Blizzard suffered a community backlash with their decision to remove LAN capability from StarCraft II, a decision they have put down to anti-piracy measures. In the meantime, other large publishers have taken steps to curb piracy with annoying DRM systems which require a constant Internet connection. Some recent examples include Command & Conquer 4, Assassins Creed II, Silent Hunter 5, and Settlers 7.
These DRM solutions have proved frustrating at times when the verification servers are down due system troubles or planned attacks. Those without a permanent Internet connection have been left out in the cold, and legitimate customers are becoming increasingly annoyed by companies who treat them like potential criminals. Meanwhile, pirates merely see the systems as a challenge and work diligently to provide the inevitable cracked version of the games.
With their highly anticipated RTS due out on July 27, Blizzard is touting the advantages of the new Battle.net system, and trying to steer away from the negative connotation associated with the DRM acronym. StarCraft II will only require a once off activation and a registered Battle.net account in order to play the single player game in offline mode – a system that sounds quite reasonable in light of the more intrusive DRM solutions going around.
However, Blizzard is well aware that the game will inevitably be pirated, and therefore hopes that the social aspect of the new Battle.net will entice players to purchase legitimate copies.
Speaking in an interview conducted by Videogamer.com, Blizzard co-founder and StarCraft II executive producer Frank Pearce said: “If we’ve done our job right and implemented Battle.net in a great way people will want to be connected while they’re playing the single player campaign so they can stay connected to their friends on Battle.net and earn the achievements on Battle.net.”
“The best approach from our perspective is to make sure that you’ve got a full-featured platform that people want to play on, where their friends are, where the community is. That’s a battle that we have a chance in,” Pearce continued.
“If you start talking about DRM and different technologies to try to manage it, it’s really a losing battle for us, because the community is always so much larger, and the number of people out there that want to try to counteract that technology, whether it’s because they want to pirate the game or just because it’s a curiosity for them, is much larger than our development teams.”
“We need our development teams focused on content and cool features, not anti-piracy technology,” Pearce concluded.
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