Blizzard Must Refund South Korean Diablo 3 Players
Diablo 3 gamers in South Korea can get a refund on Diablo 3 over server overload issues.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Blizzard Entertainment must refund the money of a string of Diablo 3 players located in South Korea due to issues surrounding the game's launch.
The news arrives around three weeks after South Korea's Fair Trade Commission launched an investigation into the company's Seoul office. The investigation was prompted by a huge wave of heated complaints it received about problems with Diablo 3's internet servers caused by overloading.
In a message posted on its website on Monday, Blizzard said that the server overload problem stemmed from a misjudgment about user volume in Asia, leading to frequent server crashes and slow connectivity. This sparked a huge backlash by South Korea’s large online gaming community which makes up two-thirds of all Diablo 3-related traffic in Asia.
To help alleviate the connection problems, Blizzard established additional servers in early June. The company also offered affected Diablo 3 players a 30-day free trial to StarCraft 2: Wings of Liberty as compensation. Now it's required to provide a full refund thanks to Korea's consumer protection law which guarantees a refund if there's a problem with a product that's not caused by the actual consumer.
According to Blizzard, Diablo 3 players in Korea who are less than Level 40 can apply for a refund from June 25 to July 3. Blizzard is also accepting returns from any player less than Level 20 within 14 days of purchase from here on out.
People will argue that this is a mainly a multiplayer game. Well i like to play the game solo. Not only Blizzard, any company that follows this always online drm should feel it. The drm is the sole reason i didn't try buying Diablo 3.
I miss those cartridges.
Anyone who argues a game like this is "multiplayer" isn't paying attention to the fact that the entire dialogue is written for one hero; it is a single player game with a well-supported co-op capability.
There are millions of us that don't mind the game having multiplayer function, but are solo players and don't want to have co-op shoved in our face.
The way I see Diablo 3 is - it's an adequate and fun game to fill some time until Borderlands 2 comes out.
Torchlight 2/Guild Wars 2 = Time to shine
After all, a refund implies you no longer want a product due to dissatisfaction.
Good luck.
People will argue that this is a mainly a multiplayer game. Well i like to play the game solo. Not only Blizzard, any company that follows this always online drm should feel it. The drm is the sole reason i didn't try buying Diablo 3.
I miss those cartridges.
Anyone who argues a game like this is "multiplayer" isn't paying attention to the fact that the entire dialogue is written for one hero; it is a single player game with a well-supported co-op capability.
There are millions of us that don't mind the game having multiplayer function, but are solo players and don't want to have co-op shoved in our face.
The way I see Diablo 3 is - it's an adequate and fun game to fill some time until Borderlands 2 comes out.
No it's not their fault, it's Blizzard's. Blizzard should have been more then ready to handle the volume. They never once acted surprised.
Of course if there was no online DRM to protect the RMAH (the game has already been hacked for offline and LAN play and there has already been item duping, so those reasons for online only have been proven false) this wouldn't be an issue for them, at least not to a great extent.
What?!?! who would think it wouldn't?!?! if you return something you don't get to keep it.... derp
uhh, that's common sense.. a refund is money you get back by returning an item, so obviously if they are getting a refund they are returning diablo 3 account included. Why would they need to specify that, they are not going to give you a refund and let you continue to play, than that wouldn't be a refund anymore but compensation.
no, this is a single countries law system that forced them to offer this. most other places its not that ingrained into the law that forces them to provide a refund apposed to they can offer a refund, i hope that makes sense.
Uhm, what if you own other games bound to your account?
they are just removeing the game from the account, invalidateing the CD-Key if u will.