Honestly, I have a hard time feeling sorry for Blizzard. They have forced all of their customers into Battle.net, after all. I remember playing hundred of hours of the first Diablo game, and probably about as much of the sequel. I have no interest in purchasing the third title though, and the forced usage of an always-on connection to Battle.net is at the forefront of my reasons why.

Blizzard used to be an awesome company. Then they released World of Warcraft.

Isn't Blizz owned by EA?



That would explain some of their suckiness

The primary reason I post this stuff is to keep you guys informed if you have any of these games and might be affected. 

Well i understand blizzard for wanting diablo 3 always be online with todays piracy and it really doesnt bother me since most ppls do have an constant internet connection anyways. battle.net is just like all the other services provided by gamecompanys nowdays (steam, ea, xbox, ps3,ubisoft and so on) game beeing online is the future and i bet we will see even more of it.

But i understand the frustration regarding diablo 3 especially the first weeks when it was released, major pain when server went offline or when you could not logon.. ( i dont play diablo 3 anymore but thats mostly cuz i couldnt be bothered farming it like i did with diablo, diablo 2 mainly cuz there aint much new about it anways)

Anyways sucks that battle.net got hacked and since quite many ppls use the same password for all their online accounts is even more sucky (but maybe they'll learn a lesson ) i know the password is encrypted at blizzard but everything that's encrypted can be decrypted.

  I don't get why they think a lot of people will download or buy pirated copies. In my life, I can only recall about 3 stores I've been where illegal movies were sold. Online there's a bunch of websites where they say you can watch a brand new movie for free, but it's damn easy to shut it down without all this P.I.P.A. and S.O.P.A. trash.
 The only major place that I've seen pirate movies being sold were in Mexico, I was just walking across the town when I found some sort of black market.

During the PS1/2 eras, in my neighbourhood we used to have guys doing regular door-to-door sales of copied games and DVDs. Not so much now due to new formats and even those who condoned piracy knew it was a rip-off. I sure as hell told 'em where to stick it.

Fact is, piracy is nowhere near the apocalyptic bogeyman that these companies make it out to be, and I'm getting fed up with the bullshit that they put me through every time I hand over my hard-earned for a new title. I've even had a PSN Store top-up card fail on me with absolutely NO recourse to get my money back. Thank feck it was only a tenner, but that's not really the point.

I am now at the point where I WANT the games industry to implode. What was it that Thomas Jefferson said about 20 years without a rebellion? Well, the gaming industry is almost at 30 years without one, and we need one now more than ever. The last implosion in 1983 ended up giving us the NES, go figure.

Maybe it's time to go back to carts

Actually, I find myself playing (and buying) more boardgames than anything nowadays. The so-called "designer boardgames" available are incredibly diverse and entertaining. I never liked Monopoly or Risk, but I can definitely get into titles like Settlers of Catan, Pandemic, or Carcassonne. I just got some D&D books in the mail last week. I've never played before, and intend to explore that avenue of analogue gaming next. I've played other RPGs before, like Rifts and Vampire the Masquerade, but even then it was close to 15 years ago.

Not only is it a nice change of pace to physically hold and move your character, but it reintroduces a social aspect of gameplay that seem to have died with LAN parties in the digital arena. Besides, it feels a lot better spending $40 on an actual, real product that will never become obsolete... as opposed to a bunch of ones and zeros that will be made obsolete within six months.

Maybe it's just because I'm old, but I don't feel like the video game industry has really offered me much to be exited about in a loooooong time.  The market has changed in a way that some of the more enjoyable aspects of the hobby to me are now gone and unlikely to ever really return.

No one will play chess with me. I don't consider myself to be astoundingly good, but I do almost always win against the rare opponents available to me.

As for obsolescence, I don't think it applies to older games quite as much. It wasn't part of the business model then as it is now. Online passes, the aforementioned DRM, account-locked consoles, and annual sequels ensure that you won't be playing most modern games much past the intended time frame. In comparison, here I am on a forum, for a mod, for a game over 10 years old.