Gamers found to be cheating or using hacks, bots, or modifications in any form in Blizzard Entertainment's new dungeon crawler Diablo III face a potential permanent ban, the developer said in an update to its website. Those banned will be permanently unable to log in to their Battle.net account, and thus prohibited from playing Diablo III. Diablo III cheaters, beware. Blizzard is threatening permanent bans.

　　Blizzard explained that it "has always taken cheating in any form in Blizzard games very seriously, and that's no different for Diablo III." The developer went on to say that hacking and cheating "goes against the spirit of fair play." According to Blizzard, suspensions and bans will begin in the "near future."

　　Diablo III launched on May 15 to a warm critical reception and a smashing sales success of 3.5 million units in its first 24 hours and 6.3 million copies during the game's first week. The game was released without player-versus-player support and its real-money auction house, the latter of which has been targeted to launch today.

　　For more on Diablo III, check out GameSpot's review.