There’s a lot of rumbling about announcements from Blizzard. The two big frustrations people are offering up are:

• Boo hoo, StarCraft II is going to be three different games. I have to play 3x as much!
• Diablo 3 is going to have monetized DLC, probably expanding the story and adding new exporable areas.

The frustration over both of these issues is, in my view, just silly. In fact, I love both of these. Love em’. Can’t wait to play both games with the usual Blizzard polish and I’m especially looking forward to the chance to support Diablo 3 with DLC. Let’s tackle each of these in turn and have some fun speculating about the company’s future.

StarCraft II

Here’s the deal with this announcement, with notes from MTV Multiplayer:

Each product is a full-scale title that contains between 26-30 single-player missions per game. The timing of the releases could be a year between each game — or longer. Though each game will make references to the others, it’s not necessary to own all three to enjoy the single-player experience. However, if you want particular units for the multiplayer portion, you’ll need to buy the product that has those units. The decision wasn’t made to make more money or due to pressure from the Activision merger; the decision was made at the end of last year.

Don’t look at StarCraft II ‘requiring’ three purchases to complete. That’s completely the wrong way to look at this. Instead, look at this as the franchise expansion that Blizzard is really moving on here. Blizzard is taking these games that were (previously) just single releases whenever they got the chance to put one out, and turning them into full-on franchise releases. Just as with World of Warcraft, which features regular updates and yearly for-cost expansions, these games are now going concerns for Blizzard. StarCraft II is now a several-year-long product.

Is this a great cash grab for Blizzard? Yes, no question. But more importantly, this is a good decision for Blizzard fans. Instead of waiting years and years for new content, we’re going to get a StarCraft campaign a year for the next three years! That’s awesome! As the campaigns release the multiplayer component will change and twist. It’s a fantastic acknowledgment that players have a devotion to these fantasy races. That players are invested enough in the Protoss, Zerg, and Terrans to actually want an entirely tailored experience. I can’t *wait* to buy the Protoss box. Honestly, this is what I’ve wanted since the first game; the other races are fine, but if I could have an entirely Protoss-oriented experience I’d be a happy guy.

This is a great move by Blizzard for Blizzard, and for us. Love it.

Diablo 3

Diablo III director Jay Wilson said today that the company does not have a great desire to charge a subscription fee for the upcoming revision of its multiplayer client Battle.net. However, the developer did note that Blizzard will likely monetize unknown features of the game. “We are going to monetize features so that we get to make them,” said Wilson. “We kind of have to.”

Just as with SCII above, it’s very clear that Blizzard sees Diablo as a franchise at this point. This is a property they’re going to be expanding over the next few years with additional content, and they’ve just got to get paid for that. The online service won’t cost the player. They’re committed to that, and that’s in keeping with the thinking of numerous businesses around the world. Providing an online experience, that service, isn’t what people are paying for anymore. They’re paying for the content you provide via that service. That’s the distinction, and one that Blizzard is recognizing here – intelligently.

That Unnamed MMO

I’m now more convinced than ever that the mysterious next-gen MMO Blizzard is working is a brand new IP. All three of their brands are now tied up in games for the next few years. Unless Blizz is planning for a launch sometime around 2015 or something Diablo, Warcraft, and StarCraft are all pretty ‘occupied.’ The result, then, is that whatever MMO they’re working on has to be something new.

I can’t wait to see what they have in store there. I’m encouraged and excited about their decisions on their current IPs to boot!