Big gaming companies learned quite a few years ago via various microtransaction practices that the market has expanded so rapidly that the gamers that complain about these things are a minority that can basically be ignored now since the vast majority of players basically only started playing after insidious monetization practices have been normalized so it doesn't feel wrong to them. Why cater to old users who would only spend 60$ on a game and complain when you can just cater to all the new users who love to spend money on microtransactions by making the geek equivalent to Madden or Fifa and print money?

We will see how Diablo 4 will perform but I seriously doubt this mobile game saga will affect even 0.1% of sales. People were genuinely excited by the trailer Blizzard put out back in June.

>permanently tainting the Diablo brand it may not be that great a trade.

I'm sure that blizzard will learn their lesson. First the real money auction house,Warcraft 3 reforged and now this.

CEO just want this year bonus, maybe one more and blizzard fans can explode themselves.

no one cares what will happen in the next 5 years to the company. bad incentives

I both agree with you and also think that Path of Exile ate their cake years ago and that hardcore playerbase no longer orbits around Diablo.