Blizzard kills LAN support in Starcraft 2

Posted by BigWhale on July 1st, 2009 in Games | 0 comments

Fingers are still crossed for 2009 release of Starcraft 2, but now with a bitter aftertaste. It appears that Starcraft 2 will lack support for multi-player games over LAN network. Multi-player will be supported only over internet via Battle.Net service. Everyone was aksing why on earth they did that?

“We don’t currently plan to support LAN play with StarCraft II, as we are building Battle.net to be the ideal destination for multiplayer gaming with StarCraft II and future Blizzard Entertainment games. While this was a difficult decision for us, we felt that moving away from LAN play and directing players to our upgraded Battle.net service was the best option to ensure a quality multiplayer experience with StarCraft II and safeguard against piracy.”

Said Bob Colayco from Blizzard.

Can a move like this kill success of Starcraft 2? What happens at LAN parties, is Starcraft 2 out for them? This could be a big problem since lag free connection to Battle.Net servers will have to be provided and having a good connection for enjoyable gaming can become a problem when you have too many people crammed on a small space. Even if we step away from bigger events this still presents a problem. Few friends, few beers, few computers and no internet connection and apparently no Starcraft 2 in multiplayer.

Multiplayer over LAN was something that kept Starcraft 1 alive for so long, in fact, it’s still keeping it alive today. However, I am more interested in the other aspect of this decision. Fighting the piracy.

Piracy is bad, m’kay? All across internet and gaming sites I can hear people shouting stuff about crippling the game, butchering the very essence of it and making it impossible to have fun with the game. I don’t like Blizzards decision, I certainly don’ t, and I am sure that you don’ t like it either. But I understand Blizzard, they are eager to milk the franchise some more, make every buck off of it. One way to minimize the piracy is to kill the LAN parties. Last time I was on such event (and it was years ago) I was greeted by few posters on the wall with IP numbers of various game servers and network locations of where those games are available for download. I had loads of fun with games that I never played or hard before. Am I a pirate? I sure was at that time. After that party I deleted all of the games that were installed on the party and never played them again. Am I a pirate?

I can think of at least two different ways that Blizzard could use to counter the piracy without killing LAN support in Starcraft 2.

Again this anti-piracy solution creates problems for legitimate users that will buy the game. At least two thirds of three wise men included. Piracy is killing all the fun.

No LAN Play For Starcraft II [StarCraft] (kotaku.com)
StarCraft II: Blizzard responds to lack of LAN support (joystiq.com)
New details, gameplay elements of StarCraft 2 revealed (arstechnica.com)
And The StarCraft II LAN Petitioning Commences [Heck No, Possibly] (kotaku.com)
StarCraft 2 Community Manager Responds to LAN Debate

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Three Wise Men