There are three regions of Diablo 3 servers: Americas (which also covers New Zealand and Australia), Europe, and Asia. But that doesn’t matter. Unlike other game systems, players will not be locked to play only within their specific country’s server region. There are literally no borders in the upcoming highly anticipated fantasy-themed dungeon stomper game-you can jump from region to region. Regardless of your country, you are free to play with your buddies on whatever server they are on. Welcome to developer Blizzard’s “Global Play.” While the label does seem very liberating and connotes a wide open game space, there are still some restrictions in place. The restrictions can prove to be quite a hassle as you can see below. For one, the game will not be region free completely. Each region that you wish to play in will require that you create a new character. Another restriction might prove to be a deal killer-if you wish to play outside your region, you will have to recreate your character, friend list, and, most importantly, your items.
After the last restriction, it already seems Global Play may not be what it is hyped to be, right? Wait, it gets worse. As you have probably heard the Diablo 3 auction house will feature both normal in-game gold and actual real world cold hard cash. In fact, this is the one factor that gets many would be Diablo 3 players excited. Imagine the possibilities of making real money just by playing this game. Well, slow down with the money-making visions, Warren Buffet. Diablo 3 restricts real-world money auctions quite a bit. You can only access the real money auction house with characters from your home region.
It is quite apparent that Global Play looks more like a marketing slogan since Blizzard’s definition of “global,” given the restrictions above, looks too much like “local.” Still, you get to team up with Diablo players from different corners of the world. Yay!