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On September 21 2014 02:38 outscar wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 00:24 Prowler wrote:
How much did it cost to develop this "expansion", what was the original price and how many copies were sold? Amazon sells per CD for approx. 17$ (£ 10). It has cost nothing for them. It seems that devs made that maps in hurry to sell them as faster as they can. About copies none information, neither about publisher.
Someone had to pay the mapmakers a salary? In a business everything costs money, even employees taking a 15 minute unpaid break costs money. Unless you run it alone.
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Eh, Stellar Forces had more heart.
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On September 21 2014 05:23 Prowler wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 02:38 outscar wrote:On September 21 2014 00:24 Prowler wrote:
How much did it cost to develop this "expansion", what was the original price and how many copies were sold? Amazon sells per CD for approx. 17$ (£ 10). It has cost nothing for them. It seems that devs made that maps in hurry to sell them as faster as they can. About copies none information, neither about publisher. Someone had to pay the mapmakers a salary? In a business everything costs money, even employees taking a 15 minute unpaid break costs money. Unless you run it alone.
I could of made all of those maps in 30 minutes or less while drunk as shit so I don't think it was that map work. Anyone played the added campaigns though on the 3 different expansions? (Retribution, insurrection, and this) , not sure if they all have campaigns but it'd be cool to know .
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Oh my holy crap, it's another shovel of garbage from hell...
Interesting how like half of the maps are just different developement degeneration stages of the same basic "concept"...
What drives people to make anything like this ? Is it the hope to extract some quick bucks from those who are marginally more deliriously naïve than them ?!
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I don't know Freakling but I would totally buy a BWMN CD if it was on sale.
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On September 21 2014 07:22 3FFA wrote:
I don't know Freakling but I would totally buy a BWMN CD if it was on sale.
I was collecting BWMN maps long since half a year. Right now I got over 2541 maps, and want to finish collecting but current newer map id is 4741, it looks like that I harbored only 50 %, but not every map id exists, so many deleted and it means 70% of my job is done. Also I think remaining 30% is trash because I really copied the best maps.
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Northern Ireland27463 Posts
These are fucking hilarious
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Anyone played the added campaigns though on the 3 different expansions? (Retribution, insurrection, and this) , not sure if they all have campaigns but it'd be cool to know .
I played Insurrection about 2 years ago. I first saw it in 2001 (at my mom's work when I was a little sucker : ) ) but never had a chance to experience that add-on. It has good sound casting, especially rough and badass voice of heroic firebat Jack Frost. I enjoyed briefings and watched all of them till the end. Terran and Protoss missions are cakewalk, the final Zerg campaign gives some challenge.
I never played Retribution. Although it is qualitative stuff with sound cast it has so boring walkthrough. The main goal of three races is Argus Stone. It has tasteless and short mission briefings with only one guider for each camp.
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On September 21 2014 05:23 Prowler wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 02:38 outscar wrote:On September 21 2014 00:24 Prowler wrote:
How much did it cost to develop this "expansion", what was the original price and how many copies were sold? Amazon sells per CD for approx. 17$ (£ 10). It has cost nothing for them. It seems that devs made that maps in hurry to sell them as faster as they can. About copies none information, neither about publisher. Someone had to pay the mapmakers a salary? In a business everything costs money, even employees taking a 15 minute unpaid break costs money. Unless you run it alone.
The "everything cost money" argument is silly and we should stop repeating it all the time. It doesnt mean anything. You cannot tie cost to a 15 min break because the cost of having employees make shitty maps is pretty much the same regardless!
And having breaks might even increase productivity. I mean why not share your mud-on-previous-map-trick with your colleagues? That way they can finished the 1000 maps in one day instead of two, with decreased net costs. (wow, amazing!). Unfortunately there wasn't any more breaks, so brilliant maps like "Lost Mud", "Mud-fight Spirit" or "Tau Mud" was never invented. So sad.
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51698 Posts
so if i understand correctly, between the period of starcraft and brood war, these shitty companies decided to try and make a quick buck through these 'expansion packs' and made all these terrible maps?
then i guess blizzard laid down the law and it stopped.
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China6332 Posts
Among all the non-BW expansions, only Insurrection and Retribution are Blizzard authorized, all the rest are unofficial and illegal.
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51698 Posts
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Northern Ireland27463 Posts
Shit I didn't even know there were two authorised non-Blizzard expansions, worth obtaining?
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On September 21 2014 12:36 Mutisk wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 05:23 Prowler wrote:On September 21 2014 02:38 outscar wrote:On September 21 2014 00:24 Prowler wrote:
How much did it cost to develop this "expansion", what was the original price and how many copies were sold? Amazon sells per CD for approx. 17$ (£ 10). It has cost nothing for them. It seems that devs made that maps in hurry to sell them as faster as they can. About copies none information, neither about publisher. Someone had to pay the mapmakers a salary? In a business everything costs money, even employees taking a 15 minute unpaid break costs money. Unless you run it alone. The "everything cost money" argument is silly and we should stop repeating it all the time. It doesnt mean anything. You cannot tie cost to a 15 min break because the cost of having employees make shitty maps is pretty much the same regardless! And having breaks might even increase productivity. I mean why not share your mud-on-previous-map-trick with your colleagues? That way they can finished the 1000 maps in one day instead of two, with decreased net costs. (wow, amazing!). Unfortunately there wasn't any more breaks, so brilliant maps like "Lost Mud", "Mud-fight Spirit" or "Tau Mud" was never invented. So sad.
My point was that if a company wants someone to make 1000 maps, I'm pretty sure that the one who is making the maps would want money for his time, no matter how easy the maps were to make, like most employees. And I was interested in knowing how much this company spent on development costs. (In order to know how much faith they had that they could sell such a product and make a profit)
I don't feel like this is the thread to discuss basic economics. Thus I wont counter your argument.
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wow should have applied for this "mapmaker" position then, easy money there. pity we are too young at the time.
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On September 21 2014 06:40 Freakling wrote:
Oh my holy crap, it's another shovel of garbage from hell...
Interesting how like half of the maps are just different developement degeneration stages of the same basic "concept"...
What drives people to make anything like this ? Is it the hope to extract some quick bucks from those who are marginally more deliriously naïve than them ?!
Yep it was a way to make some bucks quickly with low cost
but you dont understand the context... those addons were made around 1998, when internet was still not that popular.
IMHO the people who bought such expansion packs just wanted to have another single player campaign. They did not want multiplayer maps - if they had internet, they would download them online. The "1000 multiplayer maps" was just a marketing gimmick, since no one would play them anyway (people who played single player probably would not play melee vs computer, while multiplayer crowd played other maps and would not buy the addon anyway, since they could download it online). In 1998 or 1999 a single player StarCraft fan without internet connection had very limited access to other maps.
Playing the melee maps vs computer was boring - people wanted campaigns.
The only way you could get it was asking a friend with internet to download them for you (and maybe burn on a CD), perhaps going to an internet cafe (does anyone remember them?) and downloading them, or maybe some maps would be added on a CD added to a gaming magazine (does anyone remember this?)... or you could buy an addon.
I remember that I had the Insurrection addon, where the campaign was not very good... but at least it was something to play. I was really bad at the game at the time, so even going through the campaign took some time.
I remember that I finished the original Campaign, the "Precursor" campaign made by Blizzard (I think it is from the demo) and perhaps some other Blizzard made campaign (or maybe I am mistaking it with the precursor campaing - it it somewhere in the game directory)... and I was hungry to play more, since StarCraft was (and is) a great game... and in 1998 it was a fantastic game. But guess what - no internet connection.
So then we had demand.. and someone decided to get some supply.
On September 21 2014 05:16 arb wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 04:42 8882 wrote:
Everyone is discussing the terrible melee maps, but what about the campaign? Was it any good?
From the "square" placement of minerals it is pretty easy to conclude that the person who made the maps, did not even play the game. have you seen some of the campaign mineral placements? or even the blizzard map mineral placements?
Yes, they were often bad, but not super bad, not "squares" of minerals.
Those squares look as if someone who made the maps never actually played the game to see how it works.
On September 21 2014 06:15 GGzerG wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 05:23 Prowler wrote:On September 21 2014 02:38 outscar wrote:On September 21 2014 00:24 Prowler wrote:
How much did it cost to develop this "expansion", what was the original price and how many copies were sold? Amazon sells per CD for approx. 17$ (£ 10). It has cost nothing for them. It seems that devs made that maps in hurry to sell them as faster as they can. About copies none information, neither about publisher. Someone had to pay the mapmakers a salary? In a business everything costs money, even employees taking a 15 minute unpaid break costs money. Unless you run it alone. I could of made all of those maps in 30 minutes or less while drunk as shit so I don't think it was that map work. Anyone played the added campaigns though on the 3 different expansions? (Retribution, insurrection, and this) , not sure if they all have campaigns but it'd be cool to know .
You cant make 1000 maps in 30 minutes... (unless you used some automatic tool, but it is obviously not the case here).
Even if it took you 1 minute to create a map (what is unrealistic, since it probably took at least 5-10 even to make those shitty maps) you would end up with 30 maps.
Seriously, what you write is pure nonsense.
On September 21 2014 12:36 Mutisk wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 05:23 Prowler wrote:On September 21 2014 02:38 outscar wrote:On September 21 2014 00:24 Prowler wrote:
How much did it cost to develop this "expansion", what was the original price and how many copies were sold? Amazon sells per CD for approx. 17$ (£ 10). It has cost nothing for them. It seems that devs made that maps in hurry to sell them as faster as they can. About copies none information, neither about publisher. Someone had to pay the mapmakers a salary? In a business everything costs money, even employees taking a 15 minute unpaid break costs money. Unless you run it alone. The "everything cost money" argument is silly and we should stop repeating it all the time. It doesnt mean anything. You cannot tie cost to a 15 min break because the cost of having employees make shitty maps is pretty much the same regardless! And having breaks might even increase productivity. I mean why not share your mud-on-previous-map-trick with your colleagues? That way they can finished the 1000 maps in one day instead of two, with decreased net costs. (wow, amazing!). Unfortunately there wasn't any more breaks, so brilliant maps like "Lost Mud", "Mud-fight Spirit" or "Tau Mud" was never invented. So sad.
It's pretty funny that you can learn how to run the business on a Starcraft related forum, where one guy claims that it is possible to make 1000 maps in 30 minutes and another guy is apparently a management expert who knows better if Idle Time ( http://www.investopedia.com/terms/i/idle-time.asp ) is not a cost.
It is a cost.
If the employee doing maps is paid by the hour: he will take more money and not work - so it will cost you more to get the maps.
If the employee is paid a success fee for delivering 1000 maps, first of all they can be of shitty quality (since the employee was not working) and maybe the more important factor is that they will be delivered later - and time is money: either you could have shipped the product earlier (and potentially got more money since you did it before the competition / while the product was still desired), or the employee could start working on something else and earn more money, or both.
Ah socialists...
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On September 21 2014 21:04 8882 wrote:
It is a cost.
If the employee doing maps is paid by the hour: he will take more money and not work - so it will cost you more to get the maps.
If the employee is paid a success fee for delivering 1000 maps, first of all they can be of shitty quality (since the employee was not working) and maybe the more important factor is that they will be delivered later - and time is money: either you could have shipped the product earlier (and potentially got more money since you did it before the competition / while the product was still desired), or the employee could start working on something else and earn more money, or both.
Ah socialists...
I'm happy you found it funny, it was my main reason for going on the hyperbole. But since you list cases, why omit the one case I made, i.e when taking breaks increase productivity?
http://everydaylife.globalpost.com/data-entry-jobs-taking-breaks-increase-productivity-5117.html
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0014013021000047557#.VB7QJ0TjbYQ
I recognice that arguing in terms of costs is often a good thing to do, but what I object to is the statement that everything is a cost because that really doesnt say anything.
On September 21 2014 21:04 8882 wrote:... time is money ...
This is another thing we should stop saying, it is wrong. Here's a good read why: http://www.shea.io/time-is-money-will-lead-you-down-the-wrong-path/
Like myself, don't take me too serious thou... 
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During vanilla SC all people had were dial-up modems and unless you had multiple phone lines which, I didn't know anyone that did, you couldn't phone and internet at the same time. Getting 1000 maps on CD like this would have been great at the time. I would have bought this expansion if I knew about it. Probably would have had a lot of fun with it too.
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There were a lot of this type of thing around and had been for a while. 1000 Doom maps, 1000 quake maps, 1000 CS maps. I guess it started with "My friends don't have internet, I do, I'll burn a bunch of maps to CD, they will be pleased." and, after a couple intermediate steps made it to "Let's make a company, hire monkeys to spam out maps and sell it".
On September 21 2014 21:04 8882 wrote:
Ah socialists...
What are you talking about? Unauthorised break time isn't socialism. It's communism.
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On September 22 2014 00:16 Dapper_Cad wrote:
There were a lot of this type of thing around and had been for a while. 1000 Doom maps, 1000 quake maps, 1000 CS maps. I guess it started with "My friends don't have internet, I do, I'll burn a bunch of maps to CD, they will be pleased." and, after a couple intermediate steps made it to "Let's make a company, hire monkeys to spam out maps and sell it".
I remember that I used to buy "Internet Magazine" - basically they would rip whole pages and burn them on a CD... and you could browse the internet offline. Ah the dark times :-)
On September 21 2014 23:10 Mutisk wrote:Show nested quote +On September 21 2014 21:04 8882 wrote:
It is a cost.
If the employee doing maps is paid by the hour: he will take more money and not work - so it will cost you more to get the maps.
If the employee is paid a success fee for delivering 1000 maps, first of all they can be of shitty quality (since the employee was not working) and maybe the more important factor is that they will be delivered later - and time is money: either you could have shipped the product earlier (and potentially got more money since you did it before the competition / while the product was still desired), or the employee could start working on something else and earn more money, or both.
Ah socialists... I'm happy you found it funny, it was my main reason for going on the hyperbole. But since you list cases, why omit the one case I made, i.e when taking breaks increase productivity? http://everydaylife.globalpost.com/data-entry-jobs-taking-breaks-increase-productivity-5117.htmlhttp://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0014013021000047557#.VB7QJ0TjbYQ
When the market is stable (e.g. low unemployment) amount of work and earnings is something that is negotiated between the employer and employee - so the employee gets the salary to do his job. They can also negotiate the breaks and it is up to them. If employees take unscheduled breaks the productivity is lower. I am not writing that breaks are bad, but rather that people who dont do their work for which they are paid are bad.
You assume goodwill and that all people are good. Unfortunately not everyone is like you and some people would abuse it. If you would work for one day, you would probably understand, but I guess it is easy when you live off mommy's money and never run your own company.
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EPT
