Blizzard didn't expect the negative fans' reaction towards the persistent online connection requirement for playing Diablo III. Even more, the company still doesn't what the big deal is.
Blizzard VP of online technologies Robert Bridenbecker stated that he is "actually kind of surprised" for the negative reaction towards a decision that was made to maintain "the sanctity of the actual game systems."
"You're guaranteeing that there are no hacks, no dupes," he explained.
Another advantage of the system is that it protects single-player characters from being overpowered by its online counterparts if and when the player decides to go online. "What are we going to have to do about those players that are in the offline environment coming into the online environment?" Bridenbecker asked. "We said we don't want to look at that... let's just keep everything clean."
"When you look at everything you get by having that persistent connection on the servers, you cannot ignore the power and the draw of that."