The first is so they can ”guarantee no cheats were involved” creating characters, and they cite ”gameplay and security reasons” for no mod support. Got cash?
If you do happen to have some cash lying around the place then perhaps you’ll consider spending it on some in-game tradeable items through Diablo III’s auction house? Yes, Blizzard will include trades between players for actual real world money.
The studio takes a small cut of the proceeds, an auction administrative fee if you will, and lets you literally pawn off items you don’t want to keep. There is also the more traditional auction house that uses in-game gold to buy and sell virtual wares.
”One of the things that we felt was really important was that if you did play offline, if we allowed for that experience, you’d start a character, you’d get him all the way to level 20 or level 30 or level 40 or what have you, and then at that point you might decide to want to venture onto Battle.net,” said Blizzard.
”But you’d have to start a character from scratch, because there’d be no way for us to guarantee no cheats were involved, if we let you play on the client and then take that character online.” Erm, why not just offer both anyway?
As for why PC modders can suck it: “For a variety of gameplay and security reasons, we will not be supporting bots or mods in Diablo III, and they’ll be expressly prohibited by our terms of use for the game,” noted a stern, party-pooping Blizzard.
Micro-transactions in Diablo III?! “We think it’s really going to add a lot of depth to the game. If I have more money than time I can purchase items, or if I’m leet in the game I can get benefits out of it. The players really want it.” Alright, admit who you are right now.
”This is something that we know people are going to do either way. We can provide them a really safe, awesome, fun experience, or they’ll find ways of doing it elsewhere.”
Items will feature level caps so you can’t go buying insanely awesome weapons for your level one nobody, despite how much disposable income you flaunt. Thankfully there is a more traditional auction house involving trades with in-game currency for us normies.
It’s gut wrenching stuff people, particularly when mods are banned - the lifeblood of PC gaming. The always-on demand for the Internet is another swift kick to the nether regions. The micro-transaction auction house is less horrible as it can be ignored.
Perhaps Diablo actually won and we’re all in hell right now? No? Feels like it.
