THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Fun Stuff => CLIKC => Topic started by: KvP on 11 Oct 2008, 01:18
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Read it, bitches! (http://pc.ign.com/articles/918/918895p1.html)
Blizzard drops bombshell and says real-time strategy sequel is now three separate games.
ANAHEIM--Blizzard dropped a bombshell at the 2008 Blizzcon today by announcing that StarCraft II, the highly-awaited sequel to the smash hit 1998 real-time strategy game, StarCraft II, has been split into three. The company said that StarCraft II now consists of three different stand-alone titles--one for each faction campaign. The first of the StarCraft II trilogy will be StarCraft II Terrans: Wings of Liberty. The second will be StarCraft II Zerg: Heart of the Swarm, with the third and final installment of the main trilogy being StarCraft II Protoss: Legacy of the Void.
Blizzard says it made the change to make each story that much more epic and to flesh out the StarCraft universe. By splitting the game, the company says that players will access more story content, more characters, and more customization. Rob Pardo, executive vice president of game design, said that each game will be approximate in size to the original StarCraft. Each game will be a stand-alone installment – not an expansion. No release window was announced, but the only thing we can be sure of is that these games will ship, as Blizzard likes to say, when they're ready.
Well, I'll probably only be getting the Zerg one, then. Eff this noize.
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Blizzard says it made the change to make each story that much more epic and to fleHUGLBLAGSH lots of money
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I guess Blizzard got so used to making obscene amounts of money off WoW they decided to get Starcraft fans to bend over too. The only thing that saddens me more than them charging 150 fucking dollars for this game is how many people will pay that amount.
Not to be melodramatic about it, but I'm pretty much washing my hands of Blizzard entirely at this point. 95% of my gaming is done on consoles at this point, and my interest in Starcraft 2 was peripheral at best since I'm not a huge RTS fan, but this has just torpedoed any enthusiasm I had left at all about both this game and Blizzard's business practices in general.
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In this case, given the general slack-jawed nature of battle.net I'm going to get the games... second hand, for the single player campaigns, which I don't expect to be any good. The last good product Blizzard produced was the original Starcraft, and from the looks of it the sequel is going to be chock full of the same ruinous wank that Warcraft 3 introduced. Micromanagement of single unit abilities in real time just isn't all that enjoyable.
No studio's worth that sort of blatant through-the-nose fleecing. Not anybody, certainly not Blizzard.
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I wonder how the Koreans are going to react.
Why yes, three games is a WONDERFUL idea, didn't you guys love how LoTR is 3 movies instead of just one 12-hour one? I know I did. It's certainly much more epic this way.
In all seriousness this sounds like a giant load of wank. There is absolutely no reason why this could not be one game (obviously). I like the fact that people will be able to pick up the race they enjoy playing with most (mine would be Protoss) but I have a sickening feeling that they'll be charging full price for each installment.
I wonder what's in the future for Diablo III
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The idea for Diablo III brings up bad ideas of having a separate game for every class of hero/heroine T__T
This news has made me a little annoyed. Starcraft was the one franchise I was hoping Blizzard was never going to turn into a money-whoring series unlike Warcrack, but I guess I was a bit too naive. Hell, the original game was only around a few hundred megabytes tops. You could basically put all three on one DVD. I wish I could believe their reasons for doing this if it were true, but I just can't believe what they say anymore because of what they've done to the Warcraft franchise.
I just hope in the distant future they release a lame Battlechest of every Starcraft game, and I'll wait to get that. I'd rather spend around $100 AUD for one box instead of $200 for three.
I'm reserving my final judgement until the games are released, but the single-player campaigns are going to have to be REALLY the most fleshed out epic in RTS history to get my thumbs up, not some superficial shitty lame storyline development like Warcraft III. The original game had a great story; to ruin it would be one of the worst moments in gaming history.
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In most cases all RTS games, do this though.
Dawn of war did it and it was pretty damn awesome, now you can pick them all up (Dawn of War - The Complete Collection) for 20GBP.
It's not that bad a thing.
This is QC not QQ.
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I wonder how much of this decision was influenced by Activision, if at all...
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Dawn of War had expansions to an already finished product, I'd say that was quite different than breaking your one game into 3 separate products.
It was stupid when Disciples II did it and it's stupid now.
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Yet it was good when Sam and Max, Penny Arcade and Serious Sam did it for instance. And if you get 20-40hrs of single player content off each then suck it up. I mean its stating that single player campaigns will be race specific but do we know if multiplayer on any/all of them will feature the races of every/all of them. And WoW isnt a money whoring concept game, its an incredibly tight ever expanding game that is so far removed from what it was when it was released that I dont see how in good conscience or at least realistically be flaming Blizzard for.
I for one am optimistic, Blizzards only dick over consumer flaw that Ive seen so far has been Battle.net, its haflway all inclusive Xbox live like service, half Gamespy free range connection service. And I will withhold judgement on Starcraft II until its released. After all Blizzard didnt need Activision, and I doubt it has incredible sway in the realm of Blizzard games.
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Hell, the original game was only around a few hundred megabytes tops. You could basically put all three on one DVD.
Wait... are you attempting to argue that each SC2 game will only be a few hundred megs? They're talking about amount of content, not megabytes on disk.
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Yeah, I'm a little confused by that statement. I can see all the Warcrafts being on DVD (not WoW), and Diablo's plus Starcraft and expansions on another, but certainly not Starcraft 2. All 3 would take at least 2, just judging from the art I've seen in the screenshots.
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Guys, this will just be the single player aspect of the game that is split obviously.
Not just that, but the three parts will be treated less like separate games and more like expansion packs. The Terran campaign will come with the full game, while the Zerg and Protoss campaigns will both be released as expansion campaigns more in the line of Frozen Throne, so there will be huge campaigns. From reading about what they have in-store for the Terran campaign, what with controlling Raynor as you walk him around his ship and all, I think that this could potentially, in the end, create a more awesome game.
I know my optimism is extant, don't criticize me Brian. I just love Starcraft too much for negativity, until it comes out.
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This is definitely a case of download first buy later. If the campaigns is as awesome as the ones in Starcraft 1, this is a buy. But still, the game has to be really fucking fun for me to play all of the races. I mean, if all of them are as long as the traditional RTS. But the game play is supposed to be set up in other ways for the races, so maybe. I'm looking forward to this.
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Yeah, after reading the whole article it doesn't really seem like such a bad idea. I really liked the original starcraft campaigns and wish they'd been longer than they were. Now, with over 30 missions for each race it sounds like it could be pretty fuckin' sweet. And anyway, the multiplayer is all intact so right out of the first box you'll be able to play all 3 races online, which is an important reminder. And then the other expansion packs, which is what I'm going to call them even though you can play the campaigns stand-alone, will have extra units and stuff for multiplayer, or that's what they made it sound like. And since they aren't all going to be released at once, in fact it says a year apart at least, its not like you'd be shelling out 150 bucks all at once, if the other two even cost the same price as the first one.
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Each game won't add new units to the multiplayer. The idea was that each campaign would have feautres (such as additional units) that aren't included in the multiplayer content that comes standard with every one of them.
I said something about what this means for the development cycle on another forum so I'll quote it here:
I think an important thing to note here is that they didn't initially plan to do the game this way, but in development their ideas grew so "epic" (for lack of a better word) that they felt the only way to do the campaigns properly was to split them up. This is not dissimilar from Valve splitting "Half-Life 3" (or what was supposed to be Half-Life 3) into episodic content; the idea is to keep giving the fans something to do, without having to wait for such games' (not to mention Blizzard's) traditionally long development cycles to complete before releasing anything for the game. As one of those articles quoted them saying, it was either do this so that they could keep their promises to release "Starcraft 2" (or at least part of it) in 2009, let the game spend years in development hell, or release a significantly truncated version that wouldn't do the game (or the long wait for it) justice.
That said, we will see if the products they release actually do justify this move, not to mention whatever price point they decide to release it at. At least you can reasonably hope they won't pull a Valve and only release each campaign as a bundle with previous campaigns and other miscellaneous software.
Also note that Blizzard typically spends a lot of development time on its cutscenes, both cinematic and automated in-game stuff, so I kind of don't mind letting them spend time on adding a whole lot of those goodies into each campaign (as they claimed they were doing in one of the articles I read).
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This is definitely a case of download first buy later.
Provided you're a douchebag, of course. I'm waiting 'till more info is available to pass judgement.
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This is not dissimilar from Valve splitting "Half-Life 3" (or what was supposed to be Half-Life 3) into episodic content
Definitely was meant to be episodic from the beginning.
Also, I don't see what Blizzard is doing as any more epic than any other expansion-oriented gaming series ever. They've just managed to replace "we're making expansions, woo!" with "the game is so epic we're spreading it across three whole games!" in the announcement. Classy.
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I think this is a good thing, because I only play RTS games for the campaign modes, and hopefully this means each campaign will be truly epic.
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The same here. If they can truly make each of those campaigns as epic as they were in the original Starcraft, I become strangely deaf towards the whining of my wallet.
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Not to mention, the "wallet-raping" aspect is not much of an argument if you look at, say, what EA has done with Rock Band. You have to literally spend about $1000 to have Rock Band 2 and all the songs that have been released for 1 and 2.
I mean, buying an album for Rock Band costs more than buying the actual album. What the fuck.
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It comes with a method to actually play the songs as opposed to actually listen to them. Rockband has great value for the buck and add in DLC to extend the value. EVERYONES getting paid for every song they put out, Rockband has found a way to make it economically viable and still give the consumer the added ability to get more tracks if they want them.
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Not to mention, the "wallet-raping" aspect is not much of an argument if you look at, say, what EA has done with Rock Band. You have to literally spend about $1000 to have Rock Band 2 and all the songs that have been released for 1 and 2.
I mean, buying an album for Rock Band costs more than buying the actual album. What the fuck.
That's because plotting out the note charts for a song takes a lot more time and effort than you think. There's developer diaries out there somewhere for that shit, it's pretty in depth. Not to mention the licensing fees.
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The great majority of the cost of actually getting to play Rock Band goes to hardware, and games with extensive and pricey DLC are a different sort of animal entirely. You can easily play Rock Band without DLC, and if we factor in hardware costs, depending upon the system requirements of Starcraft there are people who could handily be spending more money on Starcraft than they would on Rock Band. I guarantee you that there will be far more people who will buy new hardware for Starcraft 2 than will have bought all the peripherals for Rock Band, and a decent video card plus all three games will definitely overtake the cost for a full Rock Band set, minus DLC.
And given the power and influence of Blizzard at present time, I doubt that including all campaigns in one package would be to the detriment of them individually. They could easily afford to work on all three at once and make good deadlines. Spend, what, 2 months profit from WoW on Starcraft 2 and voila. There's no "signature touch" that would be lost in a gargantuan effort like that.
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Yeah, it's a pretty blatant cash grab. If you guys think that these are going to be priced like expansion packs, you're also fooling yourselves. They're going to charge the full 50 for all three games, because they can get away with it.
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If it's a good enough product, I really don't give a crap. My brother loved playing through the original Starcraft campaign. He did this last week, by the way, for what seems like the billionth time over the last decade.
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Would you say it's a blatant cash grab for an author to charge full list price for each of the books in a trilogy?
It's only a blatant cash grab if Blizzard releases two subsidiary, less fully formed campaigns.
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I wouldn't have called it a cash grab had Starcraft 1 been three separate games as well. I don't buy Blizzard's reasonings. I don't buy that this format is the best way for them to make their games. No matter how they release them the full product is going to hit the market at roughly the same time (theoretically, if they worked on all the campaigns at the same time as they have done in the past, then Q&A and other concerns will require significantly less time, and that's not even getting into the teams "winding up" and "winding down" before and after every release) Given that I doubt the separation of the campaigns will change much with regard to the actual content of the games themselves, all we're really left with as far as motivation is the tripling of already guaranteed-staggering revenues. After all, nobody's arguing that what Activision/Blizzard's doing with Guitar Hero isn't a blatant milking of the property.
I'm not saying people shouldn't spend $150 on a game, I'm saying that they should take off the fuckin' rose colored glasses. This is a decision made for shareholders, not consumers.
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...So?
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Im definitely argueing that what Activision/Blizzard are NOT blatantly milking the property.
And with a track record of quality/content vs price Blizzard has always served up, I am reserving judgment and am quite optimistic that Blizzard can perform.
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If we follow Starcraft 2 and make Diablo III the same way, we can make a separate game for every character-specific race and gender! =D
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DUN DUN DUNNNNNN (http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/11/blizzards-wilson-some-battle-net-features-to-be-monetized/)
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I think it's hilarious how mad people are getting. Granted, I won't pay for battlenet unless they drastically change the very nature of the service, but hey, it's not like anyone's forcing me to buy it.
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Also, Cheshire, I think Bryan got the point a little better when he mentioned these aren't going to be priced like episodic content or expansions. These are likely going to be full priced games. It will either end up being $55 for the core and then $30 apiece for the 2nd and 3rd campaigns, or the full $50 - $55 apiece, which is absolute bullshit in every respect.
I hope that at the very least you can play all the races without the other campaigns in multi.
Also, B.Net being monetized is also a bit bullshit when they've proven over the last 10 years that they can run it without any problems free.
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I don't really think that's a valid point. I could afford to give everyone on my block a free peanut butter sandwich every day but that doesn't mean that people have the right to expect me to continue to do so forever. That said, I think charging for it in its present form won't fly very well, considering that it is essentially a peer-to-peer matching service with a dollop of advertising on top. Quite simply, they want me to pay for something I don't particularly need and can provide for myself.
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Exactly, those Peanut Butter sandwiches are delicious, this is the equivalent of giving out shit sandwiches for free adn charging extra for "special sauce".
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Also, Cheshire, I think Bryan got the point a little better when he mentioned these aren't going to be priced like episodic content or expansions. These are likely going to be full priced games. It will either end up being $55 for the core and then $30 apiece for the 2nd and 3rd campaigns, or the full $50 - $55 apiece, which is absolute bullshit in every respect.
Well assuming that they all share the same multiplayer component (since they are all stand alones). If you get 20-40hrs of single player content expect to pay the full $50-$55 apiece. It allows them to have longer more involved and fleshed out content for each specific race. I can repeat everything Blizzard said back at you but bottom line is. If you get a full games worth of content, then get used to the idea of paying a full games worth of money. Just because they wont have to write a new engine for ever game, or redo multiplayer, doesnt mean it takes an epic amount of man hours to create and QA that much single player content.
It remains to be seen how involves the single player campains are, but Ill say it again, if you get a full single player experience (Ive been using 20-40hrs as the model) then expect to pay $50-$55. And Blizzard has a pristine track record, and more industry clout then any company out there. I, without being a fanboy about it, am fairly certain that Blizzard will do right by its customers. Its well and cool and all to get all self righteous about you getting screwed over... wait no, its exactly not well or cool to do that. If you are uncertain, suck it up til the games or at least reviews come out to judge. A company that has never done the things you are accusing it of, and has put out quality products should expect a little more loyalty or understanding from its customer.
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Blizzard has a pristine track record
This is what I focus on.
Activision has produced a lot of shlock. Nintendo is milking its properties. Blizzard has, so far, produced nothing but quality. Just like Valve.
I'm willing to give Blizzard the benefit of the doubt until the products are actually out there.
[cough]Han shot first, and Joss Whedon is my master now.[/cough]
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Never done what? Milked a franchise? Sure...
I am saying that what Blizzard is doing here is fucking stupid and is definitely milking the franchise. Releasing 1 product as 3 separate products is what I would call milking it.
I can guarantee that if EA released RA3 with every campaign having to be bought separately, no matter how well fleshed out they were, no one would be in support of it in anyway whatsoever.
Activision has produced a lot of shlock.
Obviously Blizzard is a big enough entity that this doesn't necessarily mean it will rub off, but you do realize that Activision and Blizzard are merged right?
This is also practically the Anti-Valve when you take value into consideration. Unless you call 1 for 3 as good of a value as 5 for 1.
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Blizzard has, so far, produced nothing but quality.
Warcraft Threeeeeeeee.
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... hated Warcraft III. Villains were just superficial anti-heroes with the typical "fall from grace" story that came with the beginning of Star Wars.
My previous statement was based off the fact that they said each game would roughly be the same size as the original game. Which was only a few hundred Mbs.
Look, there are probably a multitude of reasons why they did this, but the one that would stand out to me was how they could obviously reap so much more money for this. It may or may not be the foremost reason, but it seems to be one of the obvious ones.
We all know that Blizzard can perform, and everyone knows how successful their games can be. We'll probably never dispute that. But the fact that they need to initially release it in three separate boxes is a silly idea. At most, why not just put three DVDs in one box? The fanbase could probably just wait rather than get a story WIP check with three separate releases. I guess it depends - on one hand, Blizzard could do a fantastic job of it (as it did with Starcraft), and make it one of the top storylines. The characters could be fleshed out properly, there's proper dramatic spice to it, they score the music in a proper way (hearing the previews, it's my thumbs up for the music), and the individual races truly deserve a place as a standalone product.
On the other hand, Blizzard could release campaigns that are... fairly good, Starcraft 1 standard; with lots of nice visuals and a decent story, but ultimately customers might be saying that it wasn't worth putting into three separate games. That's probably generally the options that may occur.
That said, I have more to say, but all I really want to say now is that I'd wait for a Battlechest if Blizzard don't deliver to their promises. Makes the ordeal that much easier.
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Warcraft 3 was such a huge disappointment, but I seem to be in the minority with that opinion.
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Bryan, I have to point something out:
You've already bought into this same reasoning for a different franchise. Mass Effect.
So I'm of two minds. I don't like it. I like my money (and I can't possibly get these for free). I do think it's partially a cash grab, which is the right of the company, but is still bullshit.
But if each of these games is honestly a giant, full length campaign that justifies its price point...isn't that severely awesome?
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And for all the 1 in 3 ideas that are getting put forth. Would you prefer all three race campaigns were 1/3rd as long, to justify the price point and ship it all in a single box. Or would you rather have 3 games, all released at once, all performing to Blizzards par?
And for the hating War3 got. It might not have been the game alot of people were expecting, but it was well received and earned great (http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/pc/warcraft3reignofchaos?q=warcraft) reviews (http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/pc/warcraft3thefrozenthrone?q=warcraft).
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I liked Warcraft III. I wasn't so thrilled with the graphics, but for the most part I found it very enjoyable. I liked it better than Warcraft II but not as much as Starcraft. Which, frankly, gives it something in common with the vast majority of great games.
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Blizzard has a pristine track record
This is what I focus on.
Activision has produced a lot of shlock. Nintendo is milking its properties. Blizzard has, so far, produced nothing but quality. Just like Valve.
I'm willing to give Blizzard the benefit of the doubt until the products are actually out there.
What, and Blizzard hasn't milked it's properties? I don't know if you've noticed, but Blizzard has not made a non-sequel in an entire decade. That's a hell of a lot longer than Nintendo has.
And the Valve comparison is even less appropriate because this move is basically completely contrary to Valve's business model. Starcraft II is the anti-Orange Box, where they're splitting one game into 3 packages instead of 5 games (admittedly, some of which are smaller) into one. Valve responded to the huge sums of money they made off of Steam by rewarding their fans, not using that loyalty to give them the shaft that much harder. It's like you people have fucking Stockholm Syndrome or something.
And Ozy, Mass Effect isn't a valid comparison. There's a difference between planning a trilogy and splitting what was once going to be one game into three parts. Besides which, being that Mass Effect is a franchise, there will be new features, engine improvements, and so forth made between games (or at least there had better be, if not then that will suck and should deserve the criticism it would receive). These three Starcraft games will be the same game and use the same assets, just split up so they can release them on a schedule and squeeze money out of people.
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But it was always a trilogy of campaigns. The campaigns just got too ridiculously huge for one release.
Again, I don't know how much I trust this. I think it's very possible for the finished product to justify this decision and I don't think we have all the facts yet.
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So they say. I doubt it.
Remember, this game has been in development since 2004. While that does imply that the game ended up bigger than they originally intended, unless they release all 3 games at once or at least within a reasonable time frame (meaning not Valve's model of 18 months between episodes), it begs the question of what the fuck they've been doing with all that time unless they split these games up and spread them apart to get people to pay for them individually.
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This is not dissimilar from Valve splitting "Half-Life 3" (or what was supposed to be Half-Life 3) into episodic content
Definitely was meant to be episodic from the beginning.
No. No no no no no no no. Unless you think Gabe Newell has no idea what he's talking about regarding his own series:
http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=65345&page=1
Guys, this comparison thing I've done is not saying that Starcraft 2 is like the Orange Box, it's saying that Blizzard is essentially doing with Starcraft 2 what Valve did with their originally planned sequel to Half-Life 2. The major difference is that Valve's Episodes are about half as long as the original game they are sequels to (if you read that Eurogamer interview, Newell mentions something about all three together being equivalent to a standalone sequel), so Valve packaged them with other products to justify al price; on the other hand, Blizzard is developing campaigns that are at least as long and full as the original game, and selling those separately (along with the multiplayer content in each box, which I guess is the "original Half-Life 2" of their Starcraft 2 packages). And I really don't care what you say, Bryan, until we get concrete details on price points for Starcraft 2, I'm not going to count them out yet.
Personally, I already owned Half-Life 2 and Episode 1, and had no interest in Team Fortress 2, when Valve forced me to buy all three of those games at the $50 price point just to get their two $20 value products (Episode 2 and Portal) at release, so I would not say that they were specifically "rewarding" their fans. When they cancelled the Black Box or whatever they were going to release alongside Orange Box, with just the new games included, I wasn't the only one a little upset at Valve giving out the "opportunity" for loyal fans to buy potential gifts for friends who didn't own the older games, just so we could play the new ones.
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what?
You do realize both Episode 2 and Portal are $20 right? Not $10?
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Yes. That is why they are two $20 value products. Not two products, together worth $20. I am not saying Valve totally butt-raped us for our money, but there was still an upset. It was a darker world, which knew not how awesome Portal truly would be (and back then we figured it was worth $10 at the most, since they wouldn't even sell it on its own to give us a more accurate price).
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It all comes down to the quality at the end of the day. Brood War, if I remember correctly, went on sale at 'full price' despite 'only' being an expansion to the original, but the single player campaign was every bit as epic as the original, if a little shorter. While I can't pretend to have been on the internets when it came out, I don't remember there being much of an uproar about it.
I'll be buying SC2, that's for sure. Whether I buy SC2 Part 2 or whatever they're going to call it entirely depends on what they produce. If a single campaign has as much playtime and involvement as any single standalone game, I have no problem shelling out for additional content. You could look at it as an expansion, but similarly you could look at any triology, games, movies or books, as simple 'expansions' on an established product. I paid full price for three LoTR DVDs even though it was the same 'thing' each time, but the content was of sufficient quality and length to warrant it.
In short, if they release SC2 and 2 expansions and expect people to shell out full price three times, they can suck a cock. If they release three games with equal or similar length, depth and involvement, then it's three games capable of standing on their own feet. You don't have to buy them all.
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That's a valid point. In the end the only real verdict should be on whether the released campaigns have enough merit and epic substance to warrant having it released in individual games. And they'd better be worth it.
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Yes. That is why they are two $20 value products. Not two products, together worth $20. I am not saying Valve totally butt-raped us for our money, but there was still an upset. It was a darker world, which knew not how awesome Portal truly would be (and back then we figured it was worth $10 at the most, since they wouldn't even sell it on its own to give us a more accurate price).
And, I think, in retrospect, both of them are worth the $20 (and the entire box was worth way more than $50)
Which is why I want to know more than ZOMG BLIZZARD IS ASSRAPING US before making a snap judgment, however, it's still entirely possible they are.
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I'm sure Blizzard is fully aware that they've handed the gaming masses a whole crate of axes to grind. If anything, I'm excited to see how this turns out.
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it begs the question of what the fuck they've been doing with all that time unless they split these games up and spread them apart to get people to pay for them individually.
Maybe having their dev forces split, some working on WoW others not. Maybe the designers got a little carried away and realised that the cost benefit assessment would have actually meant they had to remove content in all three campaigns to keep everything within budget and along their projections? So knowing their customers love the product so much that splitting it into three stand-alone games would benefit the community more than a, cheaper in cost and value, single release game. You are so convinced that this is a malicious cash grabbed designed to hurt you. Maybe, a company that has never in its past dicked over its client base isnt about to start now. Why are you so adamant about not giving them benefit of the doubt?
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Yeah, it's a pretty blatant cash grab. If you guys think that these are going to be priced like expansion packs, you're also fooling yourselves. They're going to charge the full 50 for all three games, because they can get away with it.
But if all three campaign modes are the length of a full game, then what's the problem?
EDIT: Also I love Warcraft 3 and its expansion. Though I have never once even attempted to play it non-campaign; I can't imagine it being a very fun human-vs-human RTS.
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heh, guess i'll bookmark torrentspy.com 8-)
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THIS IS THE FBI. WE HAVE SEIZED JOHNNY C'S ACCOUNT. STEPS HAVE BEEN TAKEN TO BRING HIM INTO CUSTODY. THIS PAGE IS TO BE CONSIDERED EVIDENCE UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE. THANK YOU AND HAVE A PLEASANT DAY.
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EDIT: Also I love Warcraft 3 and its expansion. Though I have never once even attempted to play it non-campaign; I can't imagine it being a very fun human-vs-human RTS.
Vi sitter i Ventrilo och spelar DotA.
Disclaimer: I don't actually play/like DotA that much. But I guess something significant Warcraft III brought to the table was a heavily moddable RTS with a hero system and excellent map editor?
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They don't know when to stop with the DotA releases.
The moddability and extensive map editing is pretty much the only thing I'd like to see taken from Warcraft III and applied to Starcraft II. "Excellent map editors" are commonplace in many RTS games (I especially loved C&C General's one with custom gradient mapping and everything) but they're not common enough.
And the hero system, well, I don't know enough to say anything about that. Damage types have been implemented in Blizzards RTSes for yonks, even perhaps before Starcraft. Nothing special there.
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The hero system means you have units which play like RPG characters, which gain experience, level up and have abilities you can invest skill points in.
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Doesn't this bother anyone?! Johnny has been seized! Guys, get it together! We're in trouble, and our resident Canadian has been kidnapped!
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Yeah, for you haters of Warcraft III, before world of warcrack there was warcrack three. I had hours of fun online in the modded maps, tower defenses, DotA, summoner games, dawn of the dead mods, and even good ol' fashioned online ranked ladder matches. I love the entire single player campaigns and storyline and found the cinematics to be epic in scope. Honestly, pretty much every single game put out by Blizzard I've loved, the last being one I loved so much that I have to struggle daily to not pay for it or play it any more, so in the end knowing that there is three games worth of starcraft out there in my future is only a good thing. As long as there are countless hours of storyline and the excellent cinematics, I'm okay with it in the end. Since I seem to be the minority in this thread, I'll stop posting in it and let your nerdrage battle go on about a game you're probably going to pirate anyway.
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Your negativity is encouraging.
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I actually have no intention of pirating this and unless the pricing scheme is a bit different than seems likely, I'm not going to be buying it either.
You also have to remember Phil that we aren't denying Blizzard's good history of development, some of us are questioning this specific move that I think is pretty dick since you have to pay full price for each races campaign. I'm also saying that any other company would get railed on by pretty much everyone if they attempted something like this. The fact some of dislike WC3 was just a point that not everyone, even long time Blizzard fans (which I am), has liked everything they've done.
I'm still curious about whether or not you will have to buy all 3 campaigns to get all of the multiplayer content.
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Wow, I've never heard of DotA before.
Crap, now I have to hunt down a copy of WC3 again (I lost mine last time I moved).
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DotA is a mod.
Go get the original game then download the mod.
But anyway, I have no intention of pirating this either. My internet sucks and has a crappy capping limit, so it's just not an option. And the article stated that all three games have the full multiplayer content, meaning apparently all three games will be compatible with each other on Battle.net.
The developing of three games was purely for the purposes of the single-player campaigns.
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Honestly, BAAAAWWWWW.
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DotA is a custom map for online play. I wouldn't call it a mod, IIRC it doesn't really modify much of the game.
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This kind of reminds me of people who were pissed off that Vice City was a full-price game.
I mean, seriously, do we know much about the campaigns yet? Isn't it entirely possible - or even probable given the development time involved - that each race's campaign will be as epic and different from each other's as GTA3, VC and San Andreas?
I just have a hard time blaming a company for not letting me play three 20-30 hour campaigns for the price of one.
Also, you know, isn't it good news that you can play the campaigns in any order you want? I got so impatient my first playthrough of WC3 waiting to get to the Night Elf campaign.
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You could play the campaigns in the original Starcraft in any order too, and the releases for the different Starcraft 2 games are spaced apart in probably a year or so.
The epic-ness will decide whether this move was worth it or not. Smart people are reserving their full judgement.
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Honestly, BAAAAWWWWW.
Contrast this with your posts in the Fallout thread for added hilarity.
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I am finding it really hard to get cut up about this.
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Honestly, BAAAAWWWWW.
Contrast this with your posts in the Fallout thread for added hilarity.
That's concept art (good too, craig mullins is awesome) . The above was a screenshot from an interview.
:?
« Last Edit: January 12, 2008, 06:32:47 AM by Spluff »
:-D
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You could play the campaigns in the original Starcraft in any order too
Did... did you play Starcraft? Cause like, I guess you could do that, but not without beating them in the order it allows you to first.
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Im going to go on record right now as never having ever played Starcraft, ever, not even once, at all, in my life. Never.
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You could play the campaigns in the original Starcraft in any order too
Uh. Only after you had beat them all in the order the game forced on you. :?
The epic-ness will decide whether this move was worth it or not. Smart people are reserving their full judgement.
I'm reserving my judgement. Smart people don't get all snooty within their first 50 posts on a forum.
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Yeah we tend to freeze those people out with our dickcicles
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Did... did you play Starcraft? Cause like, I guess you could do that, but not without beating them in the order it allows you to first.
Er, no. You can play them in any order. If you go out of order, it just asks if you really want to do that first.
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Er, no. You can play them in any order. If you go out of order, it just asks if you really want to do that first.
...what? My copy won't let me do that.
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Maybe they changed it in later versions, but I know I played the Zerg campaign before I finished the Terran campaign.
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I´m 100% certain that my copy of Brood Wars lets one do that. Not so sure about how it was in my copy of the original, though.
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Yeah, um, they're right. :-(
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Just tested this on my copy of Brood War and it won't let me do it there, either.
Must be a version thing, I guess.
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You can play any of the three campaigns... within those campaigns, you have to play them in order. That's my recollection. Just in case people are confusing different ideas under the umbrella of nomenclature.
That is to say, maybe we're having a vocab crossfire.
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I definitely played the campaigns out of order cause I always hated playing as the Terrans.
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Did anyone besides the OP actually READ THE ARTICLE?
Pardo explained that the multiplayer remains relatively unchanged; each StarCraft II game will have a fully functioning multiplayer suite with all three races playable. "In the shipping product, all three races will be fully featured and balanced in gameplay and also in content," he said. We asked whether that meant the multiplayer suite in each game would be exactly the same, and he said, "More than likely, the successive products will add multiplayer content; we haven't decided right now what that is." That brought up the question as to how multiplayer would work if some players only buy the first game while others only buy the second or third games. He said that they haven't made any determinations yet as to how that would work.
The original StarCraft, according to Pardo, had 32 missions; 12 for the Terrans, and 10 each for the Zerg and the Protoss. According to Blizzard, each of these StarCraft II games will consist of more than 30 missions.
I have to kind of side with the pro-blizzard people. Even if you don't like the games they make, they don't put shitty content, and while you could concievably make an argument that they charge a bit too much, I would say their quality level is high enough that they can get away with it.
it begs the question of what the fuck they've been doing with all that time unless they split these games up and spread them apart to get people to pay for them individually.
Maybe the designers got a little carried away and realised that the cost benefit assessment would have actually meant they had to remove content in all three campaigns to keep everything within budget and along their projections? So knowing their customers love the product so much that splitting it into three stand-alone games would benefit the community more than a, cheaper in cost and value, single release game.
Storm Rider... just a thought, but, why not read the article/interview before typing out things like that. The interviewee specifically stated what their time is spent doing and what they've done so far.
What Chesire said. (Even though he didn't read the article either)
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Yeah, I admit I was wondering if people had read the article either, because earlier when I posted that it implied that there would be new content such as new untis possibly and someone said that there absolutely wouldn't be
"More than likely, the successive products will add multiplayer content; we haven't decided right now what that is."
It's a possibility, damnit. The Terran game will include the Terran campaign and the full 3 race multiplayer online content, and the successive games will have the other campaigns and more than likely have new content. Which probably as well as the free maps that they've made that they released online and the maps and mods made by the community will likely have new map packs, units, or tilesets (or all of the above) like they released for Brood War. if they charge full price, they aren't gonna just tell you to bend over and take it, they'll make you want to.
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I guess I am basing that off other articles I have read that claimed pretty flatly each game would ship with the same complete, unchanging multiplayer? But then it seems every article on this subject is claiming entirely separate things ("expansions" vs. "standalones/not expansions," etc.). It does make me wonder (as the article claims they "haven't figured out yet") how it would work to play online with each version adding new stuff to the mutiplayer package. Like, would it be an original Starcraft vs. Brood War split, where you can't play with people who don't have your exact version? Or would they add the new stuff in to all owners via a patch with each new release (as WoW adds some expansion-related content to the game even for players who don't buy the expansions)?
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if they charge full price, they aren't gonna just tell you to bend over and take it, they'll make you want to.
I don't doubt that they would (to what extent is the question) but the view that I and others seem to be taking is that if they in fact told us to bend over and take it, a great many of us would gladly do so. Blizzard doesn't have to put extra muscle into anything, the success of Starcraft 2 is foregone no matter what they do. They could add microtransaction'd units and maps and people would buy them.
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"God damnit I want the firebats so bad, but 15 bucks and my soul? But its sooooo worth it."
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I don't know why you'd buy Firebats, the only less useful terran unit is the Wraith.
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Uh... my zerglings got *annihilated* by firebats yesterday. They're fantastic against all things melee (true, that's only three units, but two of those units are common, and one is one of the best units in the game).
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I don't know why you'd buy Firebats, the only less useful terran unit is the Wraith.
:? :? :? :? :? :? :?
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I trust Blizzard.
If the new campaigns add multiplayer content then that multiplayer content will be added to the previous games as a patch.
If that turns out to not be the case, then I'll no longer trust Blizzard and I won't buy from them any more.
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I understand why people hate using Wraiths (they're so damn fragile and their damage kinda sucks), but until they cease being a necessary evil in mirror matches, I can't rank them below other Terran units. If anything, I'd say the Goliath, Firebat and Valkyrie are all fighting it out at the bottom of the shit pile, but even they all have their place.
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Honestly, BAAAAWWWWW.
Contrast this with your posts in the Fallout thread for added hilarity.
The difference is, Blizzard is developer with a flawless development history and a reputation for producing good game after good game. They are providing us with three 30 hour+ games that each come with multiplayer, whilst COD4 had a 4 hour campaign and multiplayer, and it was touted as game of the year.
On the other hand Bethesda has a history of releasing buggy, crappy games that need to be heavily modded to become playable.
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I have won games with a fleet of Wraiths. I don't understand.
Anyway, I am only mildly excited about Starcraft 2 news in general. I am really anxiously awaiting D3, but I am sure I'll probably get SC2 when it comes out too, regardless of the 3-game thing. Maybe I'll wait a bit and get the nigh-inevitable 3-pack once it comes out. Maybe there will be 3 initial games plus the usual expansion? Who knows! It is a delicious mystery. Unlike some of you I don't abhor what Bliz have been doing with WC3 and WoW (I enjoyed playing WC3 and have played WoW on and off since it came out), so I am pretty sure I will like what they do with SC2 also.
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This is what happens when blizzard decides to give a piece of news in an incomplete form. (as it is their usual way)
I know it's the hardest for the zealots to believe, but Activision is probably not to be blamed.
Is amazing how fast people tend to forget. This is not the first time blizzard has shafted their beloved audience. Who remembers Lord of the Clans? Who remembers Starcraft Ghost? Who can remember "this MMO will be like no other you'll ever experience, with one, continuos, organic and moldable world" .... and then they spammed a gazillion identical, non canonical, non deformable worlds, on top of that, they charge you if you want to change from server to server.
What most people are unarticulately trying to say is that, even though NO CHARGE SCHEME has been brought to the table, it is most likely that blizzard will be charging the same price for each of those 3 games. And correctly so, the plebs are starting to sharp their pitchforks and oiling their torches.
If bliz decides to charge the same price for each game, then we will be paying twice or trice for some aspects of the game -arguably, the most important ones, the game engine and the multiplayer game-; because lets be realistic here, NORMAL PEOPLE are not going to play the single campaing every night for the next 3-4 years... Normal people will play the campaign once, maybe twice, and then bury it until a moment of nostalgia strikes, 1, 2, 3, n years from launchday.
Let's say for a moment that bliz is not giving us the Company of Heroes move (THE D1CK MOVE), and all Races will be playable from the start: Does this mean that a single, non campaign game will also be available for a fraction of the price? Because that will be the fair thing to do, after this fiasco.
On the other hand, isn't it unfairthat the gamers are left wanting? I might be completely off on this one, but wouldn't it be better to have a WHOLE experience out of a game, even if this means to have LESS longevity? You know, quality over quantity?
How about a 70 dollar game with 2 dvds and all the missions you can possibly add in a 16 gb total storage space? (without the complications of having to re-copy all the engine and multiplayer elements?) takes too much time? PLEASE! SC2 has been in the works for over 3 1/2 years (maybe more). How about working on the story from day 1, even if the technical parts are at a stall because all the other proyects? As some said before me, what have they been doing?
Lets, for the sake of it, collapse schrodinger's cat and create a fantastic world where, when you purchase one of the games, the second disc gets a discount / a price correction; lets say 30 dlls for the second one, 15 dlls for the third one...
Wouldn't it be a total catastrophe for bliz if people just lend or exchange games one another, so we can all enjoy the complete experience? What about the resale from stores like EBgames? it's certainly allowed by the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-sale_doctrine) first sale rule. And I'm not even bringing up the pirated copies to the table.
All in all, it just sounds like more work for blizzard, more frustration for us, with less revenue overall for them. Plus, they are putting at risk the entire universe by, maybe, telling a shitty story because all they really want is to enlarge it as much as possible... you know, lets bring all the things we just eliminated to the editors room and just paste it in.
Blizzard is slowly -but surely- becoming the industry's diva; lets hope no DRM software is waiting to nail us on the cross; look at spore and their splintered-shaft no-vaseline root kit, and then take a look at any torrent site of your choice. Yea, that worked allright.
You know who are the ONLY ones who have a big grin in their faces after this news, no matter what happens?The illegal downloaders.
Yes bliz, keep making more single player idiocity, keep demanding more money for your titles, and please start charging for using the most spamful, viced, unstable, ugly online peer-to-peer network convieced; that way it will be no time before someone creates a "custom" server for sc2 and we all play like it WAS MEANT to be played... in our minds.
Torpedo yourself into oblivion.
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The random textual affectations don't really help you. Imagine somebody talking like you're typing.
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The random textual affectations don't really help you. Imagine somebody talking like you're typing.
Noted.
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None of us have argued that Blizzard can't deliver on good goods. =P
It's just that sometimes their method of delivering these good goods has been questionable.
But really, it all comes down to when the first game is released, and the buyers decide whether splitting it up was really worth it or not. Fears are it isn't and it's just a money whoring technique, hopes are it is and it was a good move.
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IT AR FACT, BLIZ HATES US ALL, BLAH BLAH BLOO BLOO
You didn't read the article.
You didn't read the thread.
You made an illogical poorly thought through post.
Because seriously... did Blizz employees come over to your house and shit in your living room or something? Also how did you get shafted by Blizz canceling games? You were looking forward to them? Whoopdy-fucking-do.
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Who can remember "this MMO will be like no other you'll ever experience, with one, continuos, organic and moldable world" .... and then they spammed a gazillion identical, non canonical, non deformable worlds, on top of that, they charge you if you want to change from server to server.
Seriously? This is pretty much impossible. To provide a world that is mouldable by players' actions beyond a certain level would require ridiculous things. Sure, I want a MMORPG where my actions have a lasting effect on the world, but unless you're talking about PvP content, can you imagine how hard this would be? They'd need to be adding new content every day, or something similar. The only MMO I can think of where player actions have serious effects is EVE, and that's such a completely different model to any othe MMO I can think of. Even then, players can only have certain effects on how the world is - generally in the 0.0 security zones, and really only with regard to other players. I've been bouncing around in my head ideas as to how this mouldable MMO would work, and it's so complex as to be nigh-on impossible. Imagine the balancing!
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Well, there is Love (http://www.quelsolaar.com/love/index.html), the procedural MMO that can be altered by every player. However, I don't know where in development this is.
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None of us have argued that Blizzard can't deliver on good goods. =P
It's just that sometimes their method of delivering these good goods has been questionable.
But really, it all comes down to when the first game is released, and the buyers decide whether splitting it up was really worth it or not. Fears are it isn't and it's just a money whoring technique, hopes are it is and it was a good move.
Agreed. We can only speculate until the game is gold and on the shelves.
Its just that it has a really sad "warcraft 3 deja vu" feel to it, minus the 3 disc division.
phulease no micromanagement shenanigans :|
Who can remember "this MMO will be like no other you'll ever experience, with one, continuos, organic and moldable world" .... and then they spammed a gazillion identical, non canonical, non deformable worlds, on top of that, they charge you if you want to change from server to server.
Seriously? This is pretty much impossible. To provide a world that is mouldable by players' actions beyond a certain level would require ridiculous things. Sure, I want a MMORPG where my actions have a lasting effect on the world, but unless you're talking about PvP content, can you imagine how hard this would be? They'd need to be adding new content every day, or something similar. The only MMO I can think of where player actions have serious effects is EVE, and that's such a completely different model to any othe MMO I can think of. Even then, players can only have certain effects on how the world is - generally in the 0.0 security zones, and really only with regard to other players. I've been bouncing around in my head ideas as to how this mouldable MMO would work, and it's so complex as to be nigh-on impossible. Imagine the balancing!
Oh and I agree completely, I was making an example of how Blizzard's F.A.Q. and own declarations change over the days, months and years, but people are left out in the cold waiting for something that will just never happend. It is easiest on the technically proficient, who can smell the scent of bullshit a mile away.
Kinda reminds me of the potatomoto comic at VGcats, when pea steve gave up his life waiting for wii-lies.
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I like micromanagement. It gives me more opportunities to stomp the crap out of people.
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I liked the mods that used the heroes powers like DotA or the Summoners or DotD, but i was terrible at micromanaging any kind of larger force. However I seem to have a preternatural amount of luck, so that was never too big a problem. If there is micromanagement to a certain degree in this game I won't mind all that much.
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Oh and I agree completely, I was making an example of how Blizzard's F.A.Q. and own declarations change over the days, months and years, but people are left out in the cold waiting for something that will just never happend. It is easiest on the technically proficient, who can smell the scent of bullshit a mile away.
Kinda reminds me of the potatomoto comic at VGcats, when pea steve gave up his life waiting for wii-lies.
I, for one, don't remember blizz saying anything remotely close to what you claim they said about WoW. I won't count it out, as I would expect them to have lofty goals, but I'd like to see some proof, in the context of an interview or whatever.
And you are still acting as though canceled or changed games have a large scale, far reaching effect on you or others lives. Who exactly got "left out in the cold" waiting for what?
All developers have to change and adjust their "FAQ" (what?) over the course of development. Things get cut, it happens.
And WTF is easiest on the technically proficient who can smell bullshit a mile away? I'm guessing you mean "its easier to drop "promised" content halfway through production because they aren't technically proficient enough to complete the promised content." If that is what you mean, it is wrong. I won't crap flood the thread with reasons why.
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I liked the mods that used the heroes powers like DotA or the Summoners or DotD, but i was terrible at micromanaging any kind of larger force. However I seem to have a preternatural amount of luck, so that was never too big a problem. If there is micromanagement to a certain degree in this game I won't mind all that much.
I like DotA very, very much, is an ingenious game; micro is great when you have to control a very small elite force, but the experience and memories I have with both warcraft 2 and starcraft was one of masive, epic battles where cleaver-yet-simple moves like flanking or a formation were more decisive than a build against certain type of hero or weapon. And please, don't get this out of context: I think W3 is a great game for certain people, and I don't take away its medals, but it will be naieve to state that W3 remained loyal to the W2 feel. Granted, games can and will evolve, and bliz owns the game, so they can do whatever the hell they want with it.
Lets see what route they will choose for Starcraft 2.
I, for one, don't remember blizz saying anything remotely close to what you claim they said about WoW. I won't count it out, as I would expect them to have lofty goals, but I'd like to see some proof, in the context of an interview or whatever.
And you are still acting as though canceled or changed games have a large scale, far reaching effect on you or others lives. Who exactly got "left out in the cold" waiting for what?
All developers have to change and adjust their "FAQ" (what?) over the course of development. Things get cut, it happens.
And WTF is easiest on the technically proficient who can smell bullshit a mile away? I'm guessing you mean "its easier to drop "promised" content halfway through production because they aren't technically proficient enough to complete the promised content." If that is what you mean, it is wrong. I won't crap flood the thread with reasons why.
Hi statik; please take it easy! I may sound like a prick inside your brain, but believe me when I tell you that it is not the case.
Now, I dont hate bliz, as a matter of fact, three of my top games of all time belong to them (diablo, starcraft, warcraft2). All those things I said was with the intention to establish a credibility base for their statements.
Unfortunately I did not made screenshots of what they did or did not say about world of warcraft, all those years ago. I remember it clearly because back then, I was starting college and money was scarse: my friends and I were pumped about the idea of blizzard getting in the business territory previously dominated by Lineage, Everquest, but mostly, Ultima. I'm sorry to say I have no proof beyond my word.
It shouldn't be to hard to swallow, considering all the cancelations, delays -remember all the diablo2 trailers and missed dates?- and broken promises, which brings me to my next point:
By "technically proficient" I am trying to say that people who are familiar with the current state of technology can easily defuse all those big words about moldable worlds or one big universe (instead of a bunch or servers); by defuse I mean they can build a natural amount of skepticism about it, so when the f.a.q. , spectations, statements change, they all knew it was coming.
Its as if I tell you right now that some big company is developing a game where they will simulate a galaxy of stars to colonize and mine, with thousands and thousands of worlds to explore... you immediately think: "by thousands he must be refering to several docens... maybe a hundred if we are lucky"
I should have been more specific about it.
From all this, the only thing that really annoys me (and its mostly dissapointment) is that Blizzard does all this with premeditation: They know they just can't deliver some promises, but take all the hype that is possible. As KvP said: SC2 will be a bestseller no mater what.
If that's the case, why do it anyway?
I perfectly understand what you wrote Statik: games need revisions, specially during beta testing, and some ideas go forward while some others go to the trash can, and even others get dismissed because of bliz low system requirements. I can totally understand that.
Still, why the deception?
In any case, my life is not shattered because of this, and I do not await starcraft 2 more than I await the second coming of jebus. I take this as what it is: a great subject for discussion, particularly in a slow day at the office.
All in all, it is very interesting to see the new revenue schemes Vivendi/Actiblizzard are experimenting with. Lets hope the same creativity is directed towards gameplay. :lol:
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Blizzard has already publicly stated that they regard SC as the "huge armies" game in contrast to WC, btw.
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I have a feeling the reputation for that post will follow you for some time.
*edit*
ArcAirBender's post that is
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Blizzard has already publicly stated that they regard SC as the "huge armies" game in contrast to WC, btw.
Anyone have any idea what their plans are on the unit cap for this? That's a piece of information I'd like to know. And also if this is the "huge army" game, that definitely reduces the likelihood for heavy amounts of unit mircromanagement. hopefully.
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Yeah see, this is why you don't make half-cocked rants among your first posts. Now my eyes just skim over your posts disinterestedly.
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LOTS OF TEXT
You still sound like Blizz (or any game developer) is intentionally claiming this or that will be in the game, to build up hype? or something? Then cuts it later. Or that game devs make plans beyond the scope of available technology. With few exceptions (Phantom console is a notable one) this is not the case.
Its terrible business practice. Granted, things can still get cut, be it for practicality, time, etc, but they simply are not making up shit at the beginning with full knowledge that they will cut it later. Its a good way to piss off your potential customers, and by doing so, piss off your investors.
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So anyway, are we done flailing about ineffectually in here yet? I just read a couple more articles about this where Rob Pardo said "[The second and third games] will be like expansion packs, but we really want them to feel like standalone products" which says to me that they will be treated like expansion packs, only have a larger amount of content and be standalone, just like what the Dawn of War guys have been doing. So I guess they have looked at the DoW guys and thought "That is a cool release model" and are running with it. After disliking it at first I have come to appreciate the DoW model overall, as it lets people (other than me, obviously, as I have the first few games) pick up one of the new games without requiring the whole set.
Also, the expanded content they are talking about will probably be something like a couple/few unique units only available to people who own that specific campaign (like the Broodwar units). Perhaps they'll make it more like achievements, where you'll unlock certain types of unique units for multi play while playing through the single-player campaign. That way it'll feel less like "hurr hurr, buy this gaem 2 get uniques" and more like something you've earned. Again, I don't really see this as being unreasonable.
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I wish people that have the expanded content can fight against people who don't have expanded content (like company of heroes) I rather have a 2gb patch that downloads everything the expansion has multiplayerwise (and not let me paly it, because I didn't pay for it) than see the horrid image of a comunity divided in two or three chunks, depending which game/expansion you choose to buy.
Of course, that would mean a heckload of tweaking the units to make them balanced, but blizzard has a remarkably history of patching up games (even old ones) on a regular basis to get as close to perfection as possible. (exempli gratia bliz released v1.15.3 for starcraft around the middays of sept this year)
Anyone have any idea what their plans are on the unit cap for this? That's a piece of information I'd like to know. And also if this is the "huge army" game, that definitely reduces the likelihood for heavy amounts of unit mircromanagement. hopefully.
Hopefully...
To me huge army is 250+ ... do you think the havok engine can take that much? I'm guessing there will be maps up to 8, maybe 10 players? that would be up to 2000+ units in a map! :-o
I also think it will be SO COOL if units could gain "veterancy" by killing enemies or surviving battles, that way it promotes careful management and survival of your units without the "micro" part. A veteran unit maybe got a weary/damaged outfit/animation. Perhaps a little defensive/attack bonus. (y'now, like leveling up, without any special skills)
Units in the original SC had a counter to know which were the ones with most kills. I don't think that affected the game anyway (I am not absolutely sure about it) but i sure made up some great stories in my mind everytime I played.
Also, I'm glad they're taking the DX9 & shaders 2.0 approach.... I'm crossing my fingers the game will play flawlessly even when aproaching critical mass clusterfuck status.
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Dude, go read some of the goddamn articles. Multiplayer will include all races out of each box, letting a player who bought Terrans play as whoever they want against a dude who bought the Protoss pack say, playing as whoever they want. There's some talk about unique content, but for the most part it's going to all be on the game disc.
One more thing: I don't think I'll like SC2. After going to DoW and having smaller armies and strategic points instead of resources and etc etc it seems like a backward step to go back to mining for shit and squabbling over resources and people turtling up and such. Perhaps it will seem more interesting to me if there are more, smaller resource areas that can be more readily mined so that the war front is a more nebulous thing rather than "there's a bunch of bases, throw troops at them," but I am unsure. DoW's smaller unit cap made you think more about what units you were making instead of racing for high tech and pumping out carriers/etc.
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From what I've read, it sounds like they're trying to automate and streamline the economic side of base building without eliminating the need to carefully consider how you place your defenses and the like. So you can still bone yourself by putting your pylons and turrets in stupid places but you shouldn't necessarily have to worry about being 3 seconds behind your opponent because you don't know how to "properly" select your probes at the start. Macro vs. Micro has been one of the hottest talking points amongst SC2 speculators for a while now; hopefully they'll hit the sweet spot and keep the depth while simplifying the controls enough to make it a non-issue for guys like est. After all, the original Starcraft seems intuitive enough, but when you stop to think about it, there really is tons of li'l niggling oddities like quickly assigning workers properly and being able to abuse the Patrol command with Vultures muddying up the waters. Frankly, just expanding the maximum unit selection past 12, tightening up the pathfinding and giving workers better AI in general would be enough to make me an extremely happy man.
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Anyone have any idea what their plans are on the unit cap for this? That's a piece of information I'd like to know.
If memory serves they said (a while ago, so it may have changed, of course) that it'll be the same as starcraft.
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I don't need the controls simplified, I need the game to be more interesting. I have had awesome running battles over multiple strategic points in DoW. In SC you are rewarded for knowing the maps, claiming the most resources, then turtling up until you've built more shit than the other guy. There's all kinds of strategies to break that kind of thing, but the guy with the most resources has a pretty strong position and the other guys are mostly working against the clock/their own casualties. In smaller maps where everyone was on more or less even footing and strategy was more important I would kick ass, but in the larger maps it became more like a competition of who could remember the best build queue and click buttons the fastest. It just wasn't all that fun.
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So, uh.
http://www.starcraft2.com/faq.xml
The StarCraft II Trilogy consists of the base StarCraft II game and two subsequent expansion sets.
base StarCraft II game and two subsequent expansion sets.
base StarCraft II game
So much for "three standalone games, pick and choose which campaigns you want to play."
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Well, it just means that the article on the front page was wrong.
The biggest problem I have with this move is that the multiplayer games will be played on separate lobbies and ladders according to whichever expansion pack (or base game) you have. Personally, I think it's kinda unneccessary, but that's just my opinion. I still think it would have been more convenient if it was all smashed into one DVD.
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Yeah, I was really hoping they would try to keep multiplayer together, but then I was hoping they were serious about each game being standalone instead of requiring everyone to buy at least the "core" Terran game. The question is still, how will it work with both the Zerg and Protoss expansions in place? I mean, will you only be able to play with people who have your exact combination of expansions? Would you have to sign on with either the Zerg or Protoss expansion in order to play? Or might they follow the Roller Coaster Tycoon (1) model and have the second expansion include first expansion content (at least in terms of online multiplayer)?
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Has that FAQ been updated recently or what? The articles/interviews seem to indicate that they initially started out trying to fit everything into one game, then decided to split things into separate race-based campaigns later. Also, as I said above, Rob Pardo said straight out that they would be expansions, but that they wanted to make them feel like full games. I take this to mean they will be standalone, much the same way that the DoW guys have been doing for their recent expansion packs.
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If all the playable races are included via multiplayer in each xpac, I'd hope that at least we'd be able to play them all in skirmish games when we don't have other people around.
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Yeah, I was really hoping they would try to keep multiplayer together, but then I was hoping they were serious about each game being standalone instead of requiring everyone to buy at least the "core" Terran game. The question is still, how will it work with both the Zerg and Protoss expansions in place? I mean, will you only be able to play with people who have your exact combination of expansions? Would you have to sign on with either the Zerg or Protoss expansion in order to play? Or might they follow the Roller Coaster Tycoon (1) model and have the second expansion include first expansion content (at least in terms of online multiplayer)?
It'll probably work out as such that the multiplayer lobbies and ladders will be only concerned with a specific expansion pack you use, much like Diablo or Starcraft, and that the multiplayer content only applies to one expansion pack. At least, that's what I think.
But if the last expansion pack will contain the previous content of the expansion packs and is released in the order that Blizzard wants you to play the content, then we really don't have a choice as to which order we play the campaigns =(
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Has that FAQ been updated recently or what?
It has remained unchanged since I first registered in this forum, hence my wishing that people with the expanded content could battle people without the expanded content.
Rob Pardo said straight out that they would be expansions, but that they wanted to make them feel like full games. I take this to mean they will be standalone, much the same way that the DoW guys have been doing for their recent expansion packs.
I think pardo was referring to the long single player experience for each expansion....26-30 missions each.
Taking into account bliz game history, its most likely the 3 games will be appart with their own ladder, mods, perhaps versions. Just like Brood War and Frozen Throne.
I still be wishin' for bliz to "unite the clans"... as william wallace said, and make a humongus 2g+ patch that can make us all fight along, despite level of purchase.
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That makes absolutely no sense. The date of the article in the original post is the 10th of Oct 08 (ie: only six days ago). In that article they say it'll be three standalone titles with all three races playable in multiplayer:
Pardo explained that the multiplayer remains relatively unchanged; each StarCraft II game will have a fully functioning multiplayer suite with all three races playable. "[In] the shipping product, all three races will be fully featured and balanced in gameplay and also in content," he said. We asked whether that meant the multiplayer suite in each game would be exactly the same, and he said, "More than likely, the successive products will add multiplayer content; we haven't decided right now what that is."
Going on past expansion packs they've really only added a small amount of extra units. I really doubt there will be a huge path required to "unite the clans" or whatever. It'd be more likely that someone with the Terran pack will be able to play someone with the Protoss pack, but that each will have certain unique units available only to them.
Also, I think it's pretty important to note that Pardo's also said that there will be about a year in between each release. Terran, then #2 a year later, then #3 the year after that. They aren't all going to hit at the same time and force people to choose which one/ones they want.
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Again, I'd wait for a Battlechest so I could play whatever expansion thing I want.
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With them saying it's gonna be a year between releases I doubt I'll wait for a Battle chest. That'd probably be at least 6 mths after the final release, meaning I'd be waiting 2.5yrs minimum after the first one had come out in order to play them. Doesn't sound too appealing to me.
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Man, IGN being wrong or posting inaccurate information? Never!
I was pretty sure that Blizzard wasn't quite stupid enough to try and release one of their longest [of their three games] missing IPs in three pieces. It would be something that some fanboys would take but I can imagine most gamers having my attitude of "Then fuck it." and move back to Starcraft original.
But they didn't get into the position they are today by being stupid developers, just highly skilled at making their low creativity work for them. Which I guess is pretty admirable.
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Est, did you read the section of the FAQ headlined "Trilogy"? There they say up front that Terran is the "core" game for the Zerg and Protoss expansions, and that multiplayer will be divided much like Starcraft/BroodWar and Warcraft3/FrozenThrone, so I think it is safe to say they are forcing people who want to play Zerg or Protoss (and we can only cross our fingers that you won't need Zerg to play Protoss) to buy Terran.
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Man, IGN being wrong or posting inaccurate information? Never!
I was pretty sure that Blizzard wasn't quite stupid enough to try and release one of their longest [of their three games] missing IPs in three pieces. It would be something that some fanboys would take but I can imagine most gamers having my attitude of "Then fuck it." and move back to Starcraft original.
But they didn't get into the position they are today by being stupid developers, just highly skilled at making their low creativity work for them. Which I guess is pretty admirable.
Every comment I've ever heard from you is extremely negative. Also, seriously doubt that most gamers at this point would move back to Starcraft original beyond fanboys themselves and Koreans.
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OK, that is fucking retarded. I do not want to have to wait a YEAR to play the Zerg campaign, then ANOTHER YEAR to play the Protoss.
Perhaps there has been some miscommunication and each of the three will contain 3 campaigns, it's just that each one will FOCUS on one race, but you'll have single-player MISSIONS where you play as all three in each game.
Jesus fuck, this is getting confusing.
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OKAY
So, my ridiculously connected friend who was at BlizzCon talked to some people there and the impression he got was this:
The Terran disc is the base game. It will be $50. It will have the multiplayer. In addition to being the Terran campaign (Jim Raynor), it will have a couple of mini-campaigns with Zeratul and Kerrigan, but otherwise be entirely Terran oriented. The next two games will be $30 each, expansions to the base Terran game, to continue the story form the Zerg perspective, then the Protoss perspective.
They are expansions, not individual games. It's like Warcraft 3's story. The Night Elves part makes no sense if you haven't already played the first three campaigns. So why the hell do you want to.
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Why on earth would Rob Pardo say what he did if they are just going to be expansions? I don't understand why he'd risk internubs nerdwrath over the whole deal if it's just going to be like a business as usual set of expansion packs.
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Well, dude talked to Chris Metzen. I really don't know who would know better, maybe neither. Maybe they just have no fuckin' idea what they're doing with this yet.
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"Every comment I've ever heard from you is extremely negative."
Try the thread on N+ a game. A game I feel is a really good concept that's well executed and a good game for the average Dave or Sally, while still being a great game for the more interred gamer.
I just think those who have a serious mashed potato jones can play Starcraft original and be pretty happy. There are new RTS games that advance the genre, but I haven't kept up well with the PC market.
Also I'm negative because I'm a dick. take that in whatever sense you like.
I was glad that the story was not true though. I think Blizzard is a cool company, though i wouldn't want to work for them, and don't like hearing them doing bad things to the PC market.
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I didn't mean to put what your friend said into question, was more wondering why they would say what they did in the IGN interview and other recent articles. It really gave the impression of 3 discrete games with a common multiplayer underpinning.
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No, I know. I really do think maybe they just don't have it together what exactly they're doing here. I don't think three entirely separate campaigns is really what they have in mind, though.
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I hope it's not.
Because as far as we're concerned, putting a year between each release in a campaign is silly.
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I am fairly sure that aspect of this fiasco is not in question. The only reason they gave for the split in the first place was that they wanted to give their fans something to play sooner rather than later and still have time to do the campaigns they have in mind justice. Otherwise they would just cut the content down and release smaller campaigns all together next year, or keep everybody on edge until 2010 or '11.
Although, I think it is pretty silly that they have the multiplayer game pretty much ready to go, yet have only been working on material for the Terran campaign. You'd figure they'd have been able to plan ahead in terms of fleshing each race out simultaneously rather than going "oh woops, it's mid-2008 and we've only got a few pieces of concept art behind the Protoss and Zerg."
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I think a large part of it is that there's a major metagame component to the campaigns now. It's like an RTS within an RPG, and they have to script and make that meta game for each campaign on top of 30 huge custom maps.
Like, seriously, the more I sit down and consider this decision logically, the more I'm totally willing to accept that this will be worth the money. That by the end of the Terran game, it will have felt like a $50 game.
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Speculation is bullshit, Starcraft is cooler than sex. OKAY? GOT IT?
8-)
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Again, I'd reserve my full judgement on this issue when it's actually released. It could go either way, and to the extremes.
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Check this out, there's a friendly chat over at GiantBomb.com over what SC2 can be, straight from the horse's mouth:
http://www.giantbomb.com/news/qa-the-starcraft-ii-brain-trust/388/
The phrases I found most interesting:
"It's a full multiplayer game. Look at it just like Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos, The Frozen Throne, and then if we'd done a third, this is exactly how we're looking at this."
" are there any differences between the units and the tech in the campaign, and what you're going to see in the multiplayer? Is there single-player-specific stuff? Answer: ....one of the things we've done in the past....to pitch the solo campaign as a learning tool for online play. We are not doing that anymore...these two parts of the game can live separately from one another. We can have a solo play experience with its own technology choices, its own options, and then for multiplayer it's a completely different rule set."
"So what are the compatibility logistics between all these boxes? If I only have Terran, and two or three years later my friend buys Protoss, can we play together? Do you limit the available units to the products you own? How does that work?
CS: We haven't finalized those details yet. We're still talking about it. "
and this one is for SATSUGAIKAZE :p
"You're saying it's a minimum of a year between, say, Terran and Zerg. Can you peg or at least estimate what year we'll see Starcraft II Battle Chest on shelves?
CS: That's an unanswerable question. [laughs]"
All in all, this makes me think that the game is far greener than I once believed. Perhaps it will even miss the 2009 launch. (this is ALL speculation from my part)
I won't have my hopes up for a battlechest this decade =/
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lololz of course the battlechest won't even be heard of for ages on end.
But I am a very patient man. =) Besides, Blizzard is always good at making their customers crap themselves by dropping cryptic hints that require a hacker to decipher =P
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I still say it's shit that I won't be able to play a full Protoss campaign until 2011.
I mean Jesus did they have to start with the most boring race? :x
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lol seconded. As much as I thought the Terran heroes were probably some of the friggin coolest (Raynor forever harharhar although I don't like how he has hair now lol), the race itself was kinda lame.
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I know how you guys feel, despite being a Terran player. I mean, I like the heavy unit specialization and the combined arms force motif in multiplayer, but honestly, I thought it was hard to get too interested in the generic civil war plotline that drove a lot of their campaign action. I mean, shit, I just don't care about Space Southerners going to war against eachother over political reasons I know nothing about. Sure, there's all that crap about the Xel'naga cluttering up the Zerg and Protoss backstory, but the gist of it isn't complicated and so the overall theme can be summed up rather quickly: ancient alien warrior-priests vs. savage alien hive mind upstarts. The Protoss fight the Zerg for their very existence while Arcturus Mengsk acts like a dickhead because the Confederates apparently pissed in his Cheerios at some point. It was really hard not to feel like the Terrans were just kinda swimming around the periphery of the real story.
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Oh, I definitely prefer Terran units to Zerg - big giant Battleships, legions of invisible Wraiths, NUKES, etc. But yeah, hopefully this time they do a better job of making it feel like the Terran campaign was just something that was going on while we waited for the real story to start. Hell, they never even went anywhere with the whole thing where Mengsk talks about how the Confederates have been breeding and engineering the Zerg.
I would at least hope we get some cool Raynor/Kerrigan missions in the first game. Maybe she's been at work making Zerg/human hybrids like her.
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I just hope there's a lot more focus on Raynor this time; he was a nice supporting hero during the Protoss campaign but he just didn't seem like he was made important enough =P
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I think, based on the ridiculous amount of Raynor-related concept art they have been putting up he will be in the spotlight for a decent portion of the game. Same with Kerrigan and Zeratul.
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And remember that concept art of some nude chick reclining an volcanic material?
Either there's going to be some massive plot twist involving Kerrigan or that was just full-force fanservice. What'll it be? XD
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I think more Raynor is almost guaranteed. I seem to remember some footage they released a while back as an example of part of the "metagame" behind the single player stuff, and it featured a player controlled Raynor walking around the interior of a battlecruiser, looking at maps on the bridge, etc. It seems like this sort of thing could create a pretty serious disconnect between gameplay types... but then again, it could also be awesome. Blizz is the only game dev I can think of that hasn't seriously let me down with any of their products, so I remain hopeful.
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20 minutes of gameplay footage released. (http://www.joystiq.com/2009/04/17/watch-this-20-minutes-of-starcraft-ii-footage/)
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Wow, so, is it just me or are banelings kind of broken for such a low-tech unit?
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Damn, that was some serious shit if I do say so though. Its almost depressing to know I will never be as good as either of those players.
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Certainly a good look at how things are coming along anyways. That looked like a nigh-finished product on the multiplayer side, bar some light balancing.
Still, that whole video struck me as surprisingly... familiar. Gameplay-wise, it looked almost exactly like some other competition videos I saw from the original SC. I can't decide if that's a good thing or a bad thing. Part of me is disappointed to not see some giant miraculous leap of gameplay. But I have to stop and consider what it is that I expect. I mean, Starcraft was great as it was. Perhaps that is how it should stay. After all, it's the story I played the original for.
On a personal note: Banelings seem to be the Scourge of the the ground units. I hated Scourges :-( And did anyone else notice the Queen attacking? That is not something I'm used to.
/excuse to post in this thread
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It looked there was a ridiculous amount of micromanagement of troops.
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Knowing Blizzard, this is well more than warranted. Seeing as how they have not come out with a shitty game yet, I'm fucking pumped. For Aiur!
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Blizzard has, so far, produced nothing but quality.
Warcraft Threeeeeeeee.
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I dunno. It looks shiny & all but I still think their decision to keep direct resource gathering is a mistake. It looks like an expansion pack for StarCraft that updates the graphics and adds new units. There's nothing really new or compelling about it at all, it still looks just like the same 10 year old design principle. The level of micromanagement and fucking around still involved with the game turns me off it.
Oh also, the bit where the guy starts building a bunker next to the zerg guy's expansion and is able to get it up and a marine into it is just bullshit.
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How was that bullshit? I'm unsure what you mean.
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I have to agree, how was that bullshit at all? It was playing the game well, and a Terran player rushing a Zerg player is kinda fun to watch.
Look, complain all you want about micromanagement of troops.
and direct resource gathering
, but remember, this is a fucking RTS. It's all about unit micromanagement and taking over gathering spots. The AoE games has it, the Warcraft games has it, Red alert has it. What, do you think there's too much aiming in a FPS?
I'm really exited about this. They have kept the formula that has stayed around since forever since it works so well, but they have included a lot of interesting new elements. Units that can jump cliffs? Brushes that block line of sight? New, fun elements that will make a better game. Weee!
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remember, this is a fucking RTS. It's all about unit micromanagement and taking over gathering spots.e a better game. Weee!
DAWN OF WAR
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Thank you, lolwut. That is my point exactly. I far prefer the notion of abstracted strategic points to capture so that you don't have to fuck around with the unfun nitty-gritty of resource collection and worrying about whether you have the correct fucking SCV to marine build ratio in your opening game in order to avoid a rush but still have enough resources to continue to grow. When I play an RTS I would like to know that the S stands for something other than "remember the correct build order for things and be really quick at pressing keys."
As for the single SCV building a bunker while running away from a zerg builder dood, the thing I found bullshit about it is that the SCV shouldn't have been able to continue to build the thing under constant harassment like that. That plus the way the terran player used SCVs to shield his marines from zerglings for a while strikes me more as an exploitation of a game mechanic than a valid tactic.
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Most really good gamers are good precisely because they know how to exploit game mechanics. I don't think you'll find that happening too often in general play.
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Isn't "exploiting game mechanics" just a fancy word for "playing"?
The Dawn of War argument is kinda poor, you still take over control points to gather resources, it's just built a different way. Direct resource gathering is fun because it makes the game harder to play; you have to worry about more stuff than you have to worry about with the other variant. It's two completely different kinds of gameplay, with completely different skills needed to excel. I guess the best thing would be to do the same thing as Age Of Mythology did, where you could choose to fight over plenty vaults, or if you wanted to mine gold/gather food etc. the usual way.
And why shouldn't SCVs be able to fight? What is the problem with stacking a builder unit in an opening so the enemy has to chop it's way through it? It seems like a completely natural move to me. Somebody is shooting you, but there's someone between you and them, so you have to hack your way through the obstruction before you can kill the people shooting you. Can't see the problem at all. Everything that's a part of the game is a valid tactic. Exploiting bugs isn't, but that would be more like clicking special keys to teleport zerglings into the enemy base, not moving units around.
Bluhrg, reedited this post a bit too much, a stupid discussion to be having. Somebody likes one thing, others like the other. The fact that Dawn Of War didn't turn into such a massive multiplayer thing as Starcraft just means that more people preferred the traditional gathering. I guess.
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Not sure if you can correlate the two. Just b/c Starcraft has traditional gathering and became so popular and Dawn of War doesn't and didn't doesn't mean that type of resource gathering and popularity are linked in any way. In fact, I kinda doubt they are. Of course, that's an equally unfounded statement so maybe you're right. Who knows!
Also, I think there is a difference in exploiting mechanics and simply playing. A really good player learns all the little tricks, things that you can technically do but that the devs didn't necessarily intend to be commonly done, if done at all. It's all about learning the game in depth and then using that knowledge to do things in an unexpected way that sets the great players apart from the more casual ones. Sometimes this does mean exploiting certain little issues or possibilities that probably should have been ironed out by the dev team. Of course, that apparently entails dozens of hours of practice per day so it's probably worth it just to play casually and also do other stuff with your life.
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The Dawn of War argument is kinda poor, you still take over control points to gather resources, it's just built a different way.
The DAWN OF WAR argument is that micromanagement is fucking stupid in a game where you're controlling large armies. It's less about the differences in resource gathering and more about the being streamlined so that there's actual possibly tactical strategy rather than... idunno, spreadsheets.
I always liked the Myth series better than anything else anyway.
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The Dawn of War argument is not poor. I am saying that I think abstracting the resource gathering so that it is a part of the fun part of the game rather than a separate entity is preferable to me because I don't like fucking around with resource gathering. I find it dull. It is boring. It is a chore. I play games to have fun, not to get frustrated due to running out of resources halfway through a big push because a dude gets stuck behind a crystal due to pathing issues or what have you.
Also, I don't care about how popular a game is in multiplayer, because there are very few games I play multiplayer. Dawn of War had a superior single-player experience for me, which is all I want from the RTS genre. I think the key here is something you've already said, these are my opinions about the game. You obviously like the game and you're not going to change my mind about the things I'm saying, so let's agree to disagree/play the games each of us prefer.
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The DAWN OF WAR argument is that micromanagement is fucking stupid in a game where you're controlling large armies. It's less about the differences in resource gathering and more about the being streamlined so that there's actual possibly tactical strategy rather than... idunno, spreadsheets.
Micromanagement is fine. In fact, it's almost the entire point, in that it's the major decider of how efficient each soldier is. The alternative is macromanagement, which is a kind of fire and forget mode that doesn't appeal much to developed RTS gamers.
In addition, the resource-gathering system of Starcraft was retained due to how fine-tuned it was. It had you make real choices about the time and resources you would allocate to gathering new resources.
Some players don't like this, but it's a part of the RTS experience for others. I think I should be clear on one point, though: Starcraft is definitely a more complex and detailed gaming experience, and it's attractive to players that like that level of complexity as opposed to Dawn Of War, which is much more casual. Due to the nature of things, it's a question of preference more than anything.
What I am saying is that if you dislike the complexity and flexibility inherent in Starcraft, that is cool, but it was not designed with you in mind. It's kind of like listening to Black Sabbath and saying "these guitars are too heavy". It's a part of the experience.
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None Silly Resource Gathering Game (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warhammer:_Dark_Omen)
In allmost all other cases it's simply down to playing experience. Even sins of a solar empire is just another gather your resources and build a huge fucking ship. (Sins of a solar Empire is fricking great game if you got a weekend to spend btw.)
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Note: I have/love that goddamn game.
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so let's agree to disagree/play the games each of us prefer.
Yes.
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NO
NO FUCK YOU ALL
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DO YOU WANT TO FIGHT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
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LIGHTNING BOLT
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ENERGY SHIELD
ENTANGLING ROOTS
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YAMATO CANNON
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HADOUKEN
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MAGIC MISSILE
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CONTINGENCY: STONE SKIN
BIGBY'S CLENCHED FIST
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Spluff casts silence
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est used an Echo Herb
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***Spluff has quit (Reason: god damn it you guys)
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RUN AWAY
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So... how about that local sports team, eh?
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They beat the Waratahs that's what.
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(http://motivateurself.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/kamehameha.jpg)
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Remember how on DBZ they talked about being able to fly by... fuck, pulling up your stomach?
This thread is now about how you wasted half an hour trying to make that work.
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That's Vegeta.
Vegeta cannot Kamehameha.
Vegeta can Big Bang.
That might be what we're seeing.
I'm not sure, since I'm not the DBZ nerd I once was.
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That picture is entirely false, and stoopid, I want to hyuken ONLY!
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I'm a bit happy inside that I didn't get that right.
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It angers me that that show is roughly based on the Journey to the West characters.
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You mean Monkey?
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They beat the Waratahs that's what.
They lost Drew Mitchell to the Waratahs :cry:
At least they beat the Lions 55-14 vOv
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Everyone beats the Lions. Shit, my high school team could beat the Lions.
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I was going to say something about Starcraft 2, but - jeez, guys.
Jeez.
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You mean Monkey?
Yeah, same thing.
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Starcraft II won't have LAN support. (http://www.joystiq.com/2009/06/30/starcraft-2-blizzard-responds-to-lack-of-lan-support/) People are blaming pirates.
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I blame Blizzard wanting in on the Xfire/Steam market.
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The way I see it happening is that you all connect to Battlenet to authenticate your separate cd keys, someone hosts a room with a password, you all join it & it gets hosted locally just like a LAN game. Authenticating through BNet lets them make sure you have a proper cd key, and then at the end of the game it'll probably report game stats back to Battlenet.
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That means every computer needs an internet connection though.
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I've hosted LAN parties and these days, with the internet connection I have, in a lot of cases using battle.net is actually faster than wired play.
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Yeah, but most people aren't in that situation. I've played on Battle.net maybe three times. We play over the LAN all the time.
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That means every computer needs an internet connection though.
Or to be on a LAN with an internet connection? Most people I know at the moment will have some sort of internet gateway device that allows multiple people to use the same internet connection.
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That means every computer needs an internet connection though.
Or to be on a LAN with an internet connection? Most people I know at the moment will have some sort of internet gateway device that allows multiple people to use the same internet connection.
Wouldn't that game lag really bad?
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Not if it's only being used mostly for authorization and such.
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Yeah, what Alex said. Once a battlenet game is set up one of the players becomes the host, so if they are all on the same subnet then the traffic would become local.
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Obviously I am only speculating, so I could be completely wrong, but I would find it really odd if they cut out LAN play entirely.
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I have friends who Hamachi their Starmans.
Which, technically, means they only use LAN.
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I'm a huge Starcraft fan, so without getting into what why who when how and for how many oreos-
I will be buying all three disks, as well as custom building a computer, not only so I can run it, but I seriously need to upgrade/update what I use for a desktop in general.
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http://www.joystiq.com/2009/08/22/blizzcon-2009-starcraft-ghost-lives-on-in-spirit/ (http://www.joystiq.com/2009/08/22/blizzcon-2009-starcraft-ghost-lives-on-in-spirit/) (quite a few other sites with similar news just look around)
Map Editor features look quite in depth, although it's obviously moved from a simple mapping tool to something resembling a developer's kit.
And I really, really wish they stopped fucking around and just finished Starcraft: Ghost already (just for the story really because the third-person shooter craze is really old news by now). It was a great idea to put something new into the Starcraft franchise and I'll be really disappointed if they release nothing but novels, comics and Starcraft 2 side missions, which would be a total cop-out on the concept.
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I thought Starcraft: Ghost was officially dead. Not just postponed over and over, but scrapped. But I don't remember where I heard that.
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I'm pretty certain they announced that a couple of years ago. They were working on it and just unceremoniously dropped it because it was apparently not turning out how they thought it should?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StarCraft:_Ghost
Yeah, last paragraph. Basically it's been a clusterfuck. They said they cancelled it 2 years ago, then said it wasn't "technically" cancelled and it's probably never getting made.
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Probably just to prevent the people who actually cared about the project from running riot. They put it into development hell because it wasn't finished in time or something.
The issue of Starcraft Ghost irritates me on various levels. Firstly, it's the fact that Blizzard dropped a really good and fresh concept. Secondly, it's the fact that they denied that it was completely dropped, when it clearly seemed that they had no intention of finishing it in the future, and thirdly, it's the fact that they've dropped it and then tried to "apologise" in some sort of way by putting the characters into little side missions and relatively unimportant modding tools in favour of the Big 3 (RTS, RPG, and MMO) they've adopted.
And whatever side-missions with Nova they *have* put into Starcraft 2 I have absolutely zero enthusiasm for because unless it plays like Starcraft Ghost it's just another RTS level. I was enthusiastic for Ghost because it wasn't just another RTS level, it was a third-person shooter title with stealth, elements which weren't completely chartered back in 2001. The developers had a chance to explore something new and more immersive for players, but pulled out when it would have worked. And that I suppose is the biggest tragedy about all this shit-in-a-franchise-box.
And I am VERY unenthusiastic about the novels and comics that they've released.
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I'll never understand why people are so hung up on Ghost. For one thing, we don't know if the game would have turned out well. Most indicators are that it wouldn't have or else they probably would have stuck with it. The fact that other companies have successfully followed the 3rd person stealth blue print to success doesn't mean that Blizzard would have. It's not an area they had real experience with and Nihilistic Software apparently wasn't doing any better. Keep in mind that Nihilistic's big release up until that point was an ambitious but ultimately shitty game set in the Vampire: The Masquerade universe. There were some experienced developers involved in it, to be sure, but they were still a relatively new operation and isn't exactly unheard of for people to fail to keep their shit together after transitioning to a different work environment or taking on new responsibilities. Really, all we can know for sure is that Blizzard has some egg on their face thanks to picking the wrong pony to bet on. It happens.
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That's the thing. We don't know exactly why Blizzard dropped/shelfed the Starcraft: Ghost project, but I would bet that it was not because they spent a bunch of time and money to develop it, and then suddenly said "Oh that's right, we don't like this kind of game. We only like these other kinds." They're a business, and if you're in a business, you only have a few good reasons for abandoning a project. One is that it is clearly turning out badly, and no amount of reworking of things is going to save it and make it worth putting more resources into, so you cut your losses. Another is that the market has changed and you now find yourself sinking money into something that won't make your money back, so you cut your losses.
Blizzard had a huge reorganization/buyout/whatever some years back. Wasn't Ghost basically one of the casualties of that?
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Mainly I was excited to see Blizzard try something a bit different out. It getting dropped was kind of my last bit of hope of continuing to enjoy Blizzard in general. Diablo III still looks good, but I lost interest in Starcraft and Warcraft years ago. It's a little sad when I quite honestly keep seeing Starcraft II info and don't even have the tiniest bit of interest in it when I loved Starcraft.
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Yeah, I feel the same way. Diablo 3 looks like I might actually enjoy it, but I could give two shits about the Starcraft/Warcraft franchises.
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...and no amount of reworking of things is going to save it and make it worth putting more resources into, so you cut your losses.
So you never played Team Fortress 2 with commentaries, did you?
No one is beyond redemption, it just that it takes time and hard work, y'know?
... I lost interest in Starcraft and Warcraft years ago.
Here here!
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I really liked Starcraft's multiplayer, so I'll be buying this regardless. I'm not a huge fan of throwing myself to the wolves that lurk on battlenet, granted, but that just means I'll have to stick with playing against my brother and former roommate. I'm fine with that. Perhaps I just don't have the same relationship with developers that a lot of people on the net seem to feel. I guess I just figure that I'm pretty likely to get my $50-$60 worth of entertainment from a Starcraft sequel, which makes whether or not I should buy it a pretty easy decision.
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Yeah apparently the cancellation was something about being overshadowed by the Diablo, Starcraft and Warcraft franchises (http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=AU&hl=en-GB&v=2ka9Cy06N28)
We don't know that it could have turned out well, but back in '01/'02 there was still quite a bit to explore and any flak that the game would have copped then would probably have undertones of "well at least it's experimentation". And from the gameplay vids that have come out (there are quite a few) aren't half bad for an 02 game. I'll be honest, in today's day and age it would probably be pretty shoddy but if they'd completed it at the time, it would have been a fairly solid-looking game. I'm inclined to compare it to Modern Warfare: a comparatively standard shooter but adding a greater level of immersion into the franchise.
Also, the guy playing in those videos sucks. =P
I understand that Blizzard is running a business here, and I could probably understand them if they released it to lackluster reviews and then decided to forget about it afterwards. But experimentation is the key to improvement, and as we all know the stealth franchises and the third person shooters still had plenty of selling power.
Orbert, Blizzard requisitioned the company that was developing the game, so the decision to scrap the project was probably initiated by a higher-up's change of heart. I think that it was a matter of "Oh, wait, I don't think this would sell". It coulda/woulda sold, and IMO they made the wrong decision. Unfortunately, it so happens that a whole bunch of other titles sprung up later that took advantage of the selling power, and the developers have now missed the bandwagon of cash.
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I agree that it could have been cool, and in general I'm all for companies, especially game designers, trying out new things. But business is business, and businesses make bad decisions all the time. And yeah, this was probably one of them. There's only one thing you can do:
* SPAWN MORE OVERLORDS *