Diablo III's Auction House Is Shuttng Down

A little late Blizzard.

Good news.

Finally.

Good news, indeed.

I actually really enjoyed the auction house as a way to basically justify playing more into later levels. Granted I'm sure it's inextricably linked that way and probably what bugged people but for someone who was going to stop after the first difficulty I thought it was fun.

I feel like doing it at this point has to be for more than just game design reasons. Maybe the revenue was drying up and there wasn't much point to it anymore? Or since they already did the work to balance the game without the auction house now is the time? *Shrugs*

I wonder if we will also see native controller support for the PC version anytime? Or is it already there and I'm just ignorant?

I'd like to think it's because they realized it's a horrible broken game with it. But it's more likely because it wasn't making them any money.

Not sure it'll make D3 much better though...haven't played it since all those patches might have to have a look.

Well yes and no. Now i'm 100% more interested in that expansion pack. The Auction house sucked so much. Better now than never right?

It's probably not generating enough money anymore to justify keeping it in.

Company admits their excuse for implementing always-on DRM broke their game. As people said it probably would. Company is yet to comment (at least in their FAQ on this) about whether this opens up offline single-player for the game (similar to how it is implemented in SC2).

Edit: A week ago they commented in an interview that offline mode wasn't on the cards for the PC. Really hope that wasn't accurate (and was just required misdirection until they went live with this AH news, also from interview the sentiment is summed up as "Auction House is here to stay" by the interviewer).

Great.

This actually makes me quite a bit more excited for the expansion. I really enjoyed Diablo 3, but the auction house made it too easy to get the loot you wanted, while also making it so they had to make loot percentages kind of terrible. Hopefully this will lead to actually being able to find gear that you want just from playing rather than having to buy it off of the AH.

Smart decision, only took the prospect of not selling a single copy of the expansion for them to realise it.

I tried doing a playthrough without using the AH a few months back - it ended up being pointless because I played in public games and always ended up chasing some dude with all legendary gear ripping through everything without stopping.

I picked it up on console. The game really shines with Loot 2.0 and controller support.

That date is far off enough that it makes me wonder if it could potentially be a release date for the expansion.

I wasn't totally opposed to the auction house, but I did stop using it at some point, and it became kind of a bummer to think the game was balanced to accommodate it.

So yeah, I'm into it.

Wait a minute......... the auction house wasn't a good idea? In all serious though the auction house seemed as a thin excuse for the DRM. Console versions of Diablo 3 prove how redundant the always on requirement was.

It's a step. However I still found the game fairly boring, especially due to the homogeneous loot. It looks like you get more interesting attributes at higher difficulties because at normal I only got +X str, +Y dex, etc. That's boring because it makes all loot pieces behave identically. Attributes like X% chance to frost nova or whatever are far more interesting. I enjoyed Hellgate London more than Diablo 3 due to more interesting loot.

To little, to late. Unless they overhaul both the gear and skill system and have a story that doesn't make me ponder how a sack of potatoes is smarter than the entire cast combined I have long since lost my taste in Diablo.

Yeah, a lot of fucking good that does now.

Good news. Large part of Diablo's appeal is finding better gear. Roaming through the AH and buying items doesn't give any feeling of accomplishment.

So does that mean they will be making better loot drops and more interesting skill trees? Loot drops, probably yes. Better skill tree customization? no.

It's still a fine game but not as interesting to stick with. The AH was never an issue for me so much as other people who play this game into insane difficulties. I just don't like the way skill tree are handled. it's incredibly dull and makes repeating the same stuff uninteresting.

@cornbredx: So you prefer to start from level 1 to have a different skill build?

@wilshere: I would prefer to have skill trees instead of boring runes that you never change once you find the combination you want.

This is brilliant. They implement an auction house that no one wants (but wasn't going to detract fans of the series from buying the game anyways). Not that the game is on consoles and basically dead (and the auction house has already made them a lot of money), they get rid of it in time for the expansion so those who got mad at D3 because the auction house ruined the game are going to think "Great, the problem is removed. now I am excited for the expansion".

Well done Blizzard. You may make mediocre games now, but you certainly do make lots of money.

Probably too late. But it might get me back into it when the Xpac comes out. Can't believe it took them this long to realize this...

The item drop change makes more sense now.

This is the best stupid idea i have heard in a while. Now some poor bastard at blizzard is going to get 1000 emails a day from kids complaining how some guy in china didnt paypal him the money for his epic sword of awesome. Dont get wrong the drop rates and itemisastion are are a a joke but shuting down the auction house will not make the game any better.

For how much Blizzard playtests and iterates on their games, you'd think they would have seen the adverse effects of the Auction Houses coming a mile away. Especially since the itemization and stat design was so borked that you basically had to go to the AHs to get the small percentage of items that were of any value for your class.

It's almost like there were financial concerns that overrode the potential gameplay problems.

Good on Blizzard. Not many developers would outright come out and say they screwed up a major aspect of their game.

It was an interesting experiment. Maybe now they'll open it up to some custom content like StarCraft II.

That's okay. They tried something new-ish and it didn't work. Of course I'm not a fan of the Diablo series - my enthusiasm ended with the first game - so I was never affected by their auction house shenanigans anyway.

Good news. If only they would make it possible to play off line...

PRESERVE THE INTEGRITY OF THE GAME PLAY EXPERIENCE!

Shuttng?

Not many developers would care to change anything after a year. Chapeau Blizzard

Congratulations Blizzard, you have gotten me to care about Diablo III enough again to play the expansion pack when that comes out.

Only took a year, "preserve the integrity" most people have played the game and are done with it

Jesus H.W. Christ.

This means they're putting console D3 itemization into the PC version.

You'll be able to progress in the game without grinding for weeks of gametime.

My guess is that they have been planning to do this for a while and the great reviews of the console version's re-tuned loot system were the justification to doing it on PC.

do you think they weren't making enough real money off of it?

Waaaaayyyyy too late. This still doesn't change the fact that it's a fundamentally flawed game.

I agree with their philosophy but I played two characters into inferno difficulty and not once ever did I find a single item myself that was good. Diablo III rewards people who farm 20 hours a day.

The auction house wasn't the core of the problem, the problem was what it brought with it, the itemization. It was horrific, there was nothing to look forward to except grinding more money and then BUYING the item that was the best, you had no chance of getting better by just playing, it killed any enjoyment I had of the game.

If they revamp all of the items, I might have some interest in playing Diablo 3 again.

I'd rather them just shut it down today.

Looks like console's loot system was so successful that they want to adopt that all around. Love it.

@llexan: that'd be nice to play around it. i'd REALLY like it in torchlight ii tho.

I would care more about this if the Battle.net security system wasn't so busted. I'm locked out of my account and won't be able to get back in until I mail them a copy of my driver's license, which is never ever going to happen (ever).

Hopefully this is a step towards unifying the experience on PC and console. I bought the game but only played a couple hours due to repetitive stress pain from clicking. A controller allows me to play for far longer sessions without pain.