Battle.net woes

battle.lag

At the very, very least, Normal difficulty should be excluded from having immune monsters. Immune monsters don't feel fair, they are like an obvious attempt at making the game difficult and challenging. Instead of doing something creative with the monsters, simply making them immune to certain attacks is supposed to make the game better? That is a clearly artificial game design element and seriously detracts from the play. It's all good when you're with 5 other people and have someone with attacks that a creature is not immune to, but why punish those who play alone? Nowhere on the D2 or LoD box does it say that an internet connection is required to play the game. At higher difficulty levels, it most certainly is.

Dammit, it's full of imps

I can't leave without my buddy Aliza

In fact, immunities almost feel like a heavy-handed attempt at forcing players to use battle.net. By forcing players to group to finish the game, and by offering certain features online, Blizzard clearly has an agenda that encourages online play. Why would they? Perhaps as another level of piracy protection - by making b.net attractive to players, it makes pirates more inclined to buy a copy and have a legitimate CD-key. Battle.net is also a way to get players to suck in their friends, by making multiplayer cool with all sorts of new features. However, battle.net should not be a necessity to play the game without extremely frustrating encounters. There's a thin line between encouraging and forcing someone to do something, and Blizzard is on the verge of crossing it.

Abandon all hope, ye who enter here

You can give hirelings items!

Fortunately, b.net's condition is greatly improved over what it was upon Diablo II's release. The Realms work, even during peak hours, though it may become hard to create a game as the expansion pack renews interest and b.net gets flooded with a new wave of players. Hopefully the recently completed upgrades to the Realms will be enough to prevent any problems.