Blizzard has recently updated their Battle.net Auction House FAQ page for Diablo III, revealing that SEA and Australia/NZ players will have their own regional servers when the game is released, similar to StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty.
Gamers who wish to log-in to the North American servers will still have the option to do so, however, it is unclear whether characters created between the NA and SEA servers will be transferable. Also, Auction House items are region-locked — an item purchased from from NA for example, cannot be transferred over to the SEA server.
I’ve pasted the specific portion of the FAQ below, for your viewing convenience:
Q: If I live in Australia/New Zealand/Southeast Asia, what server will I play Diablo III on?
A: As with StarCraft II, players who purchase the Australia/New Zealand/Southeast Asia version of Diablo III will have their own regional servers, offering lower latency and more action during peak hours. While we encourage players to play on these servers, we recognize that many have longstanding friendships with North American players and would like to continue playing with them. Because of this, we’re again giving Australia/New Zealand/ Southeast Asia gamers access to both regions’ servers so they can choose where they’d prefer to play.
Q: How does this impact the items I have purchased in the auction house?
A: Auction house purchases are bound to the servers in the region in which they’re bought. Any items acquired on the Australia/New Zealand/Southeast Asia servers, in-game or otherwise, are bound to those servers and are not transferrable to the North American servers (and vice versa). Please keep this in mind when making purchases in the auction house.
It’s great to see that Blizzard has learned from their previous StarCraft II region-locking debacle, allowing SEA and Aussie/NZ gamers to play with the larger and more established American Diablo community.
The year 2012, coincidentally, happens to be the 15th anniversary of the Diablo series. Having just entered a closed-beta in late-2011, will we finally see Diablo III’s release this year?
- Related Items
- Blizzard
- Diablo III
Have your say. Add your comments:
Pingback: Diablo III Will Have Region Locked Auction Houses()