Korean Ratings Board Delays Diablo 3 Again
Posted 4 January 2012 by FluxThanks to Lukk for pointing us to news that will surely go over like a spoonful of pepper spray from Korea, as the ratings board again declined to come to a final decision on Diablo III, due to the gambling-like element that the RMAH adds to the product.
The Game Rating Board, government agency responsible for approving and classifying video games, sees no end in sight for a decision an entire legion of fans anxiously awaits.
Though a ruling on the third and latest in the series of global bestseller Diablo was rumored to be due today, the board spokesman said Tuesday there were no signs suggesting a definitive answer.
“Committee members are conflicted about what to do with Diablo 3,” he said, “because of (its American developer) Blizzard’s information on the game’s ‘auction house’ feature.”
The virtual auction allows users to buy and sell items won during the game, which for many, including the board, resembles gambling. The controversial cashing-out feature, which would convert play money into real currency, was excluded in the most recent resubmission on Dec. 22 but continues to confound the process.
Though Bashiok has said that the game could be released in different regions with different features, and that there’s no reason that Real Money Auction House delays in Korea would delay the product worldwide, many fans find this less than reassuring/believable. I guess we’ll find out at some point, if this Korean ratings board issue keeps dragging on and Blizzard refuses to remove the RM aspect of the AH in Korea, to speed things along.
Also, it’s interesting that they removed the “cashing out feature” in their latest proposal. How would the RMAH have worked without that? Would Korean players have just built up a Bobby Bucks™ balance forever, and only been able to spend it on Blizzard merch?
Update: Kotaku spotted this news here and posted an item with a delightfully-inflammatory headline. It’s interesting to see how more general gaming fans react to this news, and there are a lot of “who cares about the real money?” as well as, “this sucks I’m more eager for Torchlight 2 anyway.” type comments. How representative those are of gaming fans on the whole? No idea.
Update #2: From Jay Wilson’s Twitter feed this afternoon:
Asia is not what’s holding us back. You’ll see soon enough. –Angryrobotics
I’m fairly certain that Bashiok has said this exact same thing on at least one occasion, but that’s no reason to automatically mistrust it.
I dont see the reason why Blizzard would delay the game worldwide because of Korean issues, unless…
….the game is horrible, not really fun and sucks really really badly. Obviously then the Korean sales (when they do come) would be rather bland. This is obviously not a scenario I would hope for. Hopefully the rest of the game is much better than the rather slow starting, cartoony-wow-like beta.
The real reason for the delay would be SW:TOR, im guessing.
… what?
Oh, a troll… happy new year!
I already played the game so I am 100% sure I will love it. The real reason of delay is Korea of course. Blizzard wanted them to rate the game in August/September and they are still bi*ching about RMAH. Its unbelievable, but true. Blizzard committed to global release so no “worldwide-except-Korea” release is not going to happen. They will excuse that “the game is not ready yet” and so on, but really, they just want Korean money.
The majority of the player and online/print media beta feedback seems to be overwhelmingly positive. So its very unlikely that Diablo III wont be a hit. It is a Blizzard game (you have to give them credit for their past accomplishments)! Every Blizzard game since Warcraft 1 (?) received numerous platinum awards (90% in game tests). So far I have no reason to think the good looking Diablo III will be different.
The start of the game looks great to me, too. It has a nice fitting art style, the sound effects are great, the skillsystem is awesome, the quest system looks solid and the story (ingame and starting video) seems to be very deep and epic too. Your opinion is very biased and clearly lacks any reasoning if you call Diablo IIIs start a “slow starting cartoony wow like beta”.
Also I cant see any reason why Diablo IIIs launch should be influenced by SW:TOR. SW:TOR is a mediocre MMO game (judging by the german online/print media reviews I read so far). Diablo III is not a MMO, and barely even a RPG. I think there is no way that /THE/ most anticipated fantasy hack and slay game has to compete with a so-so good sci-fi MMORPG. Or do you think Starcraft IIs sales are affected by a new Warhammer MMO game? I dont see it, sorry.
“Though Bashiok has said that the game could be released in different regions with different features, and that there’s no reason that Real Money Auction House delays in Korea would delay the product worldwide, many fans find this less than reassuring/believable. ”
I believe Bashiok in so far, that Blizzard – at some point in the future – has to release the game, even without a green light from the korean gaming board. Right now it seems to me that Blizzard still sees the possibility of a global RMAH launch with a global DIII launch. So they use the previously unplanned extra time to further polish the game, waiting for the koreans to make up their mind. If the korean board doesnt give them the “go” sign in the near future, they will surely cut the ropes and release the game with different RMAH-versions (full / partly / none). The german game versions are extremely often censored, especially the amount of gore (blood removed, blood green, gore changed to funny junk parts [Team Fortress 2]). So why shouldnt Blizzard release different versions regarding the RMAH, if they have to? Surely koreans can buy foreign versions or log in to foreign region servers, but so can we germans. We can import the uncencored versions from (for example) the UK and play in Germany on the german servers with no cencorship, often even in our own language.
That is my _guess_, my gutt feeling so to say. Neither of us has proof, the above mentioned reasoning just seems likely to me.
SW: TOR peaked at 1.5 mil and is already declining with many subs being cancelled before the end of their free 30 days… so yeah… guess again…
Source(s)?
Various… including several posts on the official SW: TOR forums that are constantly being deleted stating the many, many glaring flaws in the game…
Not surprised that the RMAH causes extended law issues, but that it’d be gambling is ridiculous.
You could argue that drops are random and since there’s a real reward attached to a “good find”, the machine could result in an addiction similar to gambling, but I’m not buying it. Some key elements of gambling are missing, you’re not making an investment to get the next drop, the reward is an item that is only equal to money on a more abstract level, the rewards come so frequently that it should be fairly easy to calculate an “average gain” which you really don’t do in a casino, plus a clearly defined jackpot, the promise of which keeping you hooked, does not exist.
It has more similarities to a job than to gambling, stock market trading has more similarities to gambling than this.
Its not ridiculous. You just don’t want to admit it is gambling. You have to pay 15 cents to list your item for 48(?) hours. If you sell your item you win money, if you don’t, you lose. Just like a slot machine.
I’m not here trying to convince anyone to be against the AH (although I am), I’m just pointing that if Korea has laws against gambling then it makes sense to be against the current AH.
You describe here how auctions work. Are auctions gambling according to you or is it a market of supply and demand?
That is not the part the ratings board is concerned about. It’s the random drops from mobs, not the actual auction aspect. Auctions are still legal in S. Korea and are not considered a form of gambling no matter how much people try to reason that it is.
Most US states still consider one or more forms of gambling illegal (many don’t allow most or all forms) and yet Blizzard has no problems with having the RMAH in NA so yeah… it’s a dumb arguement…
It’s reasuring to know that bureaucracies work the same world wide. This panel has little to gain by approving the RMAH, while saying no to the RMAH is a safe decision.
Now, if this gaming board somehow derived funding from taxing on the conversion of Blizzard bucks to real money, it’d be rubber stamped so fast the sound barrier would be broken and the seizmic shock would be felt in California, followed by a tsunami.
The RMAH without cashing out would work better in Korea then most other markets. Over there most titles are purchased through a low monthly fee instead of the one time retail cost most of us the US and Europe are familiar with. They could pay their SC2 and WoW subscriptions with their findings.
And people still think they will be getting a noticeable amount of money by selling their items…
Monthly income? No, of course not. $10 a month? Given prices of D2 items now, pretty likely.
Good luck to you then… In the future, when you will be struggling to sell just ONE item in the RMAH, remember my post. =)
I predict that normal players, those that won’t use bots/hacks, will most likely make one dollar monthly if they try to sell their items for “profit”. Those that use only the free auctions to sell their items will make even less.
A lot of Korean and Chinese MMOs use a system where you spend money to buy “tokens” (given different names in different games, eg. “mall points”, “premium credits” etc.) that are used to buy items on the auction house (or trading post, or intergalactic exchange centre, whatever the particular game calls it).
When you sell something you can choose to sell it for an amount of gold or an amount of “tokens”. So you may list an item for 500 gold or 10 tokens. Generally the rarer items are only listed for tokens. This makes it possible to accumulate tokens by farming and selling items, and also makes it possible for people who don’t have enough gold to buy tokens and buy the item for tokens instead (eg. pay to win).
So if Diablo 3 was shipped in Korea without the cash-out option it would fit in quite easily with a model that already exists, except they’d also be able to use their tokens to buy Blizzard merch etc. which is more than they can do in other games.
The Korean gaming community must really hate their lawd right now.
So Blizzard is waiting/hoping for the board to somehow approve the RMAH? So how many NO’s will it take for Blizzard to figure out its not going to happen. As far as I know this is the third time that the board hasnt approved the RMAH, even without the cashout function. (No, no & No!) Maybe a bribe or two would help at this point? Dont get me wrong I want the game as much as the next guy, but this is ridiculous. Im thinking that we are definitely not getting the entire story here.
Perhaps the lobby of Asian Gold sellers is too important ?
I expect quite the same reaction in China.
Billions of dollars from illegal gold sellers are at stake here.
They can close their doors when this RMAH system would be universal in a few years time…
It’s not that haven’t approved it, they haven’t made a decision at all yet. There is still more deliberating going on. I’m pretty sure that KeSPA is lobbying heavily against it just to spite Blizzard.
Hopefully this catches on with other conservative governments and Blizz has to push the game back indefinitely, SC: Ghost style.
Yeah, it is SO much better to pay for items in lay designer’s cash shops.
Some people have NO clue at all….
A different point of view is to ask whether eBay works in South Korea?
The idea is the same, you bid for a product using money.
Be it in-game gold, or in this case, real money, I don’t quite see the difference between D3′s RMAH and eBay.
I agree. The first listings are even free per week.
Now this is not even bad: the FORBIDDEN fruit will be even more wanted…
Maybe eBay has the better lobby in Korea?
DC, i think, the german version get no censorship so far, when i remenber me right.
But anyway, i hope for release end of februay. Its not a big thing i mean, the feature to disable in some regions like korea, an to activate to a later time, with green light from the gaming board.