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On September 06 2025 07:45 CicadaSC wrote:The more I think about it, the more I feel stormgate missed a big opportunity. Instead of just trying to copy StarCraft with a lower budget I wish they leaned more into custom game modes (but as official modes) look at how autochess blossomed into the massively popular TFT in league of legends. SC2 has popular mods as well like auto chess. Anyone remember Squadron Tower defense? This is basically that. That's all it is. But with more polish. It gets 1000+ concurrents regularly. https://steamcharts.com/app/469600Anyone remember direct strike? Lots of people still play this in SC2 and WC3. Mechabellum took that and made it an official game and it is pretty successful as well. Even Mike Morhaime's company got production rights. https://steamcharts.com/app/669330These games were successful because they didn't try to improve upon a 100m dollar model. They improved 1 man projects. They took mods and did them better. I don't think it's too late. I don't know if stormgate will be able to capture the 1v1 audiences from SC2, WC3, AOE, but I think if they officially developed these custom games and innovated, it could have a real shot at picking up an audience. And I know these will probably exist eventually through the Map Editor as a mod, but I don't want another mod. A mod will always follow a subsidiary playerbase to the base game. I want official dev support. Make an official Direct Strike or TD and don't just leave it up to a community mod.
If you're a fan of old mods then you might be interested in battleships custom map for WC3 now being developed as a standalone game: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2790090/Sirocco/
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On September 06 2025 23:11 Manit0u wrote:Show nested quote +On September 06 2025 07:45 CicadaSC wrote:The more I think about it, the more I feel stormgate missed a big opportunity. Instead of just trying to copy StarCraft with a lower budget I wish they leaned more into custom game modes (but as official modes) look at how autochess blossomed into the massively popular TFT in league of legends. SC2 has popular mods as well like auto chess. Anyone remember Squadron Tower defense? This is basically that. That's all it is. But with more polish. It gets 1000+ concurrents regularly. https://steamcharts.com/app/469600Anyone remember direct strike? Lots of people still play this in SC2 and WC3. Mechabellum took that and made it an official game and it is pretty successful as well. Even Mike Morhaime's company got production rights. https://steamcharts.com/app/669330These games were successful because they didn't try to improve upon a 100m dollar model. They improved 1 man projects. They took mods and did them better. I don't think it's too late. I don't know if stormgate will be able to capture the 1v1 audiences from SC2, WC3, AOE, but I think if they officially developed these custom games and innovated, it could have a real shot at picking up an audience. And I know these will probably exist eventually through the Map Editor as a mod, but I don't want another mod. A mod will always follow a subsidiary playerbase to the base game. I want official dev support. Make an official Direct Strike or TD and don't just leave it up to a community mod. If you're a fan of old mods then you might be interested in battleships custom map for WC3 now being developed as a standalone game: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2790090/Sirocco/
Eh, the servers have been shut down for 2 weeks now according to their own statement. The game is literally unplayable rn.
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On September 07 2025 01:07 Miragee wrote:Show nested quote +On September 06 2025 23:11 Manit0u wrote:On September 06 2025 07:45 CicadaSC wrote:The more I think about it, the more I feel stormgate missed a big opportunity. Instead of just trying to copy StarCraft with a lower budget I wish they leaned more into custom game modes (but as official modes) look at how autochess blossomed into the massively popular TFT in league of legends. SC2 has popular mods as well like auto chess. Anyone remember Squadron Tower defense? This is basically that. That's all it is. But with more polish. It gets 1000+ concurrents regularly. https://steamcharts.com/app/469600Anyone remember direct strike? Lots of people still play this in SC2 and WC3. Mechabellum took that and made it an official game and it is pretty successful as well. Even Mike Morhaime's company got production rights. https://steamcharts.com/app/669330These games were successful because they didn't try to improve upon a 100m dollar model. They improved 1 man projects. They took mods and did them better. I don't think it's too late. I don't know if stormgate will be able to capture the 1v1 audiences from SC2, WC3, AOE, but I think if they officially developed these custom games and innovated, it could have a real shot at picking up an audience. And I know these will probably exist eventually through the Map Editor as a mod, but I don't want another mod. A mod will always follow a subsidiary playerbase to the base game. I want official dev support. Make an official Direct Strike or TD and don't just leave it up to a community mod. If you're a fan of old mods then you might be interested in battleships custom map for WC3 now being developed as a standalone game: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2790090/Sirocco/ Eh, the servers have been shut down for 2 weeks now according to their own statement. The game is literally unplayable rn.
Oh, sad 
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Direct Strike was very fun in both SC2 and WC3. I really hope Frost Giant sees the potential in this and doesn't just let it be a mod forever. Make it its own thing, with official dev support. Like how League adopted Auto Chess from Dota into an official game mode of TFT.
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On September 06 2025 07:45 CicadaSC wrote:
The more I think about it, the more I feel stormgate missed a big opportunity. Instead of just trying to copy StarCraft with a lower budget I wish they leaned more into custom game modes (but as official modes) look at how autochess blossomed into the massively popular TFT in league of legends. SC2 has popular mods as well like auto chess.
They didn't miss the opportunity. They were aiming to launch with a fully-featured map editor as one of the "four pillars" of the game. They just didn't make it, so they shipped a half-assed terrain editor that you can sort of make do other things by manually editing JSON files. But then once you make them, there's no way to play them with other people.
I don't think it's too late.
It's absolutely too late. It's been two weeks since Tim Morten said he'd be making an announcement "in the coming weeks" if the company was even going to keep going or not. In the mean time, the lone sound engineer and both art directors have left the company, according to LinkedIn.
I don't know if stormgate will be able to capture the 1v1 audiences from SC2, WC3, AOE, but I think if they officially developed these custom games and innovated, it could have a real shot at picking up an audience. And I know these will probably exist eventually through the Map Editor as a mod, but I don't want another mod. A mod will always follow a subsidiary playerbase to the base game. I want official dev support. Make an official Direct Strike or TD and don't just leave it up to a community mod.
But they can't pay anybody any more.
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It's absolutely too late. It's been two weeks since Tim Morten said he'd be making an announcement "in the coming weeks" if the company was even going to keep going or not. In the mean time, the lone sound engineer and both art directors have left the company, according to LinkedIn.
There's one thing that bothers me.
SG is online only. Even single player modes. They don't have resources to even make a makeshift local server or something.
The game will go down soon, along with its servers.
Yet, they still charge money for MTX.
I haven't seen many people, except me and some other folks on Steam, who voice their opinion regarding the immorality of such practices.
RTS fans like us know about the state of the game, but the regular players don't. You can just buy $100 worth of MTX, and the servers will just go down next month. You wouldn't be able to play even the campaign.
Has it become an industry standard, or people just don't see this as a major problem?
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On September 07 2025 12:45 ChillFlame wrote:
There's one thing that bothers me.
SG is online only. Even single player modes. They don't have resources to even make a makeshift local server or something.
The game will go down soon, along with its servers.
Yet, they still charge money for MTX.
I haven't seen many people, except me and some other folks on Steam, who voice their opinion regarding the immorality of such practices.
RTS fans like us know about the state of the game, but the regular players don't. You can just buy $100 worth of MTX, and the servers will just go down next month. You wouldn't be able to play even the campaign.
Has it become an industry standard, or people just don't see this as a major problem?
The entire steam model where you're basically purchasing a license to rent an online game, and not an actual game, or anything physical or guaranteed, with limited or zero offline components, is extremely consumer unfriendly compared to the old model. The idea that someone would support this model, and actually spend substantial money on steam, is utterly baffling to me. This is an era when console cartridges should be reigning supreme, long enough for PC game publishers to spend a little more time and money to release their product their own way, LAN included. Steam sucks cock. Only buy games that support LAN.
But also, like, where can't you find immorality? Everyone's an asshole. The ship is going down and people are looting the shit out everything, and there are people who aren't looting but then think by god if I'm leaving here empty handed, so they start taking shit. Then there's like 1 person who is helping a woman find her son.
It's on you not to complain about it, but vote with your money and your attention. It is the mentality of a young person to be lost in the sauce and to start victimizing themselves. If you have real dick, you chart a new path and all the problems behind you are very trivial indeed.
edit: Ok that last part was autistic but still, it's true. Like I had to learn my lesson, and it took a long time. Complaining about the bad things other people are doing is a waste of time. Just do it better yourself, or opt out imo.
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On September 07 2025 12:45 ChillFlame wrote:Show nested quote +It's absolutely too late. It's been two weeks since Tim Morten said he'd be making an announcement "in the coming weeks" if the company was even going to keep going or not. In the mean time, the lone sound engineer and both art directors have left the company, according to LinkedIn. There's one thing that bothers me. SG is online only. Even single player modes. They don't have resources to even make a makeshift local server or something. The game will go down soon, along with its servers. Yet, they still charge money for MTX. I haven't seen many people, except me and some other folks on Steam, who voice their opinion regarding the immorality of such practices. RTS fans like us know about the state of the game, but the regular players don't. You can just buy $100 worth of MTX, and the servers will just go down next month. You wouldn't be able to play even the campaign. Has it become an industry standard, or people just don't see this as a major problem?
It is indeed a major problem and I completely agree with Roger on his Steam take. I never buy on Steam if I have another option for that exact reason. If possible, I would rather purchase the game through gog or the developer directly, where you just own the game. This post motivated me to post a "warning review" on Steam.
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EPT
