy another one of the dozens of hit games available November-December.
- ShadowMarth, on 07/06/2009, -1/+8Not really the point. LAN simply removes every layer of needless complication from the game experience. Hell, just this weekend I got together and played some LAN with three friends. One of their wireless cards wasn't playing nice with the router, so I just grabbed a cheap router from my bag that I carry for just such an occasion. We hooked it up and played with no internet necessary. In the new Bnet, that would not have been possible. I have also had numerous Bnet experiences that were EXTREMELY sub-par despite both parties having more than adequate internet services. I have no doubt Bnet 2.0 will be improved, but I am equally certain it will not be as perfectly reliable as LAN. And in any event,, why would you EVER be glad for removal of basic features? If Blizzard is so confident about Bnet 2.0, then everyone will want to buy a legit copy to get on it anyway. Forcing everyone to use it, however, is a distinctly anti-consumer move.
On another note, if you link your original SC CD Key to your Battle.net account, you can download a version that does not require a disk to run. Nifty feature. - ShadowMarth, on 07/06/2009, -1/+8Er, monthly fees were not by any means new when WoW came out. Long since normal for MMOs. Although Blizzard certainly standardized the price point.
- AdmiralAcbar, on 07/06/2009, -2/+8@Corey - "Drive 20 miles outside of ANY major city in the US"
"you people in Irkutsk"
Learn to read, *****. - PoweredDeath, on 07/06/2009, -2/+8They took out LAN because of the rampant piracy affecting the eastern world. Read more here: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?to ...
"Hi, my vietnamese friend. I am a former administrator of Playsc.com, one of the biggest SC communities in China. I read your thread here about SC2 without LAN, and just felt kinda nostalgic when you referred to Playsc in your reply, cause it used to be my homeworld in cyberspace.
Here are something I am thinking about after reading the thread. Wish they would not be too boring to read. It is a bit too long indeed. I myself was stunned to find that I had ever typed so many letters .
1. This conclusion maybe too arbitrary, but the legal system in China is in fact a joke. There is nothing strange that Blizzard failed when it tried to sue Holdfast (aka Haofang), which belongs to Shengda, the biggest online game company in China.
2. The best way and maybe the only way for Blizzard to battle piracy in our country is to share interet with local companies, through which their Chineses partners will take efficient Chinese-style steps to fight illegal copies and/or servers. That is why pirate servers for WOW have a tough day while 3rd party programmes that promote massive piracy thrive.
In another word, imho, the best way to kick piracy in China should NOT be giving up LAN.
3. Piracy is so common in our country that hardly anybody views it a big deal. As for me, I have tons of pirate softwares in my computer, amongst them are Windows XP, Office 2007, Avast Anti-virus, Adobe photoshop, and Macromedia softwares and several games and etc.. ( It is quite a shame for me to say such things here for it is on TL.net other than a Chinese site.)
Nonetheless, Blizzard games gave me so many good memories that in around 2004, together with my friend, I bought the authentic copies of SC and WC3, since when I have become a legit gamer (that was somewhat uncommon) .
I once asked one of my classmates, who had played SC for over 5 years, whether he would buy a legit copy or not, he said no. “Cause there is no need and no benifit to do that, and I am not "hardcore" enough to spend the money that is a considerable amount to me.” He explained.
Since all Blizzard games are heavily pirated in China, I understand it well when Blizzard tries to prevent, or at least to harness future piracy of Starcraft 2. But to me, a sincere supporter of Blizzard games and a legit buyer to some extent, the cost of anti-piracy by removing LAN is tremendous, I think that legit buyers should not suffer so much because of illegal ones. In addition, if Blizzard really cares his consumers, then something like protecting consumer choice CANNOT be ignored; if SC2 wants to follow the successful road its predecessor took, I believe LAN, the legacy with wich Broodwar and TFT thrive, should be well preserved rather than being totally thrown away.
4. Our gov may never take serious measures to combat the spread of piracy though it is urged to. You can imagine that the cost will be incredibly huge if hunders of millions of computers all drop the pirate windows and have the authentic ones installed, the cost is something the gov is not willing to see, for which our officials never work hard to combat software piracy. So, in my pessimistic view, the spread of pirate SC2 in China is unstoppable even though LAN is out.
5. Holdfast and VS, another popular Chinese gaming platform abundant in gosu gamers, is not the only ones in the world. For instance, if I want to Play SC with my brother who is now teaching Chinese in Philippines, I will use Garena instead; if I want a multiplayer game with my classmates studying in U.S colleges, then Hamachi is a better choice. All those gaming platforms have the same functionality, work similarly, and promote piracy and damage Blizz’s economic interests to some degree.
6. I admit that I play most of Blizzard games via Internet, yet I also have to admit that LAN party has its own fascination which cannot be easily replaced. I can never forget the day when, for the first time, I played SC with my classmates over LAN, to cheer when my marine & medic drop threw craps on the mineral line, to shout out F**k when my large mechanic army disappeared after some Psi storms, to laugh at the ugly face of my friend when he was again overwhelmed, and even to peek through the screen of my opponent to “steal” some “secret” information. These are all fun that can hardly be acquired through BN or gaming platform, where most of the time we defeat or lose to someone unfamiliar.
Simply put, LAN is too lovely to be discarded, at least to me.
7. Blizzard said BN 2.0 is unimaginably advanced that LAN is nothing comparing to it. I will never doubt that Blizzard has enough intelligent power to make it, but still, if LAN can be included as an integrated part of BN 2.0, I will be much happier and even grateful.
However, as a Chinese netizen and citizen, I am really worried about the stability of BN2.0 in China, for our big brother gov always shoots down sites such as Google, Youtube, wiki, etc. for no reason but just someone says or shows something dissident, and it seldom accounts for the rude actions.
What’s more, our gov seems not so friendly with Blizzard. In the ban-list of Green Dam, an officially promoted Internet filter that is going to be forced to installed in countless computers since July 1st, 2009, several Blizzard’s official sites like www.battle.net are included! Blizzard said that they will build BN as not only a gaming platform but also as an Internet social place for gamers, which further aggravate my anxiety. Social sites are often where dissidence not welcomed by the gov tends to spawn, hence they have higher probabilities to be shot down indefinitely.
If what I fear comes true, then the BN-must multiplayer game will be disastrous.
The end. Hope you guys can excuse my poor English." -
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