Welcome To A New, Global Battle.Net!
Blizzard announced it has turned it's Battle.Net infrastructure global, meaning you can now see and chat with your friends in 1 Friend's list and no longer have to switch regions! And by the sound of it, this is just the beginning of what they have planned.
Quote from BlizzardWe’re breaking down barriers.
We’ve always envisioned Battle.net as a place for players to connect, collaborate, and play their favorite games. Now, we’re realizing that dream on a truly global level.
“When Battle.net first came out, the purpose was to deliver a connected, multiplayer experience for a single title,” says Arron Goolsbey, VP of Platform Engineering for Battle.net. “Fast-forward 10 to 15 years, and Battle.net had evolved into a service that spanned all Blizzard games but was still constructed with the primary notion that players would mostly play with others within their region. The internet has come a long way in the last 10 years, enabling global and cross-platform experiences with high levels of quality. So now, Battle.net is evolving once again.”
Starting today, friends lists from different territories will be merged into one*, so you’ll no longer need to switch regions in Battle.net to talk to your buddies on the other side of the planet. “As Global Battle.net rolls out, players around the world will be able to come together all across the larger Blizzard ecosystem without any hurdles for the first time ever,” says Diana Hubbard, Platform Design Manager. In doing so, they will be able to effortlessly expand their friendships, groups, and communities—paving the way for forging new bonds over our present and future epic gaming experiences. This is just the first step, and it will only get better from here.” To accent this new era of global gaming and social connectivity on Battle.net, we’ve also updated our logo.
“We realized some time ago that our players would be better served by a global Battle.net that did away with the concept of regions,” says Jeff Allison, Lead Product Manager for Battle.net. “But breaking down these barriers was a significant engineering task. Now that we’ve done it, we look forward to a future where all Battle.net players can communicate and game together no matter where they are.”
Battle.net’s global updates also include cross-platform functionality. This has given our game developers the ability to let you play with others between PC and console seamlessly. Overwatch players will be the first to experience these new cross-play capabilities; for more information, check out this blog.
“You will be able to make friends anywhere as games published on Battle.net begin to utilize this evolved experience,” says Goolsbey. “We look forward to a future where billions of players worldwide can make friends and play together, regardless of where they are and what device they play on.”
These backend updates to Battle.net will also enable developers to build even more globally connected experiences for our players in the future, so stay tuned!
*Excluding China.
I Liked The Old Battle.net
Small indie company KEKW
Its*
That had me laughing so much.
"Blizzard announced it has turned it's Battle.Net infrastructure global, meaning you can now see and chat with your friends in 1 Friend's list and no longer have to switch regions! And by the sound of it, this is just the beginning of what they have planned."
Both apostrophes can be removed. I'm sorry, but it makes my eyes bleed...
Why don't they "Break down barriers" by removing the 200 cap on friends limit...
A very simple fix is for every region to get the same updates at the same time.
Would be nice if progress from all regions can be combined into one so that we can region hop whenever and play on whichever region we like without having to grind in multiple regions, because let's be real, who has the time and energy to grind more than one region?
I am not sure that it is practically possible at all. The laws of physics cannot be skipped. Packet delays between, for example, EU and NA will be large and while it is OK for chat conversations, not too much for online gaming. Fortunately, for HS packet latencies of less than 200 ms are acceptable (unlike FPS games).
It is possible because you can do it already on Overwatch (An FPS Game). Also on other games it's not a big thing at all to have ONE (ingame-)Account with that you can choose the Servers you want to play on.
Jesus what a circlejerk, starting off with “We’re breaking down barriers” as if this some some heroic act that they blessed us with and not something nearly every gaming service has been doing for years. Lol’d at “excluding China” though.
As much as they bow to China, not so much their choice here. The CCP doesn't want their own people to have communication outside of China so that they don't know they are oppressed.
The can break barriers, but they can’t break the Great Wall
Wish they would actually merge the regions for the games too instead of just Battle.net, having to buy a different subscription and the latest expansions again on different servers just to play with different friends is awful.
By using the term "Global Battle.Net!" I would expect that Blizzard finally merges all the Hearthstone/WoW/Diablo Accounts together so that we have one Account for all regions and could then choose on which region Server we want to play, kinda what they do with Overwatch for years:(
One day, maybe one day..
But its's fine from Blizzard that they are at least trying to walk into that direction. I like the latest changes in general. Also that they finally overcame their FOMO practises with those Hearthstone cardbacks and skins. Really did not expect that from Activision. Keep on going!
No segregation by region. I like that
There is still segregation by regions. You can only see your friends from other regions on your battle.net and chat with them without needing to go ingame, but you can't play with them unless you start a new ingame-Account on your friends region..