Blizzard closes down Diablo 3 Auction House

[Boubouille]

Blizzard closes down Diablo 3 Auction House on March 18, 2014

When we initially designed and implemented the auction houses, the driving goal was to provide a convenient and secure system for trades. But as we've mentioned on different occasions, it became increasingly clear that despite the benefits of the AH system and the fact that many players around the world use it, it ultimately undermines Diablo's core game play: kill monsters to get cool loot. With that in mind, we want to let everyone know that we've decided to remove the gold and real-money auction house system from Diablo III.

We feel that this move along with the Loot 2.0 system being developed concurrently with Reaper of Souls™ will result in a much more rewarding game experience for our players.

We're working out the details of how the auction house system will be shut down, but we wanted to share the news as soon as we made the decision in order to give everyone as much advance notice as possible. Please note that the shutdown will occur on March 18, 2014. We will keep everyone informed as we work through this process.

Josh Mosqueira and I wanted to provide everyone with a little more information behind this decision, so please have a look at the video, and stay tuned to this site for further updates in the months ahead.

[Aeriscats]

I'm calling it now, Reaper of Souls is coming out March 19th.

[CosmicGuitars]

Hallelujah. Great news.

[Zoaric]

I'm looking forward to this.

[Deleted]

omg omg, huge change, now they need to implement LAN or game sharing like starcraft 2 with limited heroes

[Gallahadd]

holy shit...


Great change , also I agree with Aeris, this does put a timescale on the release of RoS.

[Dragore]

Thank god.

[Deleted]

With that in mind, we want to let everyone know that we've decided to remove the gold and real-money auction house system from Diablo III

..... -.- took them long enough.

[Mazaxist]

this is the best news ever. i might give diablo a shot with new exp...

[Coldkil]

F*** YEAH SEAKING!

Jokes apart, they realized that AH was basically a system which was going againt the game purpose. Hence the only way to fix it was the removal.

I appreciate this drastic decision - not only because i've never been a fan of AH, but also because they have taken the courage to turn the game into the right direction.

[Kolo]

and there was much rejoicing. Yay.

[Meggle]

Took them long enough to make that decision. I approve.

[dyzz]

Real Money AH, Ok.

Gold AH, lol? So now if you don't have an uber item to trade, you won't be able to trade at all. Diablo 2 works like this, the only reason Diablo 2 works is because Ladders reset the wealth system. Ladders in D3 will help, but Gold will be practically useless. Not really sure how I feel about the GAH being taken away, because now, I cannot log in and play for 60 minutes and spend 10 minutes in the AH, I will have to post on forums, and log in when people are available etc etc to make trades. I would rather have the GAH and have it reset with Ladders.

[Triggered Fridgekin]

I hope this means they will dump their abysmal MMO-inspired chat interface system and are more in favor towards bringing back an updated lobby system used in Diablo 2.

That'd be the icing on the cake.

[Shrouded]

Wow. I didn't see that coming.

[F4ulty]

Suddenly, I may be interested in Reaper of Souls.

I mean, they're redoing the loot system? That's awesome!

[Simca]

I knew they were considering it, but it seemed like they were leaning towards keeping it.

Very interesting choice.

[drake741]

That darn Blizzard! Never listening to the players!

Oh wait...

[Goron24]

"safe and convenient way to trade items" but with real money, how delusional are these guys? It was a disaster from day 1. It didn't succeed.. At all

[Hightotemz]

Wow I might actually come back, this is great news indeed.