Games regulator approves Diablo 3 but bans cash trade

By Kwaak Je-yup

The nation’s Games Rating Board (GRB) announced Friday that it has approved the long-awaited role playing game Diablo 3 for sale in Korea.

It effectively ends the tumultuous saga for U.S. game developer and publisher Blizzard Entertainment, which spent months trying to pass a feature that the authorities considered gambling.

Blizzard ended up submitting the third installment of one of the world's most popular game series without this particular element, a GRB spokesman said.

"The feature involving for-cash trades between users was not included in the presentation to the rating committee, and therefore it was not subjected to any scrutiny," he said.

But the GRB issued a warning in a Friday press release, stating that if the video game company were to include the feature again in a later software update, it would face a whole new round of rating evaluations.

"If 'item trade for cash' is added to the current version in service changes, it would...open up re-rating examinations," it said, implying that Blizzard will never be able to add this feature for Korean gamers. An amendment is out of the question.
Blizzard has argued that gamers were already trading items on unofficial websites for the previously released Diablo 2. The open, official alternative was a safer option, the management said.

Because the game's release date has continued to be pushed back, enthusiasts worldwide have produced one conspiracy theory after another about the reason, lately accusing the GRB of intentional delays.

In a puzzling coda, however, Blizzard Korea has not yet received any official notification from the board, according to a company spokeswoman.

"We saw the news on the GRB website, but nothing has come to us from the board itself," she said in a phone interview Friday.
The official process is for the GRB to notify the concerned party first, before a press release.

Having dragged on for a longer-than-expected 40-something days since the first submission, this ratings fiasco leaves a trail of bad blood between the board and Blizzard.