No LAN play for Starcraft 2

A few days ago blizzard announced that Starcraft 2 would not have LAN based multiplayer because such a feature would increase piracy. Many Starcraft fans are very upset about this news and I would like to attempt to explain why.

There a couple styles to multiplayer gaming.

Xbox Live/Halo - This style is much older than Halo but Halo is a perfect example of this. Each gamer in his or her own home on her own network connection signs onto the service. Friends find each other through the service and can game together perfectly fine. Up to 16 friends can play together (big team slayer) on Halo.

Starcraft/LAN Party - Instead of the different players playing from their own couch/desk, everyone comes together to one location be it a persons house or a larger venue.

What does battlenet2.0 mean for lan parties?

If the lan party has a internet connection everyone would connect to battle.net and join a private game. Depending on how the networking software was written each player could communicate with the game server and the server coordinated all communication between players. This is how games like World Of Warcraft work.

OR the game could designate a "Host" and all game communciation would remain within the hosts network. This way traffic wouldnt have to leave the network then come back in. This is how games like Team Fortress 2 work (for xbox360).

The second option would be better for the LAN style play because even a sufficiently large internet pipe would be stressed handling 20+ gamers communicating with battle.net servers. But the second option may not happen. Blizzard may decide allowing host to peer traffic is too hard to prevent cheating and statistics rigging.

All of this rests on the assumption that the LAN party has the internet.

Many big LAN parties are not in someones home, and it can be very difficult to get internet in whatever venue they choose to host the party in. In this scenario they cannot play Starcraft 2 at all. Even with the host to peer traffic because it requires connection to battle.net to create the game.

Why do old Starcraft fans care about LAN play so much?

Many of fans of the original Starcraft found out about the game through these LAN parties. Starcraft become something of a social phenomena where friends would get together to play a few games. For these players who broke their Starcraft teeth playing in friends basements, this decision is the most upsetting. Because Battle.net 2.0 encourages players to play at home, on their own internet connection communicating with their friends by microphone.

Diablo III - Five classes!?

Blizzard has finally announced Diablo III. In doing so they have revealed two of the classes coming with the game. The Barbarian and The Witchdoctor. Unfortunately, the FAQ reveals that the game will only ship with 5 classes total. Since we already know of two of them that means that there are three left. I am very disappointed with this. The current state of affairs is that in a Diablo II:LOD world we have seven classes to chose from. Amazon, Barbarian, Sorceress, Necromancer, Paladin, Druid, Assassin. This means a good chunk of the classes we have come to love will be gone in this new game.

The gameplay looks legendary incorporating destructible environment, massive hordes of monsters and a constant stream of story events. I just hope blizzard changes their mind and doesn't remove so many of the classes. Any bets on which ones are going to get the axe?

Quick overview of the known changes:

• Back down to five classes


• New class: Witchdoctor


• Class specific quests


• Destructible environments


• Random scripted events


• Gender


• Potion bar is replaced with a wow-esque ability bar


• Mobs drop health orbs that heal instantly upon pickup

I will add features as I find them.