It was the news that shocked the world – earlier this week, Blizzard announced that Diablo III would be shipping out with one of those always-on internet requirements that are all the rage these days. Which does sort of make one wonder why the news was so shocking in the first place.

“I’m actually kind of surprised in terms of there even being a question in today’s age around online play and the requirement around that,” said Robert Bridenbecker, Vice President of Online Technologies at Blizzard, speaking to MTV Multiplayer.

“We’ve been doing online gameplay for 15 years now…and with World of Warcraft and our roots in Battle.net and now with Diablo 3, it really is just the nature of how things are going, the nature of the industry,” he continued. “When you look at everything you get by having that persistent connection on the servers, you cannot ignore the power and the draw of that.”

He also denies that the requirement is an anti-piracy measure, citing the online feature set and “[guarantees] that there are no hacks, no dupes” as motivating factors for it.

He has a point. I mean, it’s worked out for World of Warcraft, hasn’t it?

Diablo III still has no official launch date, although Blizzard has claimed they’re “working hard” to get it out this year.

For an in-depth summary of most of the Diablo III information we have so far, check out Diablo III – what you need to know.

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