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I first started really playing starcraft:broodwar my freshman year of high school. I played an UMS map called diplomacy 7.7, before eventually discovering the competitive BW scene. I remember really loving Boxer and nal_Ra (I got kicked out of my school's library for watching klazart casts!). Though it's not impressive, I was very pleased when I finally reached C on iccup.
So when SC2 was announced, and then the beta came out I was excited! I didn't want to wait to play it, so I bought a beta key (something I've never done before or since.) My laptop wouldn't run sc2, so I had to play on my brother's computer (he really didn't like that  ). GSL was announced and it was such a huge deal at the time: Foreigners were going to be allowed to freely enter a major tournament in Korea! In 2010 MLG came to Dallas and since I live in Houston I practiced hard for it. I ended up losing 0-2 to SeleCT, and then 1-2 to iNcontrol. But it was a blast. The "chapel of SC2" is one of my fondest sc2 memories. Jinro took that tournament, and then went on the the GSL! The SC2 club at my university had a GSL account we would use to watch VODs, and I would often stay up to watch it.
Now I can't remember the last time I watched the GSL. I've hopped on and gotten my account into masters a couple times in the past year, but I almost never play. Broodwar was never like that for me. Even though I would go off and play other games, I would always come back to Broodwar. I don't "feel" like coming back to sc2.
When I ask my self why I'm not really sure. I don't think sc2 is as good of a a game as BW and that's part of it. Another part I think is hype fallout. In 2010-2011 I was so hyped on sc2. Everything was looking good everything was growing, and then it started to decline. And all of the big names said "SC2 isn't dying! SC2 is doing just fine." And yet still we kept declining. It felt shitty seeing the game I know and dedicated tons of time to, to be continually falling further and further, while being told it was fine and that I was a hater if I said otherwise.
But I think the biggest thing is how the game plays out. In BW I played terran. I like turtling, defending against every attack before slowly pushing out. I liked how taxing the macro was, and how I could beat people simply by being good at the macro. I hated mutalisks with a passion, but eventually I learned how to turret properly to defend. Contrasting that to PvZ (I played P in sc2) it always felt like I had to do something cheeky. I had to do some kind of harass or timing attack. If I tried to play straight up, I would get contained and outmacroed. I miss being able to win by macro alone. While I understand that this isn't necessarily a flaw with the game but myself, I can't help but feeling like sc2 just feels wrong. This isn't the RTS I fell in love with in highschool. This isn't what sc2 was supposed to be.
Perhaps if sc2 never would've came around I would've grown bored of BW. Maybe a lot of the things that were great about BW were purely luck of the times (replays of pros were scarce, observing in games was nothing like it was now, mechanical limits, etc....). But where's the innovation (not bogus!)? Where are the people doing wildly new things? Where's the introduction of the Fantasy mech builds, or sAviOr eating terrans like nobody could before? The games aren't exciting anymore, and I don't have any hope for legacy of the void, especially with all of the focus Heroes of the Storm is getting. I miss BW. I wish it would run well on my computer without causing crashes. But alas that time is gone. Maybe it's just because I'm getting older.
Guess that's all for my rant. I don't know what I really meant to say, or if I did anything other than vaguely whine. Oh well.
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BW is still the best RTS ever made (at least in my oppinion). I am bored after several years of playing it though. Especially because all my clanmates and friends stopped playing and the league scene is not existent anymore. I really loved to play wgtcl and bwcl. Because i am a old man now i prefer playing something that is still fast paced and tactical but not as mechanically demanding. :p Therefore i am playing TA Zero now.
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TLADT24920 Posts
I didn't "discover" the BW proscene till I came to TL in 2010 though at the time, I was immersed with SCII to take notice. I used "" because I knew about it back in 2000 from a friend after I discovered the game. At that time, I was a noob and used to 1 base. With my friends, it was NR20 and after they left, I eventually got into playing team games and finally, fastest map possible vs AI (2v6c and 3v5c were my favourite) randomly over the years.
I, like you (aside from watching the BW proscene at its prime) was excited about SCII's release. I remember checking Blizzard's website in 2007 just waiting for any news. Seeing the zerg trailer, terran units reveals, etc... so exciting. I may even have the original trailer from back when banshees did AOE damage, reapers had the bomb secondary attack which was awesome imo. Back when the cobra was in the game and BCs could be customized. I ended up putting a lot of time into SCII. I preordered it and got it on day one. I went through the campaign then played MP a ton dropping all my other games at the time. Used to play a lot of community members on another forum, play customs, micro maps etc... eventually though, I got tired of it. Colossi and the spawn larva mechanic tired me out. Being forced into the same composition each game also tired me out lol.
It's hard to explain it but in all honesty, I was crazy passionate about the game. Watching streams in the middle of class, talking about tournaments and trying to get friends to watch (I succeeded with one of them and we watched MLG vods+pizza at one point lol), having starcraft dreams etc... Eventually though, I gave up. The game slowly became boring. All my friends from another forum also moved on and I did so as time passed going back to BW. I've tried firing up SCII several times just to see if anything changed but everytime I've done that, by the time the first game starts, I wonder what I'm doing lol. After a third game, I quit. I dunno, maybe I burned out but I've played 5 games at best in the last year? Surely, you can't be burned out on 5 games in a year >.> I figured HoTS will help reignite my passion but it felt the same once the novelty of wm ran out.
As for BW, the little bugger has been in my life on and off for 14 years now lol. I still can't comprehend how it's been that long since I first played the game when I was back in high school till now. I also love terran in BW and mostly play TvZ with another friend though PvZ is fun too. Something about SK Terran and wanting good bio control never gets old especially when I've only scratched <5% of all BW maps. Also, curse the guy who thought having 10 temples on neo medusa is a good idea. Lost a game that I could've had due to that! -_- lol.
Anyways, I could write more but I went in depth in my 10,000 blog if you want to read about my own experience 
ps you can at least watch the tournaments going and I'm sure you can fix the crashes, just search around and you'll find something (or do a dual boot with xp or 7).
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I understand your feelings and thoughts, and I agree with them. I wish BW was a lil more active still in the foreign scene, i always find myself going back and forth every day from SC2 to BW, but right now i'm basically only playing SC2, If you tried switching races you may find that you will find a lot more enjoyment again.
Maybe try playing Terran in SC2 now, you know you can camp pretty well with Terran these days, and Mech is becoming more and more viable! I'd give it a shot, see how you like it.
I just recently started a clan on SC2 and have a lot of old BW friends joining in and I am finding a little more enjoyment through this, just finding things to occupy time and finding enjoyment anyway you can.
Anyways nice blog , GL HF GG !
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Just play Starbow, that's what I do when I get tired of sc2.
Sc2 is indeed a shitty game compared to BW, no doubt about that. Just look at the drama it generates. Oh, wait, it doesn't generate drama. Where is this Flash vs Jaedong hype? Or even the thrill of the last few OSLs when Jangbi came to dominate? I can only hope that a day will come when GOM adopts Starbow for the GSL instead of SC2.
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Yeah, Starbow is a nice way to keep most interesting aspects from BW while bringing something new on the table without changing as much stuff as SC2 did.
I think a lo of BW players wish that SC2 never took such a different route compared to BW as they did.
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i feel like you guys in most of the aspects you mentioned. I had that same hype and fever for Sc2 in the beginning and than it began to burn out rapidly. I tried to cling to the game quite long, because i just wasn't ready to accept, that the game would (never?) be, what i wanted it initially. I started playing BW competitively in 2007 i think because of the first Sc2 announces. But when the Beta hit, i was pretty much into BW and had very high expectations... you know the rest of the story. i stopped playing Sc2 for good a few month before HotS came out and i really never regretted going back to BW. Of course the foreign scene is very small, i dont play in a clan in BWCL anymore liked i used too and such, but i feel playing the game i love is just worth minor annoyances. BW just gives me enough joy, just playing it. By comparison if i launch Sc2 again i can't stand more than a game or two, it's boring and partly really annoys me. I have a hard time understanding how one can settle with playing Sc2 while feeling similar like i do.
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Calgary25981 Posts
I agree with everything you wrote. I also believe the community had something to do with it as well. It was a strange time when SC2 was popular, where the community was demanding absolute professionalism from events, tournaments, and broadcasters, while also demanding content for free. It might have worked to push the scene further ahead (look at broadcasts now in LoL and DotA for example), but it sucked the fun out of SC2 pretty quick during that time.
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On October 28 2014 21:56 Chill wrote:
It was a strange time when SC2 was popular, where the community was demanding absolute professionalism from events, tournaments, and broadcasters, while also demanding content for free.
that is not strange. it is standard consumer behaviour.
Fans of the WWE and UFC clamour for more content and better coverage.
as the UFC and WWE add more ways to consume their product ... more illegal methods of consuming their product develop to satisfy the demand for everything being free.
in Canada, every one is demanding higher quality hockey coverage and at the same time flocking to illegal restreams.
Rogers paid $5.2 billion for NHL rights and responded to illegal restreaming by making their latest innovations in hockey broadcasting free.
the SC2 community wants continual work done on stomping out hackers, server maintenance, balance patches, etc.. all for something they paid $60 for in 2010 and $40 for in 2013. This is the consumer segment SC2 broadcasters chose to cater to. That is, a group of people who've spent a small amount of money a long time ago.
Therefore, Sc2 content pedlars should not be surprised when meeting resistance the minute they attempt to charge money for their product.
SC2 Live Event ticket prices have always been absolute rock bottom because of the consumer segment they are dealing with. Now the Blizzcon 2014 SC2 Tourney tickets have been put on a reduced price.
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EPT
