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On September 11 2007 12:14 1esu wrote:
WC3
World Cyber Games
Electronic Sports World Cup
World e-Sports Games
World Series of Video Games
Warcraft 3 Champions League
NGL One proleague
This list isn't even close to complete....
Even this list at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warcraft_III_World_Championships is incomplete.
(scroll down for team leagues - theres TWO team leagues that run throughout the year in Europe that pay a hefty prize to the top teams)
Various tournaments like EuroCup, inCup, Digital Life, e-Stars are all missing. w3 summer grand prix are missing.
If you want to read up on the international war3 scene got frag probably has the best coverage...
http://www.gotfrag.com/war/news/
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Good old Wikipedia to educate oneself about the E-Sports scene (from 1esu's post):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warcraft_III_professional_competition
Don't forget to add, that it is possible for certain top War3 players in Europe even on a minimal contract to earn enough to make a living through winning tournament cash prizes alone (mainly through smaller national level tournaments).
Zacard (A former top Korean War3 player) moved out from Korea to Germany and achieved this for a while. He has since been ordered to do his military service.
Moon (Current #1 Korean War3 player) has also earned hundreds of thousands of dollars through tournament prizes worldwide throughout his career (imagine something like a War3 version of Fatal1ty).
Finally, the Chinese War3 scene is expanding like crazy right now. Televised games, leagues, and etc are getting more and more popular than ever right now.
Does this mean War3 is the better game and more suited to E-Sports than SC?
Hell no. Even starting from the OP, I argued the opposite, that SC is the better competitive game.
As a spectator sport: SC is cleaner to watch, easier to understand for the average viewer, faster paced, better balanced, and much more. Plus, SC even has far more entertaining commentators like Tasteless. He's done more for the SC pro scene than a thousand SC elite players combined.
Now, why you ask is the current SC scene not as successful as War3's outside of Korea?
It's because the player base for SC is smaller outside of Korea than War3's, and the exact opposite is true in Korea (especially when SC is so ingrained into their culture). The direct result from more fans/players is a larger pro-gaming scene, REGARDLESS of how some people may view the quality of the game because face it: the majority rules. This is economics 101.
Same reasoning here applies to the success of FPS's such CS and the like. FPS games are easy as pie to pick up anyone in the world. This allows for a larger initial fanbase to form the pros from.
I hope now you have a sense of how essential MBS will be to the future SC2 progaming scene outside of Korea.
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On September 11 2007 14:35 orangedude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2007 14:33 Aphelion wrote:
Like I said, I am no longer getting involved in this forum. Its not worth a ban. Translation: I have nothing to say, so I'll post a one liner "pretending that I have made a point" when I have done nothing but even further disqualify my arguments.
dude. you are so obviously out to "win" a debate it's sickening.
winning a debate is of non-importance. being right is of non-importance. if anything, the only reason you should want to confer with the anti-MBS crowd is to assuage their fears and give them new light as to what SC2 has to look forward to. Not hounding them for a 'logical dispassionate response' so that they compete with you in an arguement. jesus.
If aphelion has nothing else to say - whatever the reasons - leave him be.
seriously, how old are you?
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on topic: I am, to be honest, sort of shocked at the deep concern over MBS. The recipe for creating a successful E-Sport is not a simple one. Surely there are bigger fish to worry about.
Starcraft2 will not be successful in any way compared to Starcraft unless they take care of the same elements that so draw a crowd. Such issues/concerns as: Game Pacing, Intuitive Spectating, Hostable Multiplayer Replays, Strategical Depth, The Introduction of Super-Units, Latency (or natural unit response times), Perfect Balance!
Honestly, how does one find time to be concerned with MBS - especially when such a thing does not remove the element of macro, but just somewhat reduce it's importance.
If Blizzard is prioritizing a list of dos and donts i hope that MBS has been signed off (either for or against - who cares!) and will not bother to revisit such a trivial issue! Please, oh Blizzard, make this game a good one.
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UI simply won't deter or attract fanbase as strongly as you would imagine. The hype machine is more important for that. Do you think all publications and blogs will instantly complain about outdated UI and instantly halt sales completely? No, cause it'll still be a fast and fun game to play with a slightly harder skill curve. If the rest of the game is perfect, then losing the UI is trivial. However, if you keep the current UI (mbs and autogather and all), making the rest of the game perfect will be a completely different thing, as the feeling of always having something to do must be there. And often not only in micro, so there must be new aspects if you subtract from the resources spent into macro. I mean, if Blizzard goes out and releases their beta with MBS and a slew of new (and effective) ways to spend time/handspeed, SC2 might be fine. Keeping the ways to spend handspeed the same as in BW, however, probably won't kill the fanbase of SC2 either. I mean, part of the whole fanbase generation is on competition. What is SC2's competition? The next CnC and a few new ones coming out of the woodwork? They're different games, catering to (mostly) different audiences. If SC2 tries to cater to all RTS audiences at once, problems may occur. However, if SC2 is truly fun to play and KEEPS THE OLD STYLE OF GAMEPLAY, even with obsolete UI, the UI might play much less of a role than you think.
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On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
UI simply won't deter or attract fanbase as strongly as you would imagine. The hype machine is more important for that. Do you think all publications and blogs will instantly complain about outdated UI and instantly halt sales completely? No, cause it'll still be a fast and fun game to play with a slightly harder skill curve. If the rest of the game is perfect, then losing the UI is trivial. However, if you keep the current UI (mbs and autogather and all), making the rest of the game perfect will be a completely different thing, as the feeling of always having something to do must be there. And often not only in micro, so there must be new aspects if you subtract from the resources spent into macro. I mean, if Blizzard goes out and releases their beta with MBS and a slew of new (and effective) ways to spend time/handspeed, SC2 might be fine. Keeping the ways to spend handspeed the same as in BW, however, probably won't kill the fanbase of SC2 either. I mean, part of the whole fanbase generation is on competition. What is SC2's competition? The next CnC and a few new ones coming out of the woodwork? They're different games, catering to (mostly) different audiences. If SC2 tries to cater to all RTS audiences at once, problems may occur. However, if SC2 is truly fun to play and KEEPS THE OLD STYLE OF GAMEPLAY, even with obsolete UI, the UI might play much less of a role than you think.
SC2's competition as an e-sport game is not only limited to RTS games, but games of all other genres. The point I made about 'protecting the noobs' is universal across all genres, and you can bet that if SC2 doesn't get a large enough competitive community over the long-term, you may see professional competition in the early stages but it'll die out as the competitive community shrinks, and another game that did 'protect its noobs' will take its place. It doesn't have to be an RTS.
Furthermore, I don't think anyone's made this point, but IMHO retaining the original interface will effectively split the community at launch; while the other SC skills will have to be re-learned (to an extent) by the SC veterans due to the new units and mechanics, thus allowing the more skilled noobs to keep within a respectful distance, veterans would come into SC2 having already mastered the interface, while the noobs would have to learn it from scratch. Therefore, since a player who's mastered the SC interface has a huge advantage over one who's still learning it, the competitive community will be split into competitive noobs and SC veterans, with all the problems we've agreed are associated with such a split.
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Osaka27149 Posts
Ok, surgery has been performed on this thread and we all went back in time (to page 16...)
Due to numerous requests, this thread has been reopened. Please lets stay on topic, and remember that each persons opinion is valid, unless they post it in bold and caps.
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I think that MBS is a tough, grey area which is another point that seperates the casual SC2 gamer from the oldschool SC player. Both groups demand diffrent things, and it's up to Blizzard to decide on the ideal middle way.
As for MBS, I'm not too sure if it's going to make a big diffrence on the professional scene. It will affect the lower levels tremendously though, and I'm not sure if we would want this to happen. Some somewhat skilled players might feel that they don't have enough of an edge over lesser skilled players in this game, which could lead to as much inactivity as we suffer currently.
Then again, I might just be seeing a danger that isn't there. I trust in the development team of Blizzard to decide on the best route, since they have some of the best programmers and even an ex-progamer in their team.
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On September 13 2007 07:38 Artanis[Xp] wrote:
I think that MBS is a tough, grey area which is another point that seperates the casual SC2 gamer from the oldschool SC player. Both groups demand diffrent things, and it's up to Blizzard to decide on the ideal middle way.
As for MBS, I'm not too sure if it's going to make a big diffrence on the professional scene. It will affect the lower levels tremendously though, and I'm not sure if we would want this to happen. Some somewhat skilled players might feel that they don't have enough of an edge over lesser skilled players in this game, which could lead to as much inactivity as we suffer currently.
Then again, I might just be seeing a danger that isn't there. I trust in the development team of Blizzard to decide on the best route, since they have some of the best programmers and even an ex-progamer in their team.
Inactivity because you can't horribly bash noobs, but only beat them ? lol good logic. All the sc hardcore players are so worryed about having to re-learn everything and pissed about wasting 5 years to master the UI just to get a new easier UI because they won't have such an edge over their opponents, what about bashing noobs because you have better micro and a better uni mix and timming ? and not because you can mass units from 16 gateways faster than him ?
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On September 13 2007 07:38 Artanis[Xp] wrote:
Some somewhat skilled players might feel that they don't have enough of an edge over lesser skilled players in this game, which could lead to as much inactivity as we suffer currently.
One of the goals of any ladder system with an (anonymous match-maker) AMM that is currently in place, such as the one in War3, is to match one player to another that is as close to each other as possible. The ability to do this in the least amount of time determines how successful an AMM is, and War3's Battle.net demonstrates this admirably.
For most people who want to go online for a quick game, I'm pretty sure they would like to face someone about equal to their skill for maximum enjoyability and for a fair game. This AMM is one of the big factors that has kept the War3 scene still going. I am sure that the SC2 AMM will be similar or even better than War3's, so I do not believe this will be a problem at all. I highly doubt this will cause any inactivity at all, but will only increase activity at all levels.
I believe the "inactivity" in SC outside Korea is due to the fact that it is so difficult to find an even match in about 10 seconds like you can with a proper AMM.
Now, if some mid-level or highly skilled players would like to do some "noob-stomping" as you are concerned about, they can just create a new account and start at the middle of the ladder again and smurf their heart out (until their ELL rises to the top of ladder after ~10 straight wins).
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On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
Do you think all publications and blogs will instantly complain about outdated UI and instantly halt sales completely?
No, maybe not all, perhaps only 95% of them (excluding blogs from an SC veteran's viewpoint). No, it won't halt sales completely, but will likely greatly hamper them, which is clearly a very bad thing.
On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
If the rest of the game is perfect, then losing the UI is trivial.
Maybe trivial to you, since you started playing SC back in 98 or whenever you started. You can't speak the same about others, because they think differently from you. Proof of this is in nearly every SC review and in every other RTS game review, which are catered to the mass market (e.g. Gamespot gave SC only an 8 for gameplay). Where is your proof aside from your own personal opinion?
On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
...If SC2 tries to cater to all RTS audiences at once, problems may occur. However, if SC2 is truly fun to play and KEEPS THE OLD STYLE OF GAMEPLAY, even with obsolete UI, the UI might play much less of a role than you think.
Correct me if I am wrong, but you are saying here that an "obsolete UI" is bad for SC2, but not bad enough to drag it down because the other parts of the game will make up for it (which seems to be based on conjecture and opinion). Now, it is a given that every other part of the game will be improved in a sequel (hopefully), so why not add a more attractive UI to new players as well and make the game even better and more popular (and perhaps additional macro-related tasks)? I'm pretty sure that's the path that Blizzard has in mind.
Finally, if the UI truly plays only a small role (as you claim without proof), then all the more reason to include a noob-friendly UI to attract more sales.
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On September 13 2007 11:13 orangedude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
Do you think all publications and blogs will instantly complain about outdated UI and instantly halt sales completely?
No, maybe not all, perhaps only 95% of them (excluding blogs from an SC veteran's viewpoint). No, it won't halt sales completely, but will likely greatly hamper them, which is clearly a very bad thing.
I really doubt it. I'd say 70% at most. Your conjecture vs mine, you can say you've won this point if you want, I say it's up in the air.
On September 13 2007 11:13 orangedude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
If the rest of the game is perfect, then losing the UI is trivial.
Maybe trivial to you, since you started playing SC back in 98 or whenever you started. You can't speak the same about others, because they think differently from you. Proof of this is in nearly every SC review and in every other RTS game review, which are catered to the mass market (e.g. Gamespot gave SC only an 8 for gameplay). Where is your proof aside from your own personal opinion?
If anything, that Gamespot review only proved how often wrong game reviewers are. I've played BW melee only since late 2005, not even close to 98. I still don't see how you represent the majority, and I honestly don't believe that (lack of) UI will be a deterrent among any relatively hardcore gamers. And by hardcore, I don't mean hardcore SC players, I don't mean RTS players, I just mean gamers who have experience gaming and are willing to take up the challenge of a game that is hard to learn and master, and to improve in it. There's more of these than you think, IMO. Oh and, could you source some reviews (RTS, preferably) in which UI was blamed as game-breaking? Not games in which the UI actually sucked and was unusuable, just a bit outdated. I'd like to see some of those.
On September 13 2007 11:13 orangedude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
...If SC2 tries to cater to all RTS audiences at once, problems may occur. However, if SC2 is truly fun to play and KEEPS THE OLD STYLE OF GAMEPLAY, even with obsolete UI, the UI might play much less of a role than you think. Correct me if I am wrong, but you are saying here that an "obsolete UI" is bad for SC2, but not bad enough to drag it down because the other parts of the game will make up for it (which seems to be based on conjecture and opinion). Now, it is a given that every other part of the game will be improved in a sequel (hopefully), so why not add a more attractive UI to new players as well and make the game even better and more popular (and perhaps additional macro-related tasks)? I'm pretty sure that's the path that Blizzard has in mind. Finally, if the UI truly plays only a small role (as you claim without proof), then all the more reason to include a noob-friendly UI to attract more sales.
I'm not saying obsolete UI is bad for SC2. In fact, I think it's very important for the gameplay to be of high quality. The fact that it even can possibly be high quality without the old UI is conjecture, but the fact that it can be a good game with the old UI is proven, through BW. The "even with" was used in tandem with the whole argument against why the UI will deter sales. My previous post stated nothing in the way of actual gameplay. As I've stated, and you know, I believe the new UI will hurt the core gameplay. That wasn't relevant to your argument though, your argument was that it will turn off the prospective fans and destroy the fanbase. And my point is that I think you're underestimating the fanbase's ability to see a good game in a good game, and your guess that the fanbase will be turned off is much conjecture as my guess that they won't.
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On September 13 2007 11:13 orangedude wrote:Show nested quote +On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
Do you think all publications and blogs will instantly complain about outdated UI and instantly halt sales completely?
No, maybe not all, perhaps only 95% of them (excluding blogs from an SC veteran's viewpoint). No, it won't halt sales completely, but will likely greatly hamper them, which is clearly a very bad thing.
If you honestly think 95% of newb game reviewers will even know how to use hotkeys, you are sorely mistaken. You'd be EXTREMELY pushing it to think that half would mention it in a review.
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If you honestly think 95% of newb game reviewers will even know how to use hotkeys, you are sorely mistaken. You'd be EXTREMELY pushing it to think that half would mention it in a review.
Unfortunately, those newb game reviewers won't be mentioning hotkeys. Instead, they'll be mentioning how outdated it is to only be able to select one building at a time. (And, of course, as we all know it, Old = Bad. xD ) If they did know about hotkeys, it would probably help the hardcore sc players more, because then they'd know the importance of how much MBS will affect hotkeys and would maybe then start to have opinions like we have, with the pros and cons of new UI features, instead of the simple New is good, Old is bad mentality.
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On September 13 2007 12:16 TheShizno wrote:Show nested quote +
If you honestly think 95% of newb game reviewers will even know how to use hotkeys, you are sorely mistaken. You'd be EXTREMELY pushing it to think that half would mention it in a review.
Unfortunately, those newb game reviewers won't be mentioning hotkeys. Instead, they'll be mentioning how outdated it is to only be able to select one building at a time. If they did know about hotkeys, it would probably help the hardcore sc players more, because then they'd know the importance of how much MBS will affect hotkeys and would maybe then start to have opinions like we have, with the pros and cons of new UI features, instead of the simple New is good, Old is bad mentality.
I'm still looking for evidence on this.
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Well fortunately for you, I'm too lazy to get evidence xD So I'll let others find reviews. My argument was mostly in theory.
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Yeah, alright.
The main reason I don't think the reviews will be that bad because of one aspect is because of what I've seen of most reviews. All cons are mentioned in passing. I have rarely seen a con that is game-breaking to the point where it's taken from a would be 9.8 to a 6.4 or something ridiculous (unless the con IS actually that game-breaking, which lack of MBS is definitely not). The most likely scenario if most reviewers don't like the lack of MBS is that they mention it as "one complaint we had about the game." How many of these "one complaint"s have you seen break a review? Hardly any. If the rest of the game is good enough, the worst that will happen is maybe a 9.8 to a 9.4. That's my conjecture, orangedude, you have yours.
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On September 13 2007 12:02 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2007 11:13 orangedude wrote:On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
Do you think all publications and blogs will instantly complain about outdated UI and instantly halt sales completely?
No, maybe not all, perhaps only 95% of them (excluding blogs from an SC veteran's viewpoint). No, it won't halt sales completely, but will likely greatly hamper them, which is clearly a very bad thing. I really doubt it. I'd say 70% at most. Your conjecture vs mine, you can say you've won this point if you want, I say it's up in the air.
Fair enough, but even 50% of reviews criticizing the UI (especially by big sites such as IGN, and Gamespot who are known to be very picky about innovation) is very seriously detrimental to sales.
On September 13 2007 12:02 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2007 11:13 orangedude wrote:On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
If the rest of the game is perfect, then losing the UI is trivial.
Maybe trivial to you, since you started playing SC back in 98 or whenever you started. You can't speak the same about others, because they think differently from you. Proof of this is in nearly every SC review and in every other RTS game review, which are catered to the mass market (e.g. Gamespot gave SC only an 8 for gameplay). Where is your proof aside from your own personal opinion? If anything, that Gamespot review only proved how often wrong game reviewers are. I've played BW melee only since late 2005, not even close to 98. I still don't see how you represent the majority, and I honestly don't believe that (lack of) UI will be a deterrent among any relatively hardcore gamers. And by hardcore, I don't mean hardcore SC players, I don't mean RTS players, I just mean gamers who have experience gaming and are willing to take up the challenge of a game that is hard to learn and master, and to improve in it. There's more of these than you think, IMO. Oh and, could you source some reviews (RTS, preferably) in which UI was blamed as game-breaking? Not games in which the UI actually sucked and was unusuable, just a bit outdated. I'd like to see some of those.
Unfortunately, even if most game reviewers are complete RTS noobs (which is often true, especially for large popular sites), they are still catered to the mass market and are very important to their success among such an audience, which is where the largest amount of sales will be coming from. Basically, it does not matter one bit how "wrong" you think the reviewers are, because they are probably similar to the average gamer, and are thus writing an "accurate" review if you think about it.
Also, I don't see how the burden of proof falls completely on me to provide all the examples when you can also do some research and show me some reviews of SC that did not criticize its UI, but regardless here you are:
Armies of Exigo is modern RTS (2004) that is a perfect example of the consequences of catering to a hardcore fanbase (namely SC's):
http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/919920.asp (72%)
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/armiesofexigo/review.html?page=2
"GameSpot Score 6.7 fair (gameplay 6, graphics 9)
Summary:
Despite its goregous graphics, this real-time strategy game seemingly ignores all the advances that the genre has experienced over the past several years.
If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then Armies of Exigo is a real-time strategy game that should have Blizzard blushing. This debut offering from developer Black Hole Games borrows quite a bit from Blizzard's classic real-time strategy releases. In making its Blizzard clone, the developer has emulated everything from the 3D look of the units and buildings of Warcraft III to the three-pronged storyline of Starcraft and the Hollywood-quality cutscene movies that Blizzard is known for. The only problem is that while Black Hole has all the ingredients of a great real-time strategy game, the formula in Armies of Exigo comes off as, well, far too formulaic. Armies of Exigo is in many ways a 1999-era real-time strategy game with 2004 production values. It's a beautiful strategy offering that's technically on par with the best games on the market, and you can appreciate the graphical detail on display as armies clash, magical effects rain down, and units are hurled into the air by mighty blows. However, it's disappointing that the gameplay is very much like that of the earliest real-time strategy games. This is a traditional RTS that seemingly ignores all the advances that the genre has experienced over the past several years.
...
That said, if you're looking for an old-school real-time strategy game, then you'll most likely enjoy Armies of Exigo, especially since it features a lot of gameplay in its single-player campaign. Just be prepared for some frustration along the way. However, if you're looking for innovation or streamlined or modern gameplay, you won't find it here."
http://pc.ign.com/articles/573/573573p2.html
IGN:
"7.0
Decent OVERALL
(out of 10 / not an average)
Armies of Exigo
The perfect game for that nostalgic masochist in your life.
by Steve Butts
December 15, 2004 - No developer in their right mind would be upset if you compared their game to Starcraft. The Blizzard classic set a new standard for strategy games five years ago and sparked an excessive number of copycats. It took a few years for real-time strategy developers to absorb the model before finally breaking through it in terms of technology and design. While some gamers still hold Starcraft up as the standard by which all other real-time strategy games are judged, none can deny that lots of new features have been introduced in the meantime.
Armies of Exigo hearkens back to the days when every RTS that came our way seemed to be cast in the Starcraft mold. Though this makes it a very traditional and ultimately unsurprising game, it also means that the developers have the benefit of five years of refinement to look back on. Consequently Armies of Exigo seems like an anachronism -- a familiar but finely polished take on the previous generation of strategy games.
...
Capping groups at 15 units could potentially create a real headache in terms of controlling the armies. Armies of Exigo allows you to combine these small groups into one of four larger Super Groups. This extra layer of flexibility is definitely welcome but, given the size of the maps and the overall shape of the action, it would be much easier if the designers had just increased the unit cap for the basic groups. Keeping tabs on the status of the units within each individual group is basically impossible without lots of management.
...
Closing Comments
Since it borrows so heavily from Starcraft, Armies of Exigo definitely has a lot going for it. The three races are balanced nicely and the campaign offers a lengthy challenge. Though the story is a bit forgettable, the cutscenes are almost as good as those we've seen from Blizzard.
Still, this is definitely a game aimed at the hardcore, old school crowd. Newcomers to the real-time strategy genre will find that the campaign is difficult to the point of near total aggravation. I've played almost every RTS released since Starcraft and even I threw up my hands in frustration at times. Veterans who are looking for something new will find that the design holds no surprises. The dual-layer map system is a nice gimmick but I'm looking to Liquid's Dragonshard to actually make something interesting from the concept. "
Needless to say, Armies of Exigo despite its excellent visuals, was NOT a successful game and has literally 0 pro-scene today despite its catering to the hardcore crowd familiar to SC.
On September 13 2007 12:02 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:Show nested quote +On September 13 2007 11:13 orangedude wrote:On September 11 2007 15:34 SpiritoftheTuna wrote:
...If SC2 tries to cater to all RTS audiences at once, problems may occur. However, if SC2 is truly fun to play and KEEPS THE OLD STYLE OF GAMEPLAY, even with obsolete UI, the UI might play much less of a role than you think. Correct me if I am wrong, but you are saying here that an "obsolete UI" is bad for SC2, but not bad enough to drag it down because the other parts of the game will make up for it (which seems to be based on conjecture and opinion). Now, it is a given that every other part of the game will be improved in a sequel (hopefully), so why not add a more attractive UI to new players as well and make the game even better and more popular (and perhaps additional macro-related tasks)? I'm pretty sure that's the path that Blizzard has in mind. Finally, if the UI truly plays only a small role (as you claim without proof), then all the more reason to include a noob-friendly UI to attract more sales. And my point is that I think you're underestimating the fanbase's ability to see a good game in a good game, and your guess that the fanbase will be turned off is much conjecture as my guess that they won't.
Well, true, but I have done my research and am basing my opinions on inductive reasoning from the past. Maybe if you can provide some counter-examples from review quotes then you can say the same.
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Replying to SpiritoftheTuna's post,
But for a casual gamer looking for a game, and decides to look on gamefaqs or somewhere will probably look at the cons and weigh them against the pros (during a review I rarely look at the total score, unless it as abysmally low number, or if it is a near perfect score).
If SC2 had no cons, then the gamer would most probably buy the game over other games. But it is still possible that some would buy the game. Especially if SC2 is made so well that it's UI was it's only con (assuming that MBS was taken out) I am hoping that with or without the UI, sc2 can sell above other games.
Unfortunately, if MBS is a flop, then that will be added to the cons, which is why if it is to be added, it will need extensive testing.
But since SC2 is a big issue in gaming (almost everyone I know who plays games knows about sc2), I doubt that too many people will be looking at reviews for years, during which the UI will be outdated anyway, so it's possible reviews won't matter.
Except that there's still word of mouth, and also those people that look at the reviews before buying a game, especially if it's a highly anticipated game (to see if it's worth buying and spending time on).
If some people find the game too hard, then news of a game's difficulty will spread, and some will be driven away.
On the other hand, competitiveness might suffer from MBS, we're not sure, seeing as it's never been tested ever, and if that's the case, SC2 will have failed it's purpose (to be a good e-sports game)
And to orangedude:
It's always possible that even without MBS, sc2 will be advanced enough with new features and such that it will be innovative and creative enough to have a good rating. There were two main points that lowered Armies of Exigo's rating, one being the UI, the other being that it was too similar to Blizzard's games. Keep that in consideration too.
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On September 13 2007 12:28 TheShizno wrote:
And to orangedude:
It's always possible that even without MBS, sc2 will be advanced enough with new features and such that it will be innovative and creative enough to have a good rating. There were two main points that lowered Armies of Exigo's rating, one being the UI, the other being that it was too similar to Blizzard's games. Keep that in consideration too.
Well what a coincidence we have here  SC2 also happens to have a UI similar to SC's if MBS is not kept in, and it will also naturally be very similar to SC (as any sequel should). Being a sequel is not a good enough excuse in most game reviewers' eyes for it to be too similar to the original (without innovation). Armies of Exigo was also praised in the reviews for having innovations in other areas, especially graphics, good cutscenes, and overall high production values. These weren't enough apparently. I wonder if anyone has any data on the total sales of this game?
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I've been looking at a few Starcraft Reviews (vanilla SC, since I think they have more comments about the interface)
http://www.gamerevolution.com/oldsite/games/pc/strategy/starcraft.htm
^I seriously disagree with this review and everything it says, but it shows how stupid and picky reviewers can be.
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/starcraft/review.html
^This one rated SC extremely highly, but even then, Gamespot expressed a slight dissatisfaction to the interface.
"This safeguard is in the interface, which only allows you to select 12 units at a time. This isn't especially effective, considering six Zealots will smoke a base early in the game. The selectable unit cap does make rushing more difficult, but it also becomes frustrating at times, especially for those used to the ability to select unlimited units at once. Often, selecting the chosen units from a large group becomes a time-consuming effort. During battle, it can be an exercise in frustration. You can assign groups to hotkeys quite easily, however, lessening the frustration of the selectable unit cap - but this system isn't nearly as good as in Total Annihilation or Dark Reign, and units aren't marked by their group number like in said games. Multiplayer battles can often be decided by who has the best manual dexterity and can overcome the built-in limitations of the interface the most quickly"
Obviously, they noticed the fact about manual dexterity dominating games, even back then... and thought it was a point of frustration...
http://www.gamerankings.com/itemrankings/launchreview.asp?reviewid=86533
^IGN's review.
"
The interface is missing some things we're used to these days. A key to find the next idle worker, Age of Empires style, would have been very helpful. And since certain units' spell effects are crucial to doing well, they should be more accessible; Activision's Star Trek: Armada has the right idea in this regard. One of the most annoying things about Starcraft is the limit of twelve units to a group, especially if you're playing the Zerg, who rely on unruly swarms rather than, say, the Protoss' small groups of powerful crack troops. But it's fairly easy to get around this; instruct your groups to follow each other and just control the lead group."
I'm just wondering... If the game reviewers cared enough about the interface back then, what would they say now, if Blizz came out with a game with the exact same interface? Granted, you could say that, if the reviewers didn't care then, why would they care now? But I doubt that is the case... (My conjecture.)
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EPT
