The rest of this sentence seems redundant. :) If you buy some time on WoW or something like that and it's not for you then, yeah, sure you feel a bit conned, but you walk away. Just like any other game you buy and wind up not liking.

I'd understand 50cents per month to be able to use multiplayer in a video game, maybe $1 or $2 for games with high costs for maintaining the servers, but paying $20 every month for the same game which you already had to pay for (multiple times thanks to all the expansions) in the first place is insane.
I've seen people getting addicted to WoW by "having to justify the money put into it" and staying addicted because of the guild they had to join in order to raid the big daddies.
Damn, if you're main incentive to play it is, because you paid for it and then because you're social network is in it, then something is going very wrong.

I like to stay free and independend at least in my spare time, that's probably why I don't play online multiplayer at all.

I did a quick search: currently WoW is $15 a month, if you pay month-to-month, and $12 a month if you pay 6 months in advance. That's still quite a bit, but it all boils down to whether or not you're getting your fun's worth out of it. I played for about 5 months a couple of years ago, and I feel that I totally got my fun's worth out of it. I stopped playing because it became less and less fun and my work started to take up more of my time (my shitty internet played a role as well).

Overall I do prefer the subscription model for an MMO, only because I don't want to be bugged by 'subtle' hints for microtransactions. A friend of mine played another popular MMO, free-to-play, (I think it was neverwinter) and the 'gentle' encouragements to buy something minor started to get on his nerves. Something like : "Ok, you can walk allll the way back to town, or you can spend $0.99 and get a town scroll and teleport back instantly" Well not quite, but things like that. That would drive me absolutely nuts, and totally ruin the sense of immersion for me, which is the only reason I would play an mmo in the first place. That's why I wanted to play wow in fact, I wanted to experience the Warcraft universe first hand.

As I've said, I'm all for the suscription model (for a reasonable price) in online multiplayer, since it a) makes sure that the servers are running as long as people are playing it and b) should save you from the microtransaction crap you mentioned.
$15 or $12 are still way too much for a game that you already had to pay for in order to be able to install it at all, how much does WoW cost with all expansions included at the moment? It was quite a lot some years ago but I'm really out of touch.

The lack of local multiplayer (that wouldn't need any online servers at all and still works when those are down) is an entirely different problem though and really bugs me in some modern games.

Oh yeah, Starcraft 2 is one of the worst offenders there, especially in light of it's legacy. It was always a favorite at LAN parties. Not that I was ever any good at it though :P

Diablo 3 takes the cake though. Their treatment of the PC version I would say gave me my first real reason to be sorely disappointed in blizzard. I thank my lucky stars that I don't have any real interest in playing the game in any case, though I did love me some barbarian rampages in Diablo 2!

Btw, has battlenet implemented any privacy settings yet, like in steam where you can set it so that it makes you appear to be offline to all of your contacts?

Not being able to play Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3 offline in singleplayer or solely via LAN kind of defeats their purpose. Starcraft: Broodwar and Diablo 2 - LoD always were the LAN-party games (besides Quake 3 Arena and the original Counterstrike).

Oh I miss real LAN parties with buddies, pizza and beer.
Never managed to take part in many of those but I'd love to do that again, especcially since modern capable PCs are not as huge anymore.

Oh yes, my 17'' CRT was abnormally large and heavy, and a poor friend of mine temporarily owned an even bigger 19'' CRT...

Also, I'm concerned that you didn't mention the original Half-life! Crossfire map deathmatch ftw!! Though mentioning counterstrike almost makes up for it ;)

So true, don't forget the combat is usually garbage. Seriously how can they call these games RPG's, when they have no story or it's a complete shit one?

Sooo true :( In the era of laptop you'd expect to make it more often and instead it is not the case.

You're repeating yourself.

You're continuing on insisting on blaming the victim for the aggressor, like blaming the sheep for being so tasty to the lion. It's not the sheep's fault it's tasty. It's not the sheep's fault that the lion is hungry. It's not the sheep's fault that the lion can over power it.

You're also conveniently ignoring time. Pay close attention to what I said and you'll see that I carefully implied that the product is first created, then sold. The intent to scam happens before there is anything to sell. Just like the intent to not scam happens before there is anything to sell. So, once again, the customer is not responsible for the company. Saying otherwise is Fascist blame the victim non-sense.

I am not ignoring you, I read your post. But it does not make it less nonsense. Sure, the product is created then sold. But the buyers have choice. This is the big difference between the sheep and the lion. The customers buy because they accept otherwise they simply would not.
I can understand an honest mistake few times, but here we are speaking of million of people who accept and pay willingly, by they own choice.

Anyway, I don't really think it is a "fault" it simply means that many people see the world in a different way than me, and probably you too. And the market follow them instead of my (and your) minority.

Do you realize that you're posting on GOG.com, which I suspect is not exactly a blockbuster AAA company (in financial terms)? You are ignoring the fact that I'm referring to companies intentions and precisely their choice to produce scam products instead of non-scam products. You insist on implying that companies are forced by markets, while only consumers have choice. It's a false insistence. Companies can also choose not to create scam products and when they do choose to scam people then the fault is entirely theirs, not the customers.

It seems you did not even read what I wrote.
But once again, if you sell "scam products" that is lawful and people buy it, then the problem is or in the laws or in the people. In the context I think it is in both.