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Blizzard Korea under fire for poor online service in Diablo III - Report

Game cafe operators teaming up with local PC association to take Korean branch of Blizzard to court; local government bodies also involved.

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It looks like Blizzard won't be getting a break from the criticisms and complaints lined up against its latest action RPG, Diablo III--at least not in Korea.

Everybody's slinging mud at Blizzard these days, even government bodies.
Everybody's slinging mud at Blizzard these days, even government bodies.

According to Kim Chan-kuen, the head of Korea's Internet PC Culture Association (via Asiaone.com), the group is planning a class action lawsuit against Blizzard Korea because of server malfunctions associated with Diablo III. Due to repeated error messages, not-so-smooth online connections, and other miscellaneous problems, a number of game cafe operators and regulators in Korea have been sending their complaints straight to the company and will take the Korean branch to court.

The country's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism will also reportedly be taking administrative guidance action against Blizzard Korea, with the first order being to increase the number of servers for the game in South Korea.

The Fair Trade Commission of Korea said that after investigating Blizzard Korea and its refund policy, it will create aid measures for users starting next month.

The problem isn't restricted to Korea; French regulators have received thousands of consumer complaints, according to a report from the French consumer standards organization called the UFC Que Choisir (via Cinema Blend). In Germany, the Federation of German Consumer Organizations is looking into a possible antitrust violation lawsuit against the company due to the server system.

For more information on the actual game, check out GameSpot's review and recent features.

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