Diablo 3: Error 37

Another video game post coming your way. The next game I'll be talking about is Diablo 3. This game was another one that I was looking forward to quite a bit, mostly due to the fact that when I lived with Josh and Renee we would play the game for hours on the weekends. This game has been expected for some time as Diablo 2 came out quite a few years ago. You shouldn't rush good games, but they shouldn't drag their feet too much... such a fine line.

One tricky thing about purchasing the game is that I wanted an American copy, but being currently in Germany that is very difficult. So instead I opted to purchase it straight from Blizzard and download it over the internet. This way I had a game that I could play when I return home to the states. Now of course this caused me to have to spend quite a bit of time downloading and then installing the game, but I have learned to be patient with video games.

Finally the big day arrives (accounting for time zone differences of course), I go to sign on to the game and...... "The servers are busy at this time. Please try again later (Error 37)" Not something you really want to see. Either the folks at Blizzard weren't probably prepared for the amount of people that would sign on, or they hadn't ironed all the wrinkles out of things. Regardless of the reason, there were a lot of folks who were not happy with things.

2 hours later I finally was able to get on and play. Yay!! However by this time is was quite late in Europe so I was only able to play for a short time. I closed down the game and planned on spending the following day killing demons and saving the world. Well that was the plan, but apparently somebody didn't get the memo. When I woke up the servers were down, they were still attempting to get things running smoothly for everyone.

Finally by the end of the week, the whole problem had been "fixed" and people were able to sign on and play on a regluar basis. And then comes Tuesday, the day that all WoW players already fear... the day they perform server maintance. I'm not sure why it takes a full 8 hours,even after performing maintance once a week for numerous years. But it does, and if you are on the American server playing in Europe that means you can't play for nearly the entire day on Tuesdays because it goes from 11am-7pm people who play both Diablo 3 and WoW... as they bring down both games at the same time. Really?!

I guess it is just something that gamers will have to deal with, because it does sound like anything will change. Nor will there be any form of consolation to those who can't play Diablo 3 because of maintance (unlike WoW where the company has been known in the past to offer free months subscription in problem times). I came across a site that actually tracked how long the different servers were offline. The European server was the best with only being down about 4%, followed by the American server with nearly 10%... and in "first place" was the Asian server, it was down a whopping 17% the first month the game was released.

The entire ordeal left a slightly bitter taste in my mouth which is sad, because the game itself was very enjoyable, but the lack of playabilty is major flaw for any game. One of my biggest complaints with the game is that you HAVE to connect to their servers to play the game, even if you are playing a solo story mode. Apparently it makes it more secure and harder for hackers to disrupt gameplay.... of course it does, because they can't get sign into the game either.


Edit: More wonderful news from the people at Blizzard! All new purchases of the digital version of Diablo 3 have their copy locked down for up to 72 hours. To help combat fraud and other malicious activities, they have essentially made it so that you can only play a "demo" of the game for 3 whole days... even though you purchased the entire game