Sirlin is damn right, and Blizzard is designing SC2 in exactly the same mindset. Needing 40 actions to re-rally your 10 Gateways is NOT a strategic decision. The comparison to Street Fighter as absolutley valid. Needing to execute a (too) complex sequence of actions to make a simple move is not needed to make the game any deeper, and the same is true for SC.

Why are you all so fricking focused on APM? Do you really think the game would be less deep and interesting if it only required 200 APM to be played good? Isn't that a flaw in game design then?

I hope Blizzard will prove you all wrong with SC2 and that they will design a great game, that you all like, although it won't reward higher APM as much as does BW...

Edit: Forget this post. Some like chocolate, some like vanilla and even others like extreme high APM. SCBW was always a fun game even when i played it the first time with 9 probes on my 9 mineral patches, only using the mouse and with like 40 apm and it is fun with 200 apm, hotkeys and 25 probes.

I bet all this whining about apm/mbs/am/wtfbbq will stop when SC2 finally comes out and when we all will enjoy a new high quality game provided by our favorite game developers.

Peace

Excalibur_Z

United States12248 Posts

February 06 2009 02:32 GMT

#267

I think the inherent flaw is that maintaining a focus on exclusively strategy is a one-dimensional outlook. I'd like Rekrul to expand on what he was saying before about a neural interface causing games to be repetitive and boring, since I believe that would be a fitting response.

TSL-Lore

United States412 Posts

February 06 2009 03:14 GMT

#268

people aren't necessarily focused on APM, as a lot of very powerful players dont necessarily have the highest APM (Stork/Savior for example). But making everything automated makes starcraft a completely different game.

LosingID8

CA10830 Posts

February 06 2009 03:55 GMT

#269

ok i watched the entire thing.

pretty good for a first lecture. i wish you guys the best of luck!

if i ever get an excuse to go up to berkeley this semester i am definitely sitting in on that class.

Rekrul

Korea (South)17174 Posts

February 06 2009 04:21 GMT

#270

On February 06 2009 11:32 Excalibur_Z wrote:
I think the inherent flaw is that maintaining a focus on exclusively strategy is a one-dimensional outlook. I'd like Rekrul to expand on what he was saying before about a neural interface causing games to be repetitive and boring, since I believe that would be a fitting response.

Turning the game into more of a slower turn-basedish strategy game will result in games being decided by who can memorize the best builds much like chess. You will not be able to make up for any errors you do make. There will be no amazing things you can do.

The fact that APM is so important in SC is what makes the strategy so advanced. Because the game is so technical every player is playing every situation in a different way due to their own macro/micro and their opponents macro/micro. This creates an infinite amount of scenarios in which players much 'feel' and find the right strategical decision for that situation.

It is only under the stress of having to multitask and do so much shit that we can see a true player's strategical ability put to the test. If you slow the game down any dumb fuck kid like Sirlin can figure out what the best strategical decisions are (thanks to watching a lot of replays, which is what someone like Sirlin would do to get 'good' at a game considering he's too dumb to comprehend the obvious facts of what I've just written in this post.)

If the game is made like this retard wants you're going to end up with games being boring and decided by merely a few mistakes and a few smart moves. Starcraft in its current state are so back and forth simply because it is so easy to make mistakes and so easy to do amazing stuff at the same time, which happens thousands of times per game and why it's entertaining to play and watch.

Rekrul

Korea (South)17174 Posts

February 06 2009 04:53 GMT

#271

Seriously who is this Sirlin kid and what rock did he crawl out from under anyways?

Zalfor

United States1035 Posts

February 06 2009 04:55 GMT

#272

lol rekrul. powar to the masses!

OneOther

United States10774 Posts

February 06 2009 05:16 GMT

#273

hahahaha

rushz0rz

Canada5300 Posts

February 06 2009 05:22 GMT

#274

On February 06 2009 13:53 Rekrul wrote:
Seriously who is this Sirlin kid and what rock did he crawl out from under anyways?

LOL.

he seems like an arrogant, condescending asshole. he's like one of those guys who thinks they are good at every game and think they know everything because they are good at one.

put him in his place Rek.

systranerror

United States27 Posts

February 06 2009 05:24 GMT

#275

Sirlin made Kongai at kongregate.com, wrote some book about fighting game theory (that he tries to ineffectively apply to other genres of games), and worked on Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD. He wrote that "playing to win" article that is pretty popular. I like his attitude when it comes to fighting games, but he really pisses me off when he talks about Starcraft.

He has created this "theory" of how games should work. He can't find out how to fit Starcraft into his theory, and so rather than modifying his theory to apply to Starcraft he'd rather change Starcraft to fit into his theory. The fact that he actually raised his hand and said "what about yomi... the japanese word for--" and then actually just HAD TO SAY "I wrote a book about it and made a card game based on it" made him look like a sperging nerd who can't be taken very seriously outside of his asperger realm of fighting games/card games based on fighting games.

It's also interesting to note that his card game, Kongai, I heard from an unreliable source (don't care to research this), that the top ranked player in that game just made some formula which he uses completely mathematically and it wins for him almost all the time. The game is basically Sirlin's theory in action, and while it is sort of fun, the fact that it focuses so much on YOMI (gotta roll eyes when I type that) makes it pretty boring. The element of reading your opponent in a good fighting game or in Starcraft is fun because so much other stuff is going on, in Kongai it's pretty much the only thing you can do, and therefore it becomes way overplayed and almost random (i.e. "Ok I think he's going to switch out... but he knows I know that... so I'm not going to do that... but he knows etc. etc.)

terr13

United States298 Posts

February 06 2009 05:32 GMT

#276

I wouldn't compare it to chess, because chess does have amazing things, just much harder to understand, and the number of openings that you have to memorize is a lot more than you think. There is no best opening, there is no best line in an opening, but there are mistakes that can be taken advantage of. Chess, and most turn-based board games, are a lot more complicated than you make them seem. This is also the reason why SC shouldn't be dumbed down, it would make the game too simple. It would be like taking WC3, and then taking away the heroes.

Puosu

7020 Posts

February 06 2009 05:33 GMT

#277

On February 06 2009 14:32 terr13 wrote:
I wouldn't compare it to chess, because chess does have amazing things, just much harder to understand, and the number of openings that you have to memorize is a lot more than you think. There is no best opening, there is no best line in an opening, but there are mistakes that can be taken advantage of. Chess, and most turn-based board games, are a lot more complicated than you make them seem. This is also the reason why SC shouldn't be dumbed down, it would make the game too simple. It would be like taking WC3, and then taking away the heroes.

Very true, StarCraft is nothing if you take away the mechanics, it just becames a strategy game with no deepness in it, no video game can match chess or go..

NotJumperer

United States1371 Posts

February 06 2009 05:39 GMT

#278

--- Nuked ---

motbob

United States12546 Posts

February 06 2009 05:40 GMT

#279

How boring would it be if Kwanro and Jaedong were playing a ZvZ that went like this:

Kwanro: "I'm 9 pooling"
Jaedong: "I'm 12 hatching. GG you win."

EDIT: Well, it probably actually would be GG. But you get my point.