Blizzard gets low marks from the BBB.

[Shockeye]

Better Business Bureau report on Blizzard.

BLIZ LOCKS, REMOVES PREVIOUS MATINENCE THREAD | 7/27/2005 10:04:50 AM PDT   

After someone posted

http://www.labbb.org/BBBWeb/Forms/Business/CompanyReportPage_Expository.aspx?CompanyID=13050668&hAKAID=1&hAddrID=1

which is the Better Business Bureau's report on Vivendi/Blizzard and it's D rating the thread gets not only locked but REMOVED.

Why? Probably because they don't want you to know that it has had complaints like this. They don't want you to file a complaint.

Well, I for one did.

I bet this gets gets removed ...

However, don't ignore this.

Every month we pay apx 15 dollars for a 30 day subscription. Each month the realms go down for a total of 24 hours NOT INCLUDING the other downtimes we get from restarts, worlds being down, ect. This means only $0.50 per person each month.

THE POINT is that (suposedly) 3.5 million people subscribe to WoW. Now, I'm not a genius but doesn't that equal to $1,750,000 PER MONTH that Blizzard rips us off for?

If you want to flame me for it go ahead, I really don't care. But at least take the time to read

http://www.labbb.org/BBBWeb/Forms/Business/CompanyReportPage_Expository.aspx?CompanyID=13050668&hAKAID=1&hAddrID=1

and, decide for yourself.

The previous thread that was up to 30 pages disappeared after this post appeared.

[El Gallo]

Ah, the old "GIMME 100% UPTIME OR I SUE U FOR STEAL MY MONIES EA SOE TURBINE MYTHIC BLIZZERD !!11!" argument.  It was so popular with Vault types that it's not surprising to see it get much play on the WoW official boards.

also:

Now, I'm not a genius

truer words have never been spoken.

[Dren]

SOE - D rating
http://www.labbb.org/BBBWeb/Forms/Business/CompanyReportPage_Expository.aspx?CompanyID=13139485

Square - F rating
http://www.labbb.org/BBBWeb/Forms/Business/CompanyReportPage_Expository.aspx?CompanyID=13168063

Could do more but I think you get the idea of where this is going.

[Mesozoic]

Best complaint on the BB site.

This is by far the worst business ever to do business with, first of all I've been banned twice from this game, once for calling a person a moron for abusing me swearing etc etc every word under the son, they turn around and ban me a paying customer for 72 hours.....  if you want to discuss anything why you've been banned over the phone forget it its email only and they just send you auto reply's to get rid of you...

Its like someone skimmed the frothing anger off the top of the WoW boards and put it here for posterity.

[Daydreamer]

SOE - D rating
http://www.labbb.org/BBBWeb/Forms/Business/CompanyReportPage_Expository.aspx?CompanyID=13139485

Square - F rating
http://www.labbb.org/BBBWeb/Forms/Business/CompanyReportPage_Expository.aspx?CompanyID=13168063

Could do more but I think you get the idea of where this is going.

Can anyone find a video game company that doesn't get low marks?  Either there are no good guys in our industry, or the BBB has become in this case just another outlet for gamer angst?

[Dren]

Well that was my point.  All of them look bad on BBB.  The trouble is, nobody goes to the BBB to say how great a company is.  Essentially, it isn't a good benchmark to use in this case.

[HaemishM]

Actually, the BBB rates businesses not on how many complaints they receive, but how they handle those complaints. All businesses get complaints against them, some warranted, some not. You can't please all the customers all the time. But how you handle those complaints, whether you comply legally or not, that's what the BBB is about measuring.

[Dren]

In that case, WoW doesn't have the right rating.  If the expectation is that you get paid back for down time, then they have fulfilled more often than not.  And again, in this current case, they succeeded again.

As I've said before, other MMOG's have been much worse at this. 

[Mesozoic]

I imagine its difficult to have great responses when all the complaints revolve around unavoidable downtime.  Lets face it, cash money is a much better motivator than a BBB rating.  And if the cash motivation is not helping Blizzard surmount these issues, written tantrums won't either.

So the tantrums produce a D rating, which of course goes back to the WoW boards and produces tantrums.  The mother eats its child, so to speak.

[MrHat]

Actually, if you read the agreement you sign before they take your money it says that they are allowed to fuck with the server as much as they want.

[Margalis]

That agreement would never hold up in court. They could just take the servers down for a month and charge you for absolutely nothing.

There are a lot of EULA type things that will never stand up in court. Most EULAs basically say "this software doesn't have to do anything at all." I don't think any of that would fly. It's marketed to do something, you are told it does something, you PAY for something.

The idea that you could have any amount of downtime in an online only game and still be paid a monthly fee is ludicrous. What is that money buying exactly?

EULAs are nice for things like "we own this virtual property" and "cheaters can be banned without refund" or "if this software makes your computer crash don't blame us" sorts of clauses. I find it very difficult to believe that the "you are essentially paying for nothing, but we might grace you with some gameplay if we feel like it" has legs.

[Calantus]

Meh, that argument is so old and stupid. Everyone knows we get 6 hours of regular downtime every week, therefore you KNOW that you are paying for ~24 hours less than the full 30 days. Idiots.

[pants]

A quick bit of playing with a calculator sees that 6 hours downtime a week = 96.4% uptime.  Thats 24 hours a month, so if you add in a another whole day of downtime, ie 48 hours total in a month, thats still 93.5% uptime.  Thats pretty good - you go to someone like IBM and ask how much it costs for 96+% uptime, its gonna be a hell of a lot more than US$15 per month.

Their customer service sucks monkey cocks, but the only way its gonna get better is to have us fork out more cash for a 'premium' service or something like that, a la EQ Legends server (think that was its name).  That idea didn't seem to take off like hotcakes (they still only have 1 server), so I assume we are happy to get shit service but not pay very much for the privilege.

[Trippy]

There were similar threads to the above one when the game was first released and the servers kept dying under the strain, and apparently their rating has even gone up since that time (from an F to a D).

[Righ]

What Haemish says is true. Everybody gets complaints. It's how you handle complaints that counts. If you are a service driven company - and you ought to be if you run an online service - then you should embrace complaints as valuable feedback that allows you to better your company.

In this regard, Blizzard sucks, as does just about every online games company. To think otherwise is akin to Stockholm Syndrome.

[schild]

While the original thread poster is a mo-ron (surprise b.net keke ^_^ zerg dipshits), Blizzard - with all the money and power they have continue to paddle up shit creek. You'd think after 4 huge titles (WCII, Starcraft, WCIII, Diablo II [not counting Diablo I simply because it's essentially abandonware]) which suffered from delays, game breaking bugs, horrible balance, massive issues with online play, and a community of the whiniest users on the face of this earth - they might have learned something.

Nope. Nothing. Servers still constantly go down, people are always finding new terrible bugs, dupes still exist (both this and the terrible bug comment can be attributed to the sheer number of people playing the game. An economy can be ruined by a dupe or griefer style bug and an economy this big simply can't recover on it's own). Anyway, they suck. And since the spotlight is on them with their Hojillion users - they get the flak. In a time not too long away from now I can only hope it's a crime to do your job this badly. Anywho, all they've done is prove that people will pay for anything.

[Abel]

delays, game breaking bugs, horrible balance, massive issues with online play, and a community of the whiniest users on the face of this earth

I own both WCIII and WoW and frankly I haven't run into ANY of the issues you sum up here, though my WCIII CD doesn't seem to work anymore   . As far as I'm concerned all of Blizzards games are technically pretty stable (though they seem to have some issues with server stability), well-balanced, devoid of any game-breaking bugs and are getting updated at a steady pace. And their community is about as bad as any other big internet community.

Regarding the wider issue of MMO online support: except for patching troubles in AC I have always recieved good service, also on the rare occasions I got into problems. And I've been subscribed to all of the big MMO companies, bar SOE.

Where do all of these problems keep coming from then ? Or is it just cooler to kick up a scandal for every minor issue people fall over ?

[Merusk]

It's just Schild. He hates the game and comes in here to taunt those who enjoy it.

[Yegolev]

... thats still 93.5% uptime.  Thats pretty good - you go to someone like IBM and ask how much it costs for 96+% uptime, its gonna be a hell of a lot more than US$15 per month.

I'll agree and say that more than 90% availability for this tiny amount of cash is great.  People who want a computer center to have 99.98% uptime but don't want to pay for it... are obviously corporate excutives.  But if you want a rock-solid installation, you have to pay for it.  I'm talking about hardware, software, support contracts, and the ever-unpopular headcount.  Even then you will get outages.  We have the largest data center in the southeast US and we fight to get over 98% uptime.  These bitches should be complaining about the damn loot bug.

[schild]

It's just Schild. He hates the game and comes in here to taunt those who enjoy it.

Neg, I just hate treadmill MMOGs. And that's exactly what this is. But WoW is special. WoW has 3.5 million subscriptions and still manages to fuck up Artifact Entertainment style. That takes class.

[Mesozoic]

It's just Schild. He hates the game and comes in here to taunt those who enjoy it.

Neg, I just hate treadmill MMOGs. And that's exactly what this is. But WoW is special. WoW has 3.5 million subscriptions and still manages to fuck up Artifact Entertainment style. That takes class.

You rebut an accusation of being unfair to Blizzard by equating WoW with Horizons? 

[HaemishM]

To be fair to schild, I have run into more bugs in WoW than I did my time in Horizons. I've also had more fun, though.

As a service provider, Blizzard sucks monkey cock. As a game designer, they do a decent game. I'm still playing WoW despite the bugs I find. But among MMOG providers, they fall near the bottom in my estimation, along with SOE, Funcom and Artifact. Tops would be NCSoft (despite Lineage 2) and Mythic.

[schild]

It's just Schild. He hates the game and comes in here to taunt those who enjoy it.

Neg, I just hate treadmill MMOGs. And that's exactly what this is. But WoW is special. WoW has 3.5 million subscriptions and still manages to fuck up Artifact Entertainment style. That takes class.

You rebut an accusation of being unfair to Blizzard by equating WoW with Horizons? 

I've spent more money on Blizzard games than any other company short of MAYBE Black Isle. That is of course if we're talking about developers and not publishers. Four copies of Diablo II, 2 Copies + the battlechest of Warcraft 3, one copy of Diablo I, 2 copies of Warcraft II, and 2 copies of Starcraft. I've been VERY fair to Blizzard. They have screwed the pooch with the level of service in WoW. It sets a new bar for donkeyspunk for this industry.

[MrHat]

donkeyspunk

Google Images return for Donkey Spunk:

[Strazos]

I've spent more money on Blizzard games than any other company short of MAYBE Black Isle. That is of course if we're talking about developers and not publishers. Four copies of Diablo II, 2 Copies + the battlechest of Warcraft 3, one copy of Diablo I, 2 copies of Warcraft II, and 2 copies of Starcraft. I've been VERY fair to Blizzard. They have screwed the pooch with the level of service in WoW. It sets a new bar for donkeyspunk for this industry.

What in the name of fuck would possess you to buy multiple copies of the same fucking game?

[MrHat]

I've spent more money on Blizzard games than any other company short of MAYBE Black Isle. That is of course if we're talking about developers and not publishers. Four copies of Diablo II, 2 Copies + the battlechest of Warcraft 3, one copy of Diablo I, 2 copies of Warcraft II, and 2 copies of Starcraft. I've been VERY fair to Blizzard. They have screwed the pooch with the level of service in WoW. It sets a new bar for donkeyspunk for this industry.

What in the name of fuck would possess you to buy multiple copies of the same fucking game?

Formatted computer.  Lost CD.  Want to play.  Buy game.  Find old CD.  Cry.  But for joy.

[schild]

Blizzard games tend to disappear because you play the shit out of them and the moment you put it NOT in the same place as the same 4 years before....it's gone. Just fucking gone. An underwear gnome makes exception for Blizzard CDs. That's just how it is. Fucking gnomes.

[Strazos]

This is why you are never supposed to clean a gamer's computer desk.

[Calantus]

donkeyspunk

Google Images return for Donkey Spunk:

You ran a google image search for donkey spunk? o_O



And yeah... I'm up to 2 copies of Diablo 2, 3 for its expansion, 2 for diablo 1, 2 for SC and its expansion. It's a conspiracy, surely.

[Ironwood]

Multiple Wifey copies of those games...