As many are aware b.net 2.0 will not have chat channels Private or Public at release. It took blizzard almost 1 year to impliment a bare bones private chat system for SC2.
Blizzard has been leading the community on to expect chat channels for release ( a feature that shouldnt even require a community to express the need for regardless)
Observe the follow Q&A with Jay Wilson Answering a question on chat channels
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_pQkdn0eVw
Fast forward to 05:00 min in for the question/answer.
Fan site summit and misleading info, observe the following pic from the fansite summet for d3
http://www.gamingsur...-battle-net.jpg
Notice something? Yah, chat lobby. What do we have now? wow style chat that allows you to communicate only with 3 others in game. No private OR public chat.
Community will suffer in the long run
This needs to be the focus of debate for the community imo. What is the point of obtaining awesome gear or earning incredable achieves if no one can see your accomplishments without effort. Are we going to be limited to a "search" functionality to see someones hard earned gear? NO, right now we are limited to seeing the accomplishments of others on your friends lists or people you join a game with. Not very epic.
I have never felt so alone in an online game like I do in D3, thats not the entire truth, SC2 gave me the same feeling before fan outcry brought in chat channels. Right now there is no community in the beta , users join a game, barely say anything and rush to the next boss. I feel like I have been turned into a farmer for blizzards RMAH since blizzard sees communication as evil and is forcing me to do the following,
Log in ---> Join game ---> item find ---> leave game ---> post item ---> rinse repeat.
I dont see any communication or any point to the whole magic find grind without a community. Why use that epic Windforce bow you found if no one is even going to know you have it? Diablo 2 chat interface was superior for showing off epic characters.
Censorship is wrong, let the community decide how they want to play the game
All I ever hear from blizzard is Chat channels encourage bots and spammers, well the game is rated mature. People can decide if they want to be isolated from ad's, or you can maybe, I dont know... moderate?
No one is forcing people to join public channels and no one is forcing you to use a private channel, but people are social by nature and without a way to communicate to mass groups of people, this game will become nothing like the game it should/could have been, and the community will not grow without the use of OUTSIDE websites. This going against Blizzard's so called "positive gaming experience."
You can be happy with Battle.net 2.0 the way it is, or you can voice your opinions/concerns BEFORE the game is shipped. Do you want an online single player game or an online MULTIPLAYER game?
The ball is in your court, express your concerns and make them known.
/wave