03-07-2003, 08:04 PM
Blizz knows the place and location of everything illegit concerning Diablo 2. They do go after them, but this has more to do with the webhosts cooperating with the legal department at Blizz. They shut em down, they crop up someplace else.
Ever read the back of the box of a Battle Chest bundled Diablo set? I bought a Battle Chest set about 6 months ago when a friend/cousin became interested and wanted to play with me on my T1 connection - we were both surprised at what we read.
Over 7 million copies of the game have sold. At the price most of us paid for the game ($49.95) that would equate to roughly $350,000,000 in sales volume for the entire game. That's a lot of money. Let's assume that of that amount, 40% made it back to Blizz for about $150,000,000 in revenue (gaming is big bucks).
I remember buying verision 1.01 when it first hit the shelves (and I could swear this game is older than 3 years, but it isn't) about 3 years ago. That's a very long time for any video game to have a following.
At any given time, about 100,000+ people are on Closed Battle.net playing Diablo 2. So, there is still an interest by 1.43% of the game's original purchasers in playing the game the way it was meant to be played. The people aren't playing much anymore, they aren't selling a ton of new games everyday, so what do you do? By all means necessary, you promote an interest in a new revenue producer. Ever notice what advertisements we see when online? Battle.net is free because it is Blizzard's own advertising medium.
The Plan: Make us sick of the game's problems (Diablo 1), promote a bigger and better game that is supposed to be hack free (Diablo 2), and then when interest feigns in that game, promote a bigger game (The WarCraft Series). I'm going to go over something I read once (can't remember where), that talked about WHY people want hacks in their video gaming experience - I read this online from some general gaming site.
Hacks and Iths, although I am staunchly against them in Closed games, keep an interest in the game. I would dare say that a majority of players on Battle.net have an interest in using them or working to obtain them (Why I will never know, Open Bnet offers WAY better cheats). They provide a way to play the game in a new way so that it never gets old. We have Mod Makers out there making new maps and weapons for Open play, these people are merely interested in a new way to play the game in a cheated way on Closed.
In the case of Diablo 2, there is a sense of "getting away with something" by using Iths. Further, it feeds the ego of the user because in this Alternate Reality, they can be the best at something. In real life, they probably don't have the "best" friends, are shunned by the opposite sex, are younger (teens), and aren't very sociable (case in point: any conversation in any game). There is also a sense that they are pushing the game to it's limits because they have also grown bored with legitimate play.
One game series that I truly enjoy is the Age of Empires/Empire Earth series. I enjoyed playing it legitly against people online for a very long time. But more fun, because you were essentially playing the role of God, was to use the cheats placed in the game by the game maker. It kept my interest, but I don't play the game like I used to play it anymore. It's not that much fun when everyone has 5,000 catapults and soldiers within 5 minutes of play.
But I digress, the ONE thing that truly pisses Blizzard off is when their servers are tied down from hack methods, bots, and duping methods. When their server is down, it makes them look bad. Since Ith's are no longer capable of being created, that is not their big priority anymore. I would dare say that in their eyes, it's fine that you are using a cheated weapon, but if you try to duplicate that weapon and it causes their server to go into a frenzy, then you are intruding on them.
They recently put out a warning about equipping your character with cheats. The only legit way to determine who is using them is to sit in the Trade Channel and hit the print screen button every five seconds and then send that to Blizz. If we all did that, then we will never see the One Ten Patch come out should they decide to follow up on these goofballs.
But most distressing to me was the rampant dupe wave. I buy alot of things I need for cubing and crafting with SOJs. I was cubing a bunch of charms and building goldfind characters at the time this happened. Last night I had to fork out 1 soj per Lem rune, and people don't want SOJs for their 40 pgems anymore. Now that sucks because it takes away from my personal gaming experience. Maybe in a couple months I can get back to it (because we all know that 1.10 will be out in a few months). :(
Ever read the back of the box of a Battle Chest bundled Diablo set? I bought a Battle Chest set about 6 months ago when a friend/cousin became interested and wanted to play with me on my T1 connection - we were both surprised at what we read.
Over 7 million copies of the game have sold. At the price most of us paid for the game ($49.95) that would equate to roughly $350,000,000 in sales volume for the entire game. That's a lot of money. Let's assume that of that amount, 40% made it back to Blizz for about $150,000,000 in revenue (gaming is big bucks).
I remember buying verision 1.01 when it first hit the shelves (and I could swear this game is older than 3 years, but it isn't) about 3 years ago. That's a very long time for any video game to have a following.
At any given time, about 100,000+ people are on Closed Battle.net playing Diablo 2. So, there is still an interest by 1.43% of the game's original purchasers in playing the game the way it was meant to be played. The people aren't playing much anymore, they aren't selling a ton of new games everyday, so what do you do? By all means necessary, you promote an interest in a new revenue producer. Ever notice what advertisements we see when online? Battle.net is free because it is Blizzard's own advertising medium.
The Plan: Make us sick of the game's problems (Diablo 1), promote a bigger and better game that is supposed to be hack free (Diablo 2), and then when interest feigns in that game, promote a bigger game (The WarCraft Series). I'm going to go over something I read once (can't remember where), that talked about WHY people want hacks in their video gaming experience - I read this online from some general gaming site.
Hacks and Iths, although I am staunchly against them in Closed games, keep an interest in the game. I would dare say that a majority of players on Battle.net have an interest in using them or working to obtain them (Why I will never know, Open Bnet offers WAY better cheats). They provide a way to play the game in a new way so that it never gets old. We have Mod Makers out there making new maps and weapons for Open play, these people are merely interested in a new way to play the game in a cheated way on Closed.
In the case of Diablo 2, there is a sense of "getting away with something" by using Iths. Further, it feeds the ego of the user because in this Alternate Reality, they can be the best at something. In real life, they probably don't have the "best" friends, are shunned by the opposite sex, are younger (teens), and aren't very sociable (case in point: any conversation in any game). There is also a sense that they are pushing the game to it's limits because they have also grown bored with legitimate play.
One game series that I truly enjoy is the Age of Empires/Empire Earth series. I enjoyed playing it legitly against people online for a very long time. But more fun, because you were essentially playing the role of God, was to use the cheats placed in the game by the game maker. It kept my interest, but I don't play the game like I used to play it anymore. It's not that much fun when everyone has 5,000 catapults and soldiers within 5 minutes of play.
But I digress, the ONE thing that truly pisses Blizzard off is when their servers are tied down from hack methods, bots, and duping methods. When their server is down, it makes them look bad. Since Ith's are no longer capable of being created, that is not their big priority anymore. I would dare say that in their eyes, it's fine that you are using a cheated weapon, but if you try to duplicate that weapon and it causes their server to go into a frenzy, then you are intruding on them.
They recently put out a warning about equipping your character with cheats. The only legit way to determine who is using them is to sit in the Trade Channel and hit the print screen button every five seconds and then send that to Blizz. If we all did that, then we will never see the One Ten Patch come out should they decide to follow up on these goofballs.
But most distressing to me was the rampant dupe wave. I buy alot of things I need for cubing and crafting with SOJs. I was cubing a bunch of charms and building goldfind characters at the time this happened. Last night I had to fork out 1 soj per Lem rune, and people don't want SOJs for their 40 pgems anymore. Now that sucks because it takes away from my personal gaming experience. Maybe in a couple months I can get back to it (because we all know that 1.10 will be out in a few months). :(