michaelleung: Not sure if anyone else knows, but if you sign up for a Battle.net account at...
Battle.net you can enter your CD key to your Blizzard game, which includes Starcraft/Brood War, Warcraft 3/Frozen Throne, and Diablo 2. What do you guys think?
I registered my copy of Starcraft as a test and didn't have any problems with it. I did all the various DRM check tests I knew of:
* Scanned for files before and after the install, just the game files themselves were installed.
* Monitored the network connection before, during and after the install and it didn't phone home.
It was easy and painless. I was even happy to find that their EULA included provisions for game resale. Granted that it mentions that a fee may be assessed to do so, but the option is presented.
I immediately went and registered all of my other games.
The only downside I've found thus far is that the Starcraft download is for 1.15.2, and the latest 1.16.1 patch won't install on top of it. You can patch up to 1.60.0, but not the latest.
Battle.net won't work to patch to the latest either. If you still have the cd you can get up to the latest from there, but not via the digital download copy.
So far Blizzard is putting their head in the sand over the issue on this one. NOT the warm fuzzy feeling I want to have when considering going digitally for all future purchases through them. To be honest I'm not too worried about this as it will eventually get ironed out.
Oh, if I didn't make it clear already:
You can burn your downloads to disc and install from there. No phone home activations. :) VERY cool and worthy of consideration if you're into Blizzard titles.
Diablo 2 + exp is already patched to the latest (1.12a) and Warcraft 3 is patched at 1.21b.
I haven't tried to install the latter and patch up the latest, but I'll likely do that over the weekend and could post my results back here if anyone is interested.
Weclock: I have already done this, my only wish is for them to activate WCII :D
Me too! I have the old DOS versions and asked if they were going to be selling the Battle.net version anytime soon. I got one of the generic, "Sorry, we don't have that available at this time" replies.
Pretty much like the one I got when I reported the SC patching error.