Rumors spread on Friday of Blizzard Entertainment's plans to make their authenticators mandatory, in an apparent attempt to stem the plague of compromised accounts that have Blizzard's customer service backlogged for days. As of yet there has been no confirmation of the legitimacy of these rumors, but if true, it may prove to be a larger hurdle than most people think.
A change to the way people access the game would have to come with a change to the game as a whole. A World of Warcraft expansion like Cataclysm would be the best possible time for Blizzard to roll out the change, because the authenticator could easily come boxed with the game. Even though it's a given that most active WoW players will be all over Cataclysm, there will be players who don't buy it on day one, and who may be perfectly happy with sticking with the older expansions. If an authenticator is mandatory, they will be locked out.
Compounding this is the issue that many of WoW's eastern players log on at internet cafes, where owning a copy of the game isn't compulsory (though upgrading your account is). They will be required to buy the authenticator separately in a district where shipping isn't free.
To top it off, the thousands of players who already own authenticators will be feeling short-changed.
The only other alternative would be for Blizzard to simply lock players out and make getting an authenticator their own concern, which would naturally cause a massive backlash among the community.
A more likely scenario is that Cataclysm will indeed contain an authenticator, but its use will not be mandatory. It would be in Blizzard's best interest to make the authenticators as widespread as possible without locking their fans out of their product.
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A change to the way people access the game would have to come with a change to the game as a whole. A World of Warcraft expansion like Cataclysm would be the best possible time for Blizzard to roll out the change, because the authenticator could easily come boxed with the game. Even though it's a given that most active WoW players will be all over Cataclysm, there will be players who don't buy it on day one, and who may be perfectly happy with sticking with the older expansions. If an authenticator is mandatory, they will be locked out.
Compounding this is the issue that many of WoW's eastern players log on at internet cafes, where owning a copy of the game isn't compulsory (though upgrading your account is). They will be required to buy the authenticator separately in a district where shipping isn't free.
To top it off, the thousands of players who already own authenticators will be feeling short-changed.
The only other alternative would be for Blizzard to simply lock players out and make getting an authenticator their own concern, which would naturally cause a massive backlash among the community.
A more likely scenario is that Cataclysm will indeed contain an authenticator, but its use will not be mandatory. It would be in Blizzard's best interest to make the authenticators as widespread as possible without locking their fans out of their product.
source
