I’m currently playing Diablo IV (and having a blast with it) but finding one small gripe which I only think is going to get worse and probably stop me playing it completely in the long run.
My girlfriend is currently pregnant. This means in 6 months time we’ll have a newborn. With this in mind I’m expecting to only be able to grab a few minutes at a time to game and even when I think I’ll have longer I may end up jumping off at short notice. This means I’ll almost certainly come to rely on games which I can pause. Unfortunately this isn’t possible with Diablo IV since it requires an always online connection even though I’m essentially playing it as a single player game.
What are other people’s thoughts?
I fuckin hate it. Total bullshit
I think it might be a good anti-piracy measure. But it’s really sad for the accessibility of these games as a whole, especially when it is possible to play the game without any online features.
I’m a big fan of the Steam Deck and Nintendo Switch ability to simply turn into sleep mode, which allows me to pause very easily games. But I guess that’s not possible with online games :/
If it’s a strictly multiplayer game, fine.
If not, that’s just DRM, and it should die in a fire.
If the game actually does something useful with that connection, I don´t have a problem with it. Examples:
- MSFS does the processing of the terrain and it´s details off site. Also things like live weather and traffic obviously need a connection.
- Souls games allow you to leave messages and read messages from other players. Also you can help or attack other players in their game, which is super useful and fun.
However, sometimes the always on is just a way for the devs to battle piracy. In which case its hurting the actual gaming experience.
I´m not familiar with Diablo 4 to be honest. So, in my understanding, the fact that it need an internet connection alone can´t be the reason for not being able to pause the game, right? There must be some real time interaction going on between your “world” and the worlds of others.
EDIT: Hm, I read up on it for a second and it seems like there is a portal that you can use to teleport to a safe place? A town? Supposedly you can even do that from within a dungeon AND even teleport back to the same place?
The fact that it need an internet connection alone can´t be the reason for not being able to pause the game, right?
Yeah I don’t think so (see the next part however for my thoughts on the full reasoning why there is no pause) - D3 also was always online (sans console editions) and you could pause with a few exceptions.
There must be some real time interaction going on between your “world” and the worlds of others.
There definitely is a shared world state component, in that you seamlessly matchmake with others who can appear near you, and engage alongside you - this also grants you some extra XP (“Nearby Player Bonus”) while someone else is close. It becomes even more apparent during world events, such as world boss fights or Legion Events (which you can think of as a mini world boss fight).
I think this is where the true cost of not being able to pause comes from - since they didn’t add in a private vs public mode (in D3, you couldn’t pause when you had the game set to public, or when friends were in your game). If it existed, and you were to pause as it is, you’d need some sort of immunity buff or such, as another player could cause enemies to come near you, and either kill you outright, or right when you resume the game.
Hm, I read up on it for a second and it seems like there is a portal that you can use to teleport to a safe place? A town? Supposedly you can even do that from within a dungeon AND even teleport back to the same place?
Yep - this is nice to have (though you cannot use it in a boss fight AFAIK) though it’d really be nice to be able to actually pause still, but I suppose it’s better than nothing.
If a game has a single player mode without features that require internet, and isn’t accessible without wifi, thats just lazy design imo.
If a single player game requires online connection im not buying it.
This. If I’m gonna gave to get a pirate version in order for it to work, I’m donating to the crackers that fixed it, not the publishers that deliberately broke it.
Singleplayer games have no reason to require an internet connection to be able to play the game.
Definite no from me. Applies to all apps, really: there should always be an offline mode unless always-on is absolutely required (i.e., accessing a website/API is the app’s sole purpose).
This is a big problem for me with mobile games, since developers seem to have forgotten that cell service is not universal, capable of failure, and often metered.
Of course, there are still annoying edge cases. A bunch of apps I have don’t strictly require always-on connection, but they have a check-in at startup. They skip the check if you have no service at all, but if you have service without data, they just sit there without timing out.
It sucks, plain and simple. Single-player games should never require internet access, and if the game has a multiplayer component, it should be a separate mode that leaves the single-player mode working even when there is no internet connectivity.
It’s just basic fucking common sense… except that it conflicts with financial interests and greed.
It makes sense in that having a local single player and a multiplayer mode requires writing much of the game twice. Having a remote single player mode only requires making the game once, with a special instance spun up for each single player game.
I live a life where I often don’t have a persistent connection. That means for me, I can’t play new games. While I have been a fan and player of Diablo since the first one I’ll have to sit this one out.
In my opinion all games that can be played solo should have an offline mode. Personally I have an excellent internet connection but I hate having to depend on servers to be able to play the game that I bought.
The thing about always online is that the servers often crap out, especially during launch or during major patches. That just annoys the hell out of me.
These were my thoughts as well. Ever since I’ve had a good internet connection, online only games haven’t really bothered me, but that’s a privilege many don’t have.
When I had crap internet it, I’d have to download a patch overnight and it was awful getting a surprise patch, meaning I couldn’t play til the next day.
I don’t see any reason for single player games not to have an offline mode. Especially for people who don’t have good access to internet.
There seem to be two Diablo IV games.
One is a single player or co-op offline RPG where you’re running around killing monsters and collecting loot so that you personally can save the world. Seeing other players running around just breaks the illusion.
The other is some online multi-player thing where you can run around and team up with other people in the quest to min-max your build, where you pay stupid amounts of money to make your character look the same as all the other people who paid for the same skin.
I like the first game, have no interest in the second, and I resent where the mechanics designed for the second game interfere with the first.
Last month, construction workers did something in our street. I didn’t have Landline Internet for a whole week. Always Online is pretty horrible for single player games.
Concerning gaming with a newborn, you should also look for games that you can play with one hand, so you can hold the baby with the other. Europa Universalis 4 is a great game if you’ve got a kid who will only fall sleep while being held.
I almost exclusively play single-player games. I’m not sure I own one that is always online, since I pretty much always have WiFi on and wouldn’t notice the difference, but I don’t see why any of my games would have to be always online.
Well, games that are inherently built for an online social presence, like an MMORPG, makes perfect sense to require being always online. World of Warcraft, Star Wars: The Old Republic come to mind.
Even though you can quest solo on those games, it doesn’t make sense from a core-concept standpoint that you just walk around an empty world where there’d otherwise be players doing their own thing.
If it’s a game that has little to nothing to do with online as a core part of its concept (like a single-player campaign where you can’t have any sort of online co-op), then yeah that seems rather silly.
