What I don't get about the online requirement...

[RCIX]

More precisely, the people protesting it. Yes, it can be annoying and if your internet goes out you can't play it. Or if you're on a trip and place X doesn't have wifi you can't play it there either. But from a pragmatic view, if you wanna play a PC game, how often are you doing so where there isn't internet access? Feel free to get upset at the principle, but what is essentially throwing a mini fit over something that doesn't and probably won't affect you hardly ever seems... petty. I don't like the restriction either, but I spend 99-100% of my PC gaming time in a place where there is internet so I just buy what games I have fun playing.

Ask yourself, do you honestly think that most game devs *want* to put this sort of restriction on their games (Actibilizzard/Ubisoft nonwithstanding)?

[KingIsaacLinksr]

More precisely, the people protesting it. Yes, it can be annoying and if your internet goes out you can't play it. Or if you're on a trip and place X doesn't have wifi you can't play it there either. But from a pragmatic view, if you wanna play a PC game, how often are you doing so where there isn't internet access? Feel free to get upset at the principle, but what is essentially throwing a mini fit over something that doesn't and probably won't affect you hardly ever seems... petty. I don't like the restriction either, but I spend 99-100% of my PC gaming time in a place where there is internet so I just buy what games I have fun playing.

Ask yourself, do you honestly think that most game devs *want* to put this sort of restriction on their games (Actibilizzard/Ubisoft nonwithstanding)?

You have clearly never been on my Internet connection that I had for 7 years prior to moving. Lag, disconnects, unstable connections, the entire works. Yes, you can go online. But online multiplayer gaming was a tricky beast in the best times and when I sat down for single player games, I sure as heck did NOT want to worry about the stupid internet going down for the 5th time that week. Not all of us live in the middle of the cities with 5 different ISPs to choose from. Some of us live in cities with one dominant ISP that has the worst shoddiest service on the planet and there is nothing we can do about it. Its a really bad problem in the States.

Also, if games are tied to a server and that server suddenly goes down permanently (and guaranteed that will happen with most AAA games within 5-10 years), good luck every playing it again. Sad part is, most old games will outlast new releases because they still aren't tied into a server.

[Mánagarmr]

I don't need to say more than a few words about this to make my opinion perfectly clear:

Assassin's Creed 2 launch. Diablo 3 launch.

There you go, argument made. Two single player games that were utterly BORKED on launch day, and in AC2's case for weeks, for legitimate customers, while pirates laughed all the way to the end of the game. When a game's method of DRM hurts no one but the legit customer, something is horribly wrong. I don't mind a one time activation online. What I do mind is DRM that actively counteracts my possibility as a customer to enjoy the game.

My latest pet-peeve is SimCity(5). SimCity has always been a single player experience and always will be. Simcity 2000 had an experimental network version that didn't really work too well. If I wanted multiplayer, I would've played something else.

Now, I don't mind the option of multiplayer. It's nice that it's there, but don't shove it down my throat. Or would you rather be forced to play AI:War in multiplayer? It's the same thing. A single player game that can be played in multiplayer. This whole forced, always online, multiplayer thing is nothing but a very thinly veiled DRM. Also, see Timmy's "Old games" argument. I'm currently enjoying Master of Orion 2 (on my phone no less) and Total Annihilation. If they carried this kind of DRM, I wouldn't have been able to play them, because their servers would be down by now.

And now you got me ranting. Thank you very much.

[Mánagarmr]

Ask yourself, do you honestly think that most game devs *want* to put this sort of restriction on their games (Actibilizzard/Ubisoft nonwithstanding)?

No, the devs most likely don't, because they know it'll shaft their customers over. Publishers (such as the aforementioned Activison/UBISoft) however very much do. If they can lock their customers in a room with a custom-made console with ONLY their game on it, they would. But they can't, so they have to make do with what they can get away with.

And it's people like you that let them get away with taking more and more freedoms for us customers away. (Not saying that in any accusatory way, just stating facts).

[RCIX]

I'd just rather support the devs how I can then shaft them for something the publishers made them do ;p And since I don't see a lot of these people offering a direct donation option...

[Mánagarmr]

I'd just rather support the devs how I can then shaft them for something the publishers made them do ;p And since I don't see a lot of these people offering a direct donation option...

Such is the world of publishing. Besides, the devs have already been paid during development. Everything past publishing goes right into the publishers hands. (Most of the time, afaik)

Either way, I'd say it's the devs fault for siding with greedy suits in that case. I just can't bring myself to support these initatives as they hamper my experience as a customer. Compare that to how Arcen treats its customers.

[RCIX]

It's not even siding in most cases. You saw the Planetary Annihilation kickstarter video; there is simply no way to take a large sized game idea (95% of 3d games) and make it into a reality without publisher help. Much like houses and cars cannot be realistically bought up front without a decade+ of saving in 80% of American jobs anymore. Kickstarter is taking a whack at it but you're not gonna see people regularly put in the money to fund games like that. So it ends up being a necessary evil, unfortunately. =/

[Mánagarmr]

It's not even siding in most cases. You saw the Planetary Annihilation kickstarter video; there is simply no way to take a large sized game idea (95% of 3d games) and make it into a reality without publisher help. Much like houses and cars cannot be realistically bought up front without a decade+ of saving in 80% of American jobs anymore. Kickstarter is taking a whack at it but you're not gonna see people regularly put in the money to fund games like that. So it ends up being a necessary evil, unfortunately. =/

That is quite true, and it's a sad state of being. But I just can't support it regardless. :/

[zebramatt]

A) I like to be able to play games on trains, planes and automobiles, where internet is often patchy at best.

B) If the internet goes out at home, one of the things I'd like to do to pass the time is play a game.

C) I rarely play online multiplayer.

But sure, maybe over half the time I want to play a game I have an internet connection, so I see where you're coming from. I'm just not sure why anyone would want to alienate their player base for any reason, least of all because they don't find my position legitimate!

[keith.lamothe]

@OP:

Liberty.

[LaughingThesaurus]

@OP:

Liberty.

This, and the fact that if I'm playing single player, I want the experience to be reliable. There is no feature that you can add to a game to make me care in any way whatsoever about being forced to always play online. I don't care about networking with strangers, or visiting their cities, or selling items for pennies in the case of Diablo 3. I just want to play the game and have fun, and those extra features that cause a significant problem for me for marginal benefit detract from the game in the long run.
Case in point: Even though I hate the online-only requirement, and even though I absolutely adore Rock Band Blitz, I still don't play Blitz much. Why? Because when my Xbox's connection dies occasionally, it takes away all of my power-ups, which is the most fun part of the game. Why? God only knows.

I would rather buy the game, then pirate a copy so that I can play it whenever I want without those features.

[madcow]

A lot of people live in areas that simply don't have access to high speed internet.

I live out in the boonies, so no net provider will run DSL/cable lines out to where I live. As a result my options are to use satellite (or dial up). It is both extremely slow, has bandwidth limits, and is prone to going out during the rain (or even just a very cloudy day sometimes).

As a result, any game with an always online "feature" is basically one I won't/can't play at home for the above reasons.

Edit: I also have to keep steam in offline mode and don't watch youtube/netflix.

[LaughingThesaurus]

^ I don't even have that issue. I just have a broken router that will completely at random lose connection. Not every day, not every week, but when it happens, it's always when I'm doing something really video game-like.

[Lancefighter]

I used to have an internet connection that died when any of my roommates used the microwave.

Its often not a question of 'does the average gamer have internet', but 'how stable is his internet'.

I dont think I am incredibly against the idea of requiring a connection at login (I'm not entirely sure. Steam does this anyway, and their system seems most fair). But I would really like to argue against it on principal  - Do I really want someone else to tell me if I can pay THE GAME I PAYED FOR, when I want to play it?

[Echo35]

The fact that I do most of my gaming on the go and on various portable devices and the fact that, no, I don't have internet a lot of the time aside, there are a myriad of other issues:

• What if the company shuts the servers down in 10 years?
• What if there's a lot of people online (As happens during launch) and I can't play my game simply because lots of other people are also? (See Diablo 3 launch).
• What if my internet connection is spotty (As happens sometimes even at home) and I get lag and desyncs and other stupid crap in my single player game?
• What if the connection protocols simply don't work on my network (Like, if I'm on a college campus or apartment complex with restrictive network access)?
• What if something happens to the company in question like they go out of business or have hardware/network failures on their end?

I mean, yes, if I'm playing a multiplayer game, obviously I need internet. But when I'm playing a game by myself? Why on earth does it make any sense at all that I should be tethered to your potentially crappy and unreliable service to play your game? If I were to pirate said game, I wouldn't have these problems, so you're basically treating me like a criminal for giving you money and telling me I can't have the product that I've paid to use from you.

EDIT: I do a TON of board games as well. This would basically be like me having to call Fantasy Flight Games every time I wanted to play A Game of Thrones with my friends and asking for a password to play the game. It's a completely ridiculous business model.