It feels like it's only a matter of time. There are too many votes to ignore, especially for their top three franchises. What say you?

Vote for BLIZZARD ENTERTAINMENT titles on the wishlist:

Blackthorne
The Death And Return Of Superman
Diablo + Unearthed Arsenal + Hellfire
Diablo II + Lord Of Destruction
Diablo III + Reaper Of Souls
Justice League Task Force
The Lost Vikings
The Lost Vikings 2: Norse By Norsewest
Rock N' Roll Racing
RPM Racing (a.k.a. Radical Psycho Machine Racing)
StarCraft + Stellar Forces + Insurrection + Retribution + Brood War
StarCraft II: Wings Of Liberty + Heart Of The Swarm + Legacy Of The Void + Nova Covert Ops
Warcraft: Orcs & Humans
Warcraft II: Tides Of Darkness + Beyond The Dark Portal
Warcraft III: Reign Of Chaos + The Frozen Throne

Couldn't the always online requirement be patched out eventually?

What's a number larger than "never"?

So many people said the same about LucasArts, Bethesda and 2K.

In this case, I don't think so. I haven't played the game, but as far as I know too many features of the game are dependant on the server and patching out that dependancy would be too much work for the devs.

Don't hold your breath for it. :P Given they've already done it for the console versions, it could indeed be done. The question is, do they have any interest whatsoever in doing so? Blizzard are at a point where most of their fans accept or even defend the always-online requirement. Why would they step back on that, and give up on the control they have over their software and customers?

Not me. And the difference between the above-mentioned companies and Blizzard is that the former ones released their games on Steam. The latter one, no. I wouldn't expect to see their games here, before they start releasing stuff on Steam.

I don't think they have anything to lose by selling their legacy titles and I could even see them loosening their stranglehold on Diablo III when they're ready to release Diablo IV. Didn't GOG release games from Bethesda and LucasArts that weren't on Steam?

That's true.

But those companies aren't self-contained behemoths.

With Blizzard, you're talking about games that will never be on Steam, let along a niche distributor like GOG.

"You think you do, but you don't."
When asked if they would consider legacy servers for WoW. He didn't just decline, no, he had the audacity, to tell the audience what they really want. Blizzard, as of now, is a bunch of assholes, so full of themselves with the success of WoW, that they let their IPs rot for 10 years and only as WoW is declining, they spit out some half-assed sequels, after most of the creative talent responsible for the old games already left.

When the sun rises in the west and sets in the east.
When the seas go dry and mountains blow in the wind like leaves.

What about them?

Proves that the games don't need to be released on Steam first.

This looks about right: