I've been playing WOL since start. Zerg, platinum. Loved to watch MLG, GOM etc. However, lately I start to lose interest in the game, as well as watching streams or VOD's. This are starting to get repetitive and I have a feeling less people are online as well.
Now my question is: Did any of you experience this sudden decrease in SC2 enthusiasm, and if so, did you quit or find a way to stay interested?
Yes. It gets boring after a long while. The biggest problem is the horrible BNet UI and no clan system etc, you log in and feel like a ping pong ball in outer space. Empty. Lonely. edit: happy birthday btw
well i go on and off alot, ill play like crazy for a month and a half then stop for 3 4 weeks strait. what usually gets me back going is watchin a BIG LAN event.
but what i would recomend to keep your intrest, (if your just REALLY trying to get better) is to get a practice team/ parners or something like that. Get 4 5 people that are either you skill level or better then you and just practice... i wish i had some good firends to play with localy..... ever 1 i know is gold ot silver
i got 1 friend who is dia but he just 6 pooled his way to it and is garbo... so he does not count ^_^
I've been playing WOL since start. Zerg, platinum. Loved to watch MLG, GOM etc. However, lately I start to lose interest in the game, as well as watching streams or VOD's. This are starting to get repetitive and I have a feeling less people are online as well.
Now my question is: Did any of you experience this sudden decrease in SC2 enthusiasm, and if so, did you quit or find a way to stay interested?
Thx!
I've been watching a lot of Brood War, and that's motivated me to play more SC2.
after my friend stopped playing sc2, my motivation to play went away. none of my other friends would even consider it since theyd much rather play CoD or Madden. so i think having friends to play with is a huge factor. however, finding sc2 players to be friends with can be very hard
i got bored last summer. what can i say, game didnt entertain me and i didnt enjoy playing it. had a lot of friends playing it. i play with some of them time to time though. I got into diamond and wanted to get to masters but decided not to. I moved on to League of Legends and i enjoy it more lol . There is no specific reason for me quiting. Battle.net sucked, i couldnt turn to map making, etc.etc.
Yeah, one of the things that kept me going in WC3 was the fact that we had a place to hang out between games, chat with other people, friends clanmates etc. This led to random games, UMS, bets, obs games, just overall fun. I met tons of new people this way.
Bnet 2.0 doesn't really seem to allow this. It's great if you just want to log in and play some games, but it doesn't feel like a whole experience. My experience is that friends are made in chatrooms, and not so much in 1v1 games. So basically you meet noone new, which leads to things becoming dull. Or that's how it went for me anyway. Nowadays I have no motivation to play ladder anymore, just the occasional UMS with friends who have quit ladder as well. I still watch the big tournaments though.
There was a time where I used to watch every single game on GSL live, even up and downs, and first rounds of code A. After a while this kinda got boring (about a month or two ago for me), so now I only watch games of favourite players live or watch VODs of highly recommended games (based on LR thread voting). I think the reason it can become boring is that after becoming familiar with what standard play looks like, you know what to expect, and when you see exactly what you expect, you get bored. To answer your question, I don't have a magic formula to offer to make you suddenly more interested. But I must say that after taking a break from watching, when I tune into a 'standard' game, I find a few interesting changes to people's builds that can have a large impact to the game. Don't mass consume, but pick and choose what to watch.
Edit: game-play wise, try something different! play random, or choose to play another race for a while. Or keep playing your race, but do ridiculous non-standard play/cheese. Terran cheese in particular is fun imo.
Getting some friends to play with. Battle net alone is quite boring and not really social. And while laddering its hard to make friends, because not a lot of time to talk inhale and half the people are raging regards.
Only reason I occcasionally logon is to play some monobattles or teamgames.
On April 08 2012 17:32 OneObsession wrote: You need to set goals in Sc2 for example getting into higher league and focus on it. The feeling of getting promoted is unbelievable :D
I also did that. However, I'm master now, so I'm losing interest.
I've been getting bored of watching and playing Zerg lately, so I'm in the midst of switching to Terran... I went 2-6 on mid-plat ladder, so not TOO bad so far considering how little I've played T. TvP early game is tough.
Anyways, I always used to watch GSL and other events looking for Zerg games, and having seen hundreds it just got old... Now I'm watching from the Terran perspective and I'm excited again.
I'm having also huge motivation dumb towards sc2... I just feel that no matter what I do it is always in vain. I dont even see statistics. I don't see win rates ZvX. I just would like to see so much more statistics in the bnet but I guess it is just a stupid wish.
Been playing LoL with friends, just casual since sc2 makes me so frustrated.
Start going for more achievements and all that. I like playing the random Co-op matches vs. AIs. You meet some fun people and because the AIs suck in general, you can try out weird builds and whatnot while also getting achieves.
I mean if you are bored with the game you can just quit playing for a bit until you feel like playing again. If you aren't having fun, take a break and when you get that urge to play sc2 do it. I did this in december, took a month break about then I had the insane urge to play sc2 alot again and walla it still comes to me everyday :D. A month break did me good, just take a break and once you get a huge urge to play sc2 again do it ^^.
I was starting to lose interest about 1 year after the game launched. I now have minimal interest, but this is due to working full-time as a doctor. My interest will be rekindled when HotS releases.
On April 08 2012 17:32 OneObsession wrote: You need to set goals in Sc2 for example getting into higher league and focus on it. The feeling of getting promoted is unbelievable :D
I also did that. However, I'm master now, so I'm losing interest.
So why you dont focus on this broken GM league ^^?
What I felt like after getting a little bored was to play Brood War/Start getting into mapmaking. When I found both of those my interest got back. And now I've been playing since release and have never been this into it. Platinum Terran in 3 months time and still climbing
Delete the leagues, the division and the ranking. Keep the association system so you can play against people with the same level as you.
Problem solved , no more ladder fear : you just play for the fun not to get in an higher league when you are on losing streak you don't see you rank decreasing like crazy and you don't care that much because that doesn't mean anything no one make fun of you anymore ( how many times do I see on the Battlenet forum people saying " X is silver , he doesn't understand the game , he is not allowed to talk" )
Just keep GM league for the best players ( these players obviously don't fear the ladder ).It must be demotivating to say "i'm so bad that I can't be diamond / master" but no one really cares about being in the top 200 of Sc2 if you are playing for fun.
just make a little pause? i think there is just to match to watch and maybe you overplayed aswell soo just make a little pause dont watch if you dont want it and soon there will be an event which will catch you again and youll start watching/Playing again. thats how it works for me at least
For me, it is depend on watching tournaments. The games become more und more boring, saw no exciting games yesterday at ipl4 & gathering. Maybe because i watch/watched sc:bw & wc3 games and sc2 cant follow them.
On April 08 2012 20:00 algue wrote: Delete the leagues, the division and the ranking. Keep the association system so you can play against people with the same level as you.
Problem solved , no more ladder fear : you just play for the fun not to get in an higher league when you are on losing streak you don't see you rank decreasing like crazy and you don't care that much because that doesn't mean anything no one make fun of you anymore ( how many times do I see on the Battlenet forum people saying " X is silver , he doesn't understand the game , he is not allowed to talk" )
Just keep GM league for the best players ( these players obviously don't fear the ladder ).It must be demotivating to say "i'm so bad that I can't be diamond / master" but no one really cares about being in the top 200 of Sc2 if you are playing for fun.
How would that make it more interesting? He never says ladder fear is an issue for him
On April 08 2012 20:00 algue wrote: Delete the leagues, the division and the ranking. Keep the association system so you can play against people with the same level as you.
Problem solved , no more ladder fear : you just play for the fun not to get in an higher league when you are on losing streak you don't see you rank decreasing like crazy and you don't care that much because that doesn't mean anything no one make fun of you anymore ( how many times do I see on the Battlenet forum people saying " X is silver , he doesn't understand the game , he is not allowed to talk" )
Just keep GM league for the best players ( these players obviously don't fear the ladder ).It must be demotivating to say "i'm so bad that I can't be diamond / master" but no one really cares about being in the top 200 of Sc2 if you are playing for fun.
How would that make it more interesting? He never says ladder fear is an issue for him
It would make it more interesting because you don't need to play to win , you play to have fun. You can do One base Ultralisk , you will lose but you don't care because you don't lose anything else than the game If you do this now you lose rank/league so you don't do it ( even if you LoO0Oove this strat ) because 1 base ultra is not the best way to win
off-racing, playing tournaments like playhem etc. play differend everyday for example as terran u could do mechday, bioday, airday etc to keep stuff intresting or make fast ninja expand every game. play team games. its seem in every this kind of thread people are bored with laddering not exactly with the game itself. or take a few day/week/month break. my friend is platinum zerg too and he took like 2 month break then he started playing again and has played like 300+ games in a week.
On April 08 2012 20:00 algue wrote: Delete the leagues, the division and the ranking. Keep the association system so you can play against people with the same level as you.
Problem solved , no more ladder fear : you just play for the fun not to get in an higher league when you are on losing streak you don't see you rank decreasing like crazy and you don't care that much because that doesn't mean anything no one make fun of you anymore ( how many times do I see on the Battlenet forum people saying " X is silver , he doesn't understand the game , he is not allowed to talk" )
Just keep GM league for the best players ( these players obviously don't fear the ladder ).It must be demotivating to say "i'm so bad that I can't be diamond / master" but no one really cares about being in the top 200 of Sc2 if you are playing for fun.
How would that make it more interesting? He never says ladder fear is an issue for him
It would make it more interesting because you don't need to play to win , you play to have fun. You can do One base Ultralisk , you will lose but you don't care because you don't lose anything else than the game If you do this now you lose rank/league so you don't do it ( even if you LoO0Oove this strat ) because 1 base ultra is not the best way to win
You're still assuming that fear of losing its what is holding him back. Thats hardly a given.
hm i'm really sorry for all those players like myself who just got bored with sc2. hope you guys will find something to keep you interested in sc2. if everything else fails just switch games like i did. as long as you stay on tl.net it's fine XD
Its inevitable that every game will get less popular over time.
What is needed though, is to keep a large core group of passionate viewers to sustain the scene just like in BW.
Stuff like more community interaction, better social mediums in the bnet client, more interesting gameplays, more marketing of tournaments and personality to viewers. All of these blizzard have either dropped the ball huge time or they just don't want to create a sustainable sc2 scene (i can't understand why they wouldn't want this so i assume they fucked this up big time)
I've had the same problem to some degree, I think it's largely because I generally have been trying to copy the builds and styles of the pros. Only playing standard strategies can get quite repetetive over time.
Switching around and trying weird shit helps alot to add variety to the game, for those who haven't played more than one race for a long time should definitely play around with the other races aswell.
I got bored of SC2 after discovering League of legends in august 2011.
But you know what, after watching a couple of lan events 1 month ago, i wanted to get back on sc2 and see if i could become master again, i think season 7 will bring me this promotion and i will keep playing until i reach top 8 master. Of course i have good friends to play with so it helps a lot, but i think starcraft 2 is interesting only if you have a goal and that you can achieve it. ( plus i enjoy sc2 because games don't last like 45 minutes, and you have less rage in sc2 than LoL, because you can only blame yourself )
I think some people are lying to themselves if they say that it is Battle.net's fault or gamers today are much more whiny than they used to be. Fact is, matchmaking is fine, hosting games is fine (no problems with NAT traversal etc.) and cheating problem is still under control. Battle.net works fine for 99% of the people. It's just that missing features like cross-realm play, LAN support, reconnect ability and replay sharing leave a bitter taste in your mouth considering SC2 is supposed to be an e-sports title, but again, this maybe touches 1% of the player base.
You are missing moderated chat channels, embedded streams, alternative ladder systems? Guess what, older games didn't have all those features either but the community looked for and found better alternatives (IRC, scene sites, tournament orgs, etc.). The SC2 community appears to be extremely spoiled in this regard.
SC2 is possibly the gaming community with the biggest ratio of passive spectators to active players. This shows the interest and the reluctance to actually play the game at the same time. Don't you think the game itself is the problem here? SC2 is the best RTS of the last years, but it is so by doing its handcraft, it doesn't excel gameplay-wise in any point which would wow casual and expert players alike. Players that put a lot of work into the game will stick much longer to the game than just spectators. Yes, there is BW with a lot of spectators only in Korea, but it is a fully-dressed professional sports there with expensive production and its popularity developed from the grassroots PC bang scene.
Usually when I get bored, its actually frustration, not boredom.
Play random, play team games, play customs, practice new builds, etc. Or just don't play for a while. There's no prize for playing sc2 (for you and me), so if you don't have fun there is no point.
On April 08 2012 22:02 SinCitta wrote: I think some people are lying to themselves if they say that it is Battle.net's fault or gamers today are much more whiny than they used to be. Fact is, matchmaking is fine, hosting games is fine (no problems with NAT traversal etc.) and cheating problem is still under control. Battle.net works fine for 99% of the people. It's just that missing features like cross-realm play, LAN support, reconnect ability and replay sharing leave a bitter taste in your mouth considering SC2 is supposed to be an e-sports title, but again, this maybe touches 1% of the player base.
You are missing moderated chat channels, embedded streams, alternative ladder systems? Guess what, older games didn't have all those features either but the community looked for and found better alternatives (IRC, scene sites, tournament orgs, etc.). The SC2 community appears to be extremely spoiled in this regard.
SC2 is possibly the gaming community with the biggest ratio of passive spectators to active players. This shows the interest and the reluctance to actually play the game at the same time. Don't you think the game itself is the problem here? SC2 is the best RTS of the last years, but it is so by doing its handcraft, it doesn't excel gameplay-wise in any point which would wow casual and expert players alike. Players that put a lot of work into the game will stick much longer to the game than just spectators. Yes, there is BW with a lot of spectators only in Korea, but it is a fully-dressed professional sports there with expensive production and its popularity developed from the grassroots PC bang scene.
The thing is, "old games" had many of those things. Take wc3 for an example.
Maybe it's time for you to take a break, it's not necessarily a bad thing. Try picking up another game for a few weeks and then come back to SC2 and you'll have a whole slew of new metagame intricacies and strategies to learn and explore.
I have lost some interest in watching SC2, I used to watch tons of matches at first, most of them on Youtube, watched Day9 every day and so on. Now I only watch live tournaments or sometimes I keep a pro player's stream on the second monitor but that's about it. I'd say that it's a very normal thing to watch less and be more selective about what you spend your time on after the initial period where you want to gather information from anyone and anywhere.
I didn't get bored of playing yet even though I've played since the beta. In fact, I think I'm only now starting to really enjoy it. But yeah, I think it's Blizzard's job to make the experience more interesting, not much you can do if you stop having fun playing..
Same here, I used to stay late at night to watch streams and leagues, now I barely see any championship and it has been months since the last time I opened SCII, the game itself gets boring and BNet 0.2 makes It even worse, so from a hardcore user to almost never get online again... I feel like StarCraft II lacks something that other games have, but I dont know what It might be^^, by the way I am also playing LoL with friends as most of people who left SC2 do^^.
I still play but barely watch anymore, it's just too repetitive, and the game is too fast, such that you don't see enough micro moves to keep it interesting. Except if you watch marineking of course =)
Stop playing standard (playing customs like monobattle works too) until you want to play "seriously" again. Battlecruiser or nuke rushes always makes me laugh (everyday can be funday monday!), and laughing is the cure for everything you get bored about. :-D
Otherwise just take a break, nobody is forcing you to play - maybe SC2 just isn't your thing.
Battle Net is the thing that keeps me from being online 24/7, there is no reason to.
With WC3 or BW there was a reason to just idle online and chat. It got you coming back to the game, which in turn got you playing.
With WOL there is no compelling reason to log onto Battle Net, and this in turn keeps people from playing. In BW the majority of games I would play would only be after a conversation with a friend about XYZ vs ZYX. This doesn't really happen in WOL since chat channels are a joke and there is no clan support.
With the new GSL maps, people will hopefully play more, but I also think that a big reason people are bored of SC2 is that the game is boring. Unless you are a tip top professional player its a very stagnant and straightforward game. WC3 and BW had much more breadth of gameplay within a single match, and WOL simply doesn't.
Maybe you should try a different race. If you feel that you can't compete with another race in same level of league, then you could even purchase another account just for the other race. Protoss and Terran are complitely different playstyles PLUS I think you should have good games against zerg, since you now know that race quite well, which helps alot when forming new ideas for your play.
I got back to iccup and his awesome MapPack with more than 30 ladder maps.
Starcraft2 bored me after a few months, all games are deathballs, all maps are equal (main with ramp, nat, and near third), battle.net is the worst MultiPlayer UI I have seen.
On April 08 2012 22:02 SinCitta wrote: I think some people are lying to themselves if they say that it is Battle.net's fault or gamers today are much more whiny than they used to be. Fact is, matchmaking is fine, hosting games is fine (no problems with NAT traversal etc.) and cheating problem is still under control. Battle.net works fine for 99% of the people. It's just that missing features like cross-realm play, LAN support, reconnect ability and replay sharing leave a bitter taste in your mouth considering SC2 is supposed to be an e-sports title, but again, this maybe touches 1% of the player base.
You are missing moderated chat channels, embedded streams, alternative ladder systems? Guess what, older games didn't have all those features either but the community looked for and found better alternatives (IRC, scene sites, tournament orgs, etc.). The SC2 community appears to be extremely spoiled in this regard.
SC2 is possibly the gaming community with the biggest ratio of passive spectators to active players. This shows the interest and the reluctance to actually play the game at the same time. Don't you think the game itself is the problem here? SC2 is the best RTS of the last years, but it is so by doing its handcraft, it doesn't excel gameplay-wise in any point which would wow casual and expert players alike. Players that put a lot of work into the game will stick much longer to the game than just spectators. Yes, there is BW with a lot of spectators only in Korea, but it is a fully-dressed professional sports there with expensive production and its popularity developed from the grassroots PC bang scene.
SC2 is the best RTS of the last years?!? Haha. Doing so by handcraft? IDK what the means, but it sounds like you don't really understand what makes a good game. "it doesn't excel gameplay-wise in any point which would wow casual and expert players alike" I can remember watching BW and WC3 tournaments with my dad, and he was totally into both of them having never touched a game in his life. When I watch SC2 with him, he asks "why do I only get to see the base, where is the fighting?"
THAT is the core issue, SC2 is a game of 1 army ball vs 1 army ball, with one massive engage to decide the game. One player wins the fight, and simply has to hold onto their lead. If the other player isn't NesTea they can't come back, and might as well leave. It is uninteresting and boring.
Warcraft 3: Fronzen Throne completely outshines, outplays, and outlasts SC2. Also as someone else said WC3 had all of the things "old games" didn't have, minus stream in client since streams weren't really prevalent at the time. I mean shit dude, League of Fucking Legends has a better UI than Battle.Net, how sad is that? I dinky little indie company like Riot Games can make a better multiplayer interface than Blizzard-Activision, the people who INVENTED BATTLE.NET. It just shameful to the consumers and developers everywhere.
Your points about why people are "whiny" amuse me. Aren't you whining about the community you claim to be a member of? "Players that put a lot of work into the game will stick much longer to the game than just spectators" again, this is another core issue being raised here. Just because I am a professional Lacrosse fan doesn't mean I want to play. I like watching the sport, and enjoy the excitement. I shouldn't be urged out of the community because I don't play, that is counter intuitive to the longevity of a community surrounding a sport.
Oh - and what about disconnects at almost every major tournament outside of Korea? That definitely keeps people interested. When they have to listen to annoying-as-fuck Anna Prosser while the internet at Cosmo needs to be reset in the hopes that professionals won't have to worry about D'C while in a $40k match. The cards are stacked against SC2 in my mind, if they want to stick around and keep their jobs, Dustin and his team better get their shit together.
On April 08 2012 17:46 TheAmazombie wrote: Start going for more achievements and all that. I like playing the random Co-op matches vs. AIs. You meet some fun people and because the AIs suck in general, you can try out weird builds and whatnot while also getting achieves.
This. I started trying to get achievements just for fun by playing Co-op vs AI (very easy), the FIRST match I got this really awesome guy. He doesn't play very much, but we had this great chat for like a few hours even outside of the game and quickly became friends. If you can find people like that to play with, it makes the game so much better.
On April 08 2012 22:02 SinCitta wrote: I think some people are lying to themselves if they say that it is Battle.net's fault or gamers today are much more whiny than they used to be. Fact is, matchmaking is fine, hosting games is fine (no problems with NAT traversal etc.) and cheating problem is still under control. Battle.net works fine for 99% of the people. It's just that missing features like cross-realm play, LAN support, reconnect ability and replay sharing leave a bitter taste in your mouth considering SC2 is supposed to be an e-sports title, but again, this maybe touches 1% of the player base.
You are missing moderated chat channels, embedded streams, alternative ladder systems? Guess what, older games didn't have all those features either but the community looked for and found better alternatives (IRC, scene sites, tournament orgs, etc.). The SC2 community appears to be extremely spoiled in this regard.
SC2 is possibly the gaming community with the biggest ratio of passive spectators to active players. This shows the interest and the reluctance to actually play the game at the same time. Don't you think the game itself is the problem here? SC2 is the best RTS of the last years, but it is so by doing its handcraft, it doesn't excel gameplay-wise in any point which would wow casual and expert players alike. Players that put a lot of work into the game will stick much longer to the game than just spectators. Yes, there is BW with a lot of spectators only in Korea, but it is a fully-dressed professional sports there with expensive production and its popularity developed from the grassroots PC bang scene.
That one percent that you are talking about is pretty much the only players that are left now. Which is ironic, in a way.
And yeah! We are spoiled. We are spoiled from other games, other games that have ALL THE FEATURES that this game should have, from clearly inferior companies. If it wasn't for the other games that had these features, we wouldn't be spoiled, would we? Blizzard is an incredible company, they made RTS's what they are today! They moved online gaming forward like no one else! They programmed an entire virtual world, and consistently deliver high quality games made only for PC in a very unique way.
It's just their goddamn Battle.net system they need to work on. Can you imagine, CAN YOU IMAGINE, how much better this game could be? Without changing the actual game? My god it makes me sad. And angry, because I KNOW Blizzard can deliver, I know because they've done it before for fuck's sake. I mean it used to be that the words "Battle.net" was said with respect and regard, now it is said in a disappointed and frustrated way.
Blizzard really needs to shape up and begin targeting the so-called "one percent" of the community that you refer to, because if they make it up to those "spoiled" standards, then EVERYONE benefits; even that 99 percent which supposedly doesn't care. Maybe they don't have the standards they should. Some people who quit SC2 don't even know what they are missing, since maybe they never played BW or WC3. Blizzard oughtta blow their fucking minds out with a new Battle.net. They truly have nothing to lose, as long as they keep the matchmaking system how it is now. Everything else they could implement could not hurt the game. It would be physically impossible for replay sharing to hurt the game, for clans to hurt the game, for chat channels (which no one is forced to use) to hurt the game... so much. So much untapped potential.
They better shape the fuck up with Heart of the Swarm. If this game is not exactly what the one percent wants by the release of Legacy of the Void, I will personally go out and picket Blizzard headquarters. I will. Hold me to it.
EDIT2: Spoilered my rant. Didn't realize I felt so strongly about this.
1lay in some tournaments, either Playhem or Beyond gaming and just have fun playing other people 2:Join some people in a low level team/clan and just chat between games, makes the ladder less frustrating 3: Pick a day for 10 ladder games when you focus on one thing and one thing only. If you lose dont worry, as long as you hit goals/try strats. Go 10 ladder games using hydras intelligently (i.e not mass hydra), go 10 games with bane drops, infestor drops etc. Just something that you can try and if it works out you can use it more, if not you lost some ladder points but you had fun making your own strat
We need tournaments like in WC3. Not only 1v1, but team tournaments as well. I play almost only team games nowadays (because I can voicechat with friends while playing and it's really fun) and having tournaments would really get us playing more.
Despite the popular misconception in this thread, Blizzard did, in fact, add chat channels to SC2. You can even join them and chat in them. You may find people to play some games with.
"Oh!" I hear you cry, "But there are no people in those chat rooms!" While unfortunately true for the most part (I'm starting to wonder myself, did we really want chat?), the only way for this to be fixed is for people to actually start using them. If you have a desire to stay interested in the community and want to help the community, then get in those chat channels, make a joke, theorycraft, and queue up those games. You may not be so interested in playing team games or co-op, but you'll shorten someone else's queue time, maybe make a friend (or arch nemesis), and at least get the other people to enjoy the game a bit more.
On April 09 2012 22:27 bouhko wrote: We need tournaments like in WC3. Not only 1v1, but team tournaments as well. I play almost only team games nowadays (because I can voicechat with friends while playing and it's really fun) and having tournaments would really get us playing more.
This is very true. While 1v1 exploded with independently ran tournaments for SC2, team games definitely have not, and an in-game method of tournaments like WC3 would help tremendously on that front.
On April 09 2012 22:38 Toboe wrote: Despite the popular misconception in this thread, Blizzard did, in fact, add chat channels to SC2. You can even join them and chat in them. You may find people to play some games with.
"Oh!" I hear you cry, "But there are no people in those chat rooms!" While unfortunately true for the most part (I'm starting to wonder myself, did we really want chat?), the only way for this to be fixed is for people to actually start using them. If you have a desire to stay interested in the community and want to help the community, then get in those chat channels, make a joke, theorycraft, and queue up those games. You may not be so interested in playing team games or co-op, but you'll shorten someone else's queue time, maybe make a friend (or arch nemesis), and at least get the other people to enjoy the game a bit more.
On April 09 2012 22:27 bouhko wrote: We need tournaments like in WC3. Not only 1v1, but team tournaments as well. I play almost only team games nowadays (because I can voicechat with friends while playing and it's really fun) and having tournaments would really get us playing more.
This is very true. While 1v1 exploded with independently ran tournaments for SC2, team games definitely have not, and an in-game method of tournaments like WC3 would help tremendously on that front.
Everyone realizes there are chat channels. People are frustrated with how small and rinkydink they are, and the lack of commands, and the fact that BN team seems to have just shoved them in their design, not be shaped the design around them. Of course there are chat channels, they just blow.
As for automated tournaments, yes. Brilliant, it really does draw people in.
There are actually some custom maps ('1v1 OBS Map of the Day' I think?) which are very fun to participate in and are similar to tournaments. This can reignite your interest in the game, it certainly did for me.
it took me around ~1300 1v1 wins to lose interest in playing sc2. managed to get to mid masters as zerg. dunno what it is with sc2 but compared to bw and other competive online games (played q3a and bw pretty much all my life), it has a much higher frustration curve for me. i took a ~3 month break and tried to get back into sc2 but i sadly lost the interest in this game. still watching some major tournaments if zerg players are still in but other than that i went back to play and watch bw and ql.
i think a major part in why i dont get myself to play anymore is the bad decisions made for bnet 2.0. i realy hate playing mirrow matches and i am to lazy and dont want to find ppl or organize my playtime that much. furthermore i think theres too much derpherp in sc2 compared to bw.
as for how you could get back into sc2 i dont know. maybe changing race, team games or just wait for hots and hope youll get hooked again.
Weird I continue to enjoy sc2 more and more as I keep getting better and better and I feel like more playstyle becomes more and more clean and more well throught out.
But I think its about having goals for for how you play. I want to improve, and I can feel that I become 0.1% better for each game I play, and thats what motivates me.
I tank myself to bronze, and since I hate protoss, I only play PvT or TvP, I leave the game if the opponents are other races. Because of that, I keep playing bronze and pwn bronze. Since I always win, I feel good about myself and keep SC2 interesting.
On April 08 2012 22:02 SinCitta wrote: I think some people are lying to themselves if they say that it is Battle.net's fault or gamers today are much more whiny than they used to be. Fact is, matchmaking is fine, hosting games is fine (no problems with NAT traversal etc.) and cheating problem is still under control. Battle.net works fine for 99% of the people. It's just that missing features like cross-realm play, LAN support, reconnect ability and replay sharing leave a bitter taste in your mouth considering SC2 is supposed to be an e-sports title, but again, this maybe touches 1% of the player base.
You are missing moderated chat channels, embedded streams, alternative ladder systems? Guess what, older games didn't have all those features either but the community looked for and found better alternatives (IRC, scene sites, tournament orgs, etc.). The SC2 community appears to be extremely spoiled in this regard.
SC2 is possibly the gaming community with the biggest ratio of passive spectators to active players. This shows the interest and the reluctance to actually play the game at the same time. Don't you think the game itself is the problem here? SC2 is the best RTS of the last years, but it is so by doing its handcraft, it doesn't excel gameplay-wise in any point which would wow casual and expert players alike. Players that put a lot of work into the game will stick much longer to the game than just spectators. Yes, there is BW with a lot of spectators only in Korea, but it is a fully-dressed professional sports there with expensive production and its popularity developed from the grassroots PC bang scene.
SC2 is the best RTS of the last years?!? Haha. Doing so by handcraft? IDK what the means, but it sounds like you don't really understand what makes a good game. "it doesn't excel gameplay-wise in any point which would wow casual and expert players alike" I can remember watching BW and WC3 tournaments with my dad, and he was totally into both of them having never touched a game in his life. When I watch SC2 with him, he asks "why do I only get to see the base, where is the fighting?"
THAT is the core issue, SC2 is a game of 1 army ball vs 1 army ball, with one massive engage to decide the game. One player wins the fight, and simply has to hold onto their lead. If the other player isn't NesTea they can't come back, and might as well leave. It is uninteresting and boring.
Warcraft 3: Fronzen Throne completely outshines, outplays, and outlasts SC2. Also as someone else said WC3 had all of the things "old games" didn't have, minus stream in client since streams weren't really prevalent at the time. I mean shit dude, League of Fucking Legends has a better UI than Battle.Net, how sad is that? I dinky little indie company like Riot Games can make a better multiplayer interface than Blizzard-Activision, the people who INVENTED BATTLE.NET. It just shameful to the consumers and developers everywhere.
Your points about why people are "whiny" amuse me. Aren't you whining about the community you claim to be a member of? "Players that put a lot of work into the game will stick much longer to the game than just spectators" again, this is another core issue being raised here. Just because I am a professional Lacrosse fan doesn't mean I want to play. I like watching the sport, and enjoy the excitement. I shouldn't be urged out of the community because I don't play, that is counter intuitive to the longevity of a community surrounding a sport.
Oh - and what about disconnects at almost every major tournament outside of Korea? That definitely keeps people interested. When they have to listen to annoying-as-fuck Anna Prosser while the internet at Cosmo needs to be reset in the hopes that professionals won't have to worry about D'C while in a $40k match. The cards are stacked against SC2 in my mind, if they want to stick around and keep their jobs, Dustin and his team better get their shit together.
This is so wrong that it hurts. Maybe in 2010 it was a 1 ball vs 1 ball fight, but it's pretty rare that it occurs now, and when it does it's usually the fault of the other player. I don't even know where people come up with this shit (barring PvP, but that's been a bad match-up since BW) even though I hear it all the time.
And anecdotal evidence is meaningless, none of my friends or family (who don't play) enjoyed watching BW or WC3, but they (mostly) all enjoy watching sc2. Not to mention the fact that Riot has hundreds of millions of dollars and only 1 game to support, with a chat system that continually crashes, looks terrible, and performs even more terribly.
There is a lot that Blizzard can/could improve on, that's basically the only thing you got right. But that could be said for any game ever created to be completely honest.
Laddering is the problem with this game. People want easy wins, so the game turns into a coinflippy cheese fest and gets boring after you spend your day getting 6 raxxed or 7 gate all ined.
too bad the mentality is "win no matter how you do it!" because it just makes the game boring and not at all fun to play
On April 09 2012 22:45 CyDe wrote: Everyone realizes there are chat channels. People are frustrated with how small and rinkydink they are, and the lack of commands, and the fact that BN team seems to have just shoved them in their design, not be shaped the design around them. Of course there are chat channels, they just blow.
Nonetheless people keep saying in this thread that sc2 is devoid of an ability to connect with other people through the interface. The size problems will be addressed in patch 1.5 as someone linked to at the end of the 3rd page of this thread. The lack of chat commands doesn't stop you from finding new people and playing with them. Don't get me wrong, it helps to have them, but they're far from necessary. My point is that while people can make all the excuses they want for not using chat channels (like 'chat channels were shoved into the design so I refuse to use them on principle'), but they exist and they work fine.
If we're going to bring up the chat channels, let's at least bring up the actual problem - nobody uses them.
Edit: sorry that's vague. Let me be more clear: even with vast improvements to the chat channels, I highly doubt we'll see some miraculous increase in their use. Are there really so many people that draw the line at "lack of chat commands" before they'll use an otherwise completely working chat channel to speak with people?
SC2 is much better than any other RTS game to spectate, smooth gameplay and slaughter fest battles. When it comes to playing the game from an amateur point of view.......... I do not think its the best game. Its still really good do not get me wrong but very punishing, everything dies so fast and the learning curve with regards to holding off all ins so you can feel like a genuine solid player just seems to not suit people who do not have a lot of time to invest into the game thus frustrating people and eventually turning them off playing SC2 long term.
If you can play the game with the attitude of not taking losses too hard and just try to improve and have fun at the same time then their is plenty to keep your interest in SC2. Sadly for many the frustration dominates and I think most can understand it.
I'd say try different things to keep it entertaining, repetition is probably the worst.
For example I have opened a stream and been interacting with my viewers, talking with them, taking advice, giving advice, and knowing new people, even a few of these are now my practice partners and/or friends !
I personally find great satisfaction in self improvement even through a game so I keep my interest in starcraft 2 the same way I keep my interest in league of legends... trying to be the best or at least my personal best... having been as high as mid masters rank in sc2 I want to get top 10 in a season or maybe even push myself for a grandmasters spot in sc2. so thats how i keep my interest. I fuel it with my competitive nature.