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First Post: Thoughts about SC2 and Blizzard
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BlackPanther
United States872 Posts
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Paljas
Germany6926 Posts
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HolyExlxF
United States256 Posts
Another thing is that StarCraft, the StarCraft that is played casually, is NOT the StarCraft played competitively. League of Legends (which I assume is where you base your argument) is the same game, at the very least, played casually and competitively. Players on UMSes don't with tournaments, don't buy tickets, don't watch streams, and don't care about "real" StarCraft. | ||
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krndandaman
Mozambique16569 Posts
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Capped
United Kingdom7236 Posts
On August 04 2013 20:58 krndandaman wrote: Is anyone really surprised though? The result now isn't really surprising at all looking back at how Blizzard has handled SC2. And yes, in this day and age, free to play seems to reign- with all the games out there, most people can't be bothered to commit money to a game they don't know if they will enjoy or not. An anecdote from yesterday: 2 friends and I were at a pc bang in seoul and decided to play games all night before my friend had to go back to military service. After playing several LoL games we wanted to play other games. We played sudden attack, MVP baseball, world of tanks, and soon ran out of games. Friend mentioned he wanted to try sc2 seeing how he loved sc1 and never got to play sc2 and was bummed when he realized he had to buy an account to even try it. Who pays to try a game when you have so many fun, free options? You dont have to pay to try it. nice waste of a post | ||
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krndandaman
Mozambique16569 Posts
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synd
Bulgaria586 Posts
Also Diablo 3 is another example of foolishness. | ||
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krndandaman
Mozambique16569 Posts
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Wesso
Netherlands1245 Posts
On August 04 2013 22:45 krndandaman wrote: how so? mind explaining so your post isn't a waste as well? if there is a method I do not really know- the only way I was able to play sc2 without paying was through the beta and using a friend's account, which wasn't that fun because I was matched against people much better than me. my friends seem to have a similar issue with trying sc2 so please, enlighten me instead of just bashing. there is a starter edition https://us.battle.net/account/sc2/starter-edition/ | ||
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Targe
United Kingdom14103 Posts
On August 04 2013 23:51 Wesso wrote: there is a starter edition https://us.battle.net/account/sc2/starter-edition/ And there is spawning. | ||
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don_kyuhote
3006 Posts
On August 04 2013 22:45 krndandaman wrote: how so? mind explaining so your post isn't a waste as well? if there is a method I do not really know- the only way I was able to play sc2 without paying was through the beta and using a friend's account, which wasn't that fun because I was matched against people much better than me. my friends seem to have a similar issue with trying sc2 so please, enlighten me instead of just bashing. you just need blizzard battle.net account. It's free to register, but the whole registration process is such a hassle compare to bw where you just click multiplayer -> battle.net -> new id/new pw -> log in and play. | ||
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krndandaman
Mozambique16569 Posts
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HardlyNever
United States1258 Posts
Also, if you make SC2 f2p, you may as remove the ladder and matchmaking from the game, as it will instantly become a hackfest on the level WC3 was in its later years. There already seems to be an issue with a rise in hackers, and if you make it f2p, hacking will become the standard, not the exception, as any sort of ban can be circumvented by just creating another account. F2P would actually kill the sc2 (or any other RTS) "casual" scene, not help it. | ||
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BlackPanther
United States872 Posts
On August 05 2013 02:13 HardlyNever wrote: There will never be a company to try to compete with SC2. RTS has not been popular, as a genre, since the 90s. There is no money in RTS. Honestly, we should be grateful for what we have from Blizzard, because no other company would even try to put an RTS out now, because they are so unpopular (we can get into why they are unpopular, but it isn't because they aren't free to play). Also, if you make SC2 f2p, you may as remove the ladder and matchmaking from the game, as it will instantly become a hackfest on the level WC3 was in its later years. There already seems to be an issue with a rise in hackers, and if you make it f2p, hacking will become the standard, not the exception, as any sort of ban can be circumvented by just creating another account. F2P would actually kill the sc2 (or any other RTS) "casual" scene, not help it. I don't know where you are getting the idea that RTS isn't a popular genre. It's probably one of the most popular genre on PC next to FPS. Command & Conquer 3, Red Alert 3, Empire: Total War, and Company of Heroes were all major PC hits before SC2 came out so there certainly is a market out there for them. In response to the hacking concern, I think this is actually a design issue as opposed to an unsolvable problem. SC2 runs multiplayer games using a peer-2-peer model, basically meaning that the map data is on your computer whenever you are playing as opposed to a centralized server. This means you can essentially create a hack to modify the map data on your computer to reveal the fog of war, give information, etc. If SC2 was free-to-play, Blizzard would probably be making enough money through microtransactions to maintain the cost of running these servers. I believe this is also how League of Legends runs its games and which is why you never hear about hackers. | ||
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HardlyNever
United States1258 Posts
On August 05 2013 05:12 BlackPanther wrote: I don't know where you are getting the idea that RTS isn't a popular genre. It's probably one of the most popular genre on PC next to FPS. Command & Conquer 3, Red Alert 3, Empire: Total War, and Company of Heroes were all major PC hits before SC2 came out so there certainly is a market out there for them. In response to the hacking concern, I think this is actually a design issue as opposed to an unsolvable problem. SC2 runs multiplayer games using a peer-2-peer model, basically meaning that the map data is on your computer whenever you are playing as opposed to a centralized server. This means you can essentially create a hack to modify the map data on your computer to reveal the fog of war, give information, etc. If SC2 was free-to-play, Blizzard would probably be making enough money through microtransactions to maintain the cost of running these servers. I believe this is also how League of Legends runs its games and which is why you never hear about hackers. Those games were "popular" by pc standards, but we not really big sellers. Also, they were popular largely in a single player sense; there is no competitive scene (that I'm aware of, and if there is, it is really small) for any of those games. I guess to be more specific, competitive multiplayer RTSs aren't popular (and probably never will be). There will always be market for a decent single player experience every year or so. I know they have multiplayer components, but no one really plays them for that over a long period of time. The second thing about hacking isn't correct. It's been rehashed on these forums (and others) why you can't hack LoL/Dota and why you can hack sc2. The short of it is, because there is so much more relevant data (units, structures) both player's computers have to know what the other has in SC2, because it can't preload this information right before they encounter it in the fog of war. In mobas, there is a lot less info, so you can preload it when players get close to each other. There's a little more too it than that, but it isn't because Blizzard is "too cheap" to have dedicated sc2 servers. Edit: Also C&C and red alert are the same thing, and that was published back in 2008... RTS isn't a big money maker genre. | ||
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Bayyne
United States1967 Posts
I'm of the opinion that the game itself, the actual game design elements and the basic features accompanying the game need complete overhaul. Remember all those 'ladder anxiety' threads, the many fixes to encourage people to play (hiding records in lower leagues, no league demotion, etc)? I believe you don't need actual numbers to see that the player-base is gradually dropping off(and has been after the first year release hangover), which is the opposite trend that the two other games are currently experiencing. If Blizzard could release their active player base numbers and show us long term increase in player numbers I will happily admit error on my part. But to my knowledge they haven't and they won't, because I believe the numbers are pretty embarrassing. You mentioned that going F2P would motivate Blizzard to do things that would trigger micro-transactions, which in essence would finance other things surrounding SC2 esports. I think that's a great idea, however that seems like (in my eyes) putting a band-aid over a cut that requires reconstructive surgery and many stitches. Why would your average Joe want to spend money on micro-transactions towards a game they don't really enjoy playing anyways? You might see an initial interest because of the novelty of SC2 micro-transactions, but as a long term model I just can't see F2P working with the current SC2 game we have. I don't believe a F2P wouldn't work, I just don't think it would work with the game we have now. | ||
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