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On June 10 2015 21:02 Hider wrote:Show nested quote +Yeah, in terms of units sold. But then Starcraft 2 is up there at the 13th place, but I would say it's not the 13th most played game today. So there's that also. And PoE is a Free-To-Play, so not on that list obviously. Just like League Of Legends. I think the twitch viewer-numbers between D3 and POE gives a decent indication of which game is the most played.
nobody is streaming PoE anyway. And PoE is making money compared to d3 at the moment, which is kinda sad for blizz since a f2p diablo 3 would have been so huge.
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On June 10 2015 00:35 TronJovolta wrote: I have played more lotv than most people, I feel. 100 games about. Low masters level.
I personally love it. At first I was skeptical about the cyclone, but I'm starting to enjoy using it. At this point I like all of the new units. The massive buffage to Zerg doesn't make a ton of sense to me, I don't get why quite so many but obviously that will get pulled back a bit.
I feel Protoss is totally fine. And seriously I have over 1500+ wins as a diamond toss in WOL. I love the direction they're taking toss. The colossi nerf is amazing. The disruptor is a little underwhelming, but the adept is cool as fuck.
I really wish they would have added another bio unit, but I really do see a place for bio/tank and bio/liberator in certain matchups and think that's really exciting.
The economy changes are awesome. Game starts immediately and games that feel like 20 minute games in hots are like 9 minute games in lotv. That's badass.
Overall I feel like the game still feels a lot like hots, in that personally I do still play on 3 base a lot til main is drying out and I do still have maxed army fights a lot. But nearly every game I do end up taking a fourth eventually, more so than hots.
As a big sc2 fan this is great. It feels like the same game with new compositions and strats, and just more fast paced.
I feel the same way, LOTV is great and I for one appreciate the work Blizzard is putting in.
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On June 10 2015 21:47 sAsImre wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2015 21:02 Hider wrote:Yeah, in terms of units sold. But then Starcraft 2 is up there at the 13th place, but I would say it's not the 13th most played game today. So there's that also. And PoE is a Free-To-Play, so not on that list obviously. Just like League Of Legends. I think the twitch viewer-numbers between D3 and POE gives a decent indication of which game is the most played. nobody is streaming PoE anyway.
That's exactly my point.
]And PoE is making money compared to d3 at the moment, which is kinda sad for blizz since a f2p diablo 3 would have been so huge.
Diablo 3 made a ton more money than POE without any reasonable level of doubt.
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On June 10 2015 22:02 Hider wrote:Show nested quote +On June 10 2015 21:47 sAsImre wrote:On June 10 2015 21:02 Hider wrote:Yeah, in terms of units sold. But then Starcraft 2 is up there at the 13th place, but I would say it's not the 13th most played game today. So there's that also. And PoE is a Free-To-Play, so not on that list obviously. Just like League Of Legends. I think the twitch viewer-numbers between D3 and POE gives a decent indication of which game is the most played. nobody is streaming PoE anyway. And PoE is making money compared to d3 at the moment, which is kinda sad for blizz since a f2p diablo 3 would have been so huge. That's exactly my point. Show nested quote +]And PoE is making money compared to d3 at the moment, which is kinda sad for blizz since a f2p diablo 3 would have been so huge. Diablo 3 made a ton more money than POE without any reasonable level of doubt.
I know, but not sure about it if we compare development cost. Just a shame they didn't dare to go full f2p with d3 and waited HS for it, the game has definitely the potential for it. (and their in game monetization was utter crap, the real money ah ...)
D3 was the archetype of the game you pay once, play a bit and ditch off but it's still a great success for the dev since you get your money and don't spend much maintaining your servers and stuff since your playing community is small.
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I know, but not sure about it if we compare development cost. Just a shame they didn't dare to go full f2p with d3 and waited HS for it, the game has definitely the potential for it. (and their in game monetization was utter crap, the real money ah ...)
If Diablo sold 20M copies, that's still $1B in revenue. Maybe a F2P skin/larger stash-model could do the same thing, but it would also be more expensive to maintain, and it's still a gamble.
As a general rule, a F2P-model is an advantage for non AAA-companies as it allows them to enter a market where they otherwise wouldn't have the ressources to enter (in terms of brand value, marketing).
FYI, this is a comment from a POE developer:
We probably would be making more income if we were pay-to-win," said lead programmer Jonathan Rogers. "But the game is doing very well. We paid off our development costs, the company is making enough money to expand.
Above doesn't sound like a company that made hundreds of millions of dollars in earnings.
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You can't compare pacman to Starcraft, that's just ridiculous. Pacman is a shallow novelty game.
I think this is a better comparison: if Hearthstone fails then the online card game genre dies. If Diablo III fails then the action rpg genre nearly collapses. If World of Warcraft fails then the MMORPG genre quickly becomes niche. If Starcraft II fails then the RTS genre suffers.
Currently there are world war II strategy games, simulation games, action-rts games, real-time-tactics games, all with reasonable to high levels of success. &Starcraft II itself has sold a lot of copies. There is a market for strategy games. The main issues are that Starcraft II is not well adapted to the modern environment (difficult to play, expensive, many mistakes made in the development) and that Blizzard's success killed the competition. In some cases quite literally, since Blizzard has many Relic & C&C alumni in its development team, meaning that their competitors partly had their talent siphoned off.
I'll grant that it might be difficult to adapt RTS to the modern world and that it's also true that it has a bad reputation by now. But all it takes is one good, innovative title to turn that around. A lot of studios want to jump onto the next big thing, so they commission more MOBAs to be developed, while RTS lacks the hype. The lack of quality studios with an interest in strategy games becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy as all recent RTS games are not that appealing.
Anyone who was involved with BW, WC3 or early SCII knows it has vastly more potential than Pacman.
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There's no point in all this begging and pleading with Blizzard. Just play BW or Starbow or the arcade. Or hope that some new and better game company takes an interest in the RTS genre.
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On June 11 2015 01:14 Grumbels wrote: You can't compare pacman to Starcraft, that's just ridiculous. Pacman is a shallow novelty game.
Anyone who was involved with BW, WC3 or early SCII knows it has vastly more potential than Pacman.
thanks for your reply. i regret to inform you that you are incorrect. as an RTS fan... i wish u were right.
Pacman was the highest grossing arcade game of all time. Once you factor in price inflation Pacman has brought in more money than all Blizzard RTS games combined and Blizzard has zero chance of surpassing it in the future.
Pacman is a cultural icon and was played competitively and "Pacman hustling" was similar to "Billiards Hustling" in the early 1980s. Ken Uston , top blackjack player, was probably the most famous "Pacman Hustler" of the early 80s. it was a fascinating time in video game history. http://www.amazon.ca/Mastering-Pac-Man-Ken-Uston/dp/1626548978
Pacman impacted western culture as much or more than Starcraft has impacted cultures of the eastern hemisphere.
SC2 is life and death to generate $600 million in 2015 dollars. Pacman had 3.5 Billion in revenue with most of it made in 1980 and 1981. Blizzard RTS games do not have hte potential to surpass this #. http://www.usgamer.net/articles/top-10-biggest-grossing-arcade-games-of-all-time
in 1980.. Pacman made video games part of Western culture.. until then video games were sociologically non-existent.
Ms. Pacman is a pretty tough strategy-action game. Pacman is not as good because u can go from board 5 to board 20 (1st Apple to the 8th Key) with the same pattern
my point was MsPacman is 1000X better of a game than Pacman and yet it didn't even make 25% of the money Pacman made.
a better game does not always mean better sales when the genre is declining. it does not matter how great or awesome the genre was in the past.
Bobby Kotick is well versed in all this history and will align his billions accordingly when it comes time for ATVI to make a decision on the RTS team once LotV is released.
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Russian Federation93 Posts
We shouldn't think about StarCraft like it is an ordinary game.
It could be the best game ever made, but with b2p model it will generate sufficient income only for the first 6 month max. It is good for the singleplayer GTA V or The Witcher 3, because they don't have goals to constantly develop the cybersport scene.
They don't need to constantly maintain the game. It is just Made - Sold process. Sometimes it will require a very little development for bugfixes or dedicated servers rent for 2-3 years after the release but it is nothing in compare to what Blizzard must do to keep StarCraft alive as a cybersport.
Every single day StarCraft should become a better game in all aspects and it is impossible without continuous development process which requires money spending. And the only way to afford this is to have p2p or f2p model. And the last one shows itself much more profitable nowadays.
Without continuous growth StarCraft will die as a worldwide cybersport discipline in less than 3 years after the LotV release. Just like WarCraft 3 did but much faster due to the presence of very successful competitors.
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I don't think most people actually progress past the early stages of pacman. I played a version of it when I was about 8 and neither me nor my brothers had any interest in the game beyond beating the first few levels, because as a genre it gets old really quickly. I'm sure that there is some mathematical complexity to the strategy because at its heart it's a pathfinding problem, but that doesn't translate to being a compelling playing experience. I doubt whether many people really thought of MsPacman as a significant improvement.
Pacman had tremendous rapport, but not all success stories are created equal. I don't think you can separate Pacman's success from its role in being one of the first accessible, reflex-based strategy games that play well in arcades. Starcraft is similar in that it was arguably the first major competitive war game, and you could make a case that other genres have superceded it by offering the same experience in a more accessible framework, but I don't fully buy that.
This is a simple game to play: what if Starcraft II was conceived as a more accessible free-to-play game that was still true to the Starcraft experience? what if the game had been better balanced and bl / infestor, protoss, swarm hosts etc had never been problematic? what if the arcade and social experience had been better designed?
Just arbitrary decisions that imo would have a major impact on the success of the RTS genre, even if Blizzard would still have monopolized it.
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On June 11 2015 20:39 sh1RoKen wrote: We shouldn't think about StarCraft like it is an ordinary game.
It could be the best game ever made, but with b2p model it will generate sufficient income only for the first 6 month max. It is good for the singleplayer GTA V or The Witcher 3, because they don't have goals to constantly develop the cybersport scene.
They don't need to constantly maintain the game. It is just Made - Sold process. Sometimes it will require a very little development for bugfixes or dedicated servers rent for 2-3 years after the release but it is nothing in compare to what Blizzard must do to keep StarCraft alive as a cybersport.
Every single day StarCraft should become a better game in all aspects and it is impossible without continuous development process which requires money spending. And the only way to afford this is to have p2p or f2p model. And the last one shows itself much more profitable nowadays.
Without continuous growth StarCraft will die as a worldwide cybersport discipline in less than 3 years after the LotV release. Just like WarCraft 3 did but much faster due to the presence of very successful competitors.
you make great points. i think it will be 5 years and not 3 though. Let me explain why.
5 years ago Frank Pierce stated they view SC2 as a 10 year esports experiment. Therefore, i think a WCS backed by Blizzard will be around for the next 5 years to fulfill this promise. After that, all bets are off.
A big crossroads comes upon us after LotV is released. Will another RTS game get made so that it can be released in 5 years from now and essentially "replace" SC2 as Blizzard's showcase RTS game... similar to how SC2 replaced WC3 for that designation.
After LotV is released and as Blizzard supports SC2 for the next 5 years will Blizzard make another RTS game?
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Russian Federation93 Posts
On June 11 2015 22:12 JimmyJRaynor wrote:Show nested quote +On June 11 2015 20:39 sh1RoKen wrote: We shouldn't think about StarCraft like it is an ordinary game.
It could be the best game ever made, but with b2p model it will generate sufficient income only for the first 6 month max. It is good for the singleplayer GTA V or The Witcher 3, because they don't have goals to constantly develop the cybersport scene.
They don't need to constantly maintain the game. It is just Made - Sold process. Sometimes it will require a very little development for bugfixes or dedicated servers rent for 2-3 years after the release but it is nothing in compare to what Blizzard must do to keep StarCraft alive as a cybersport.
Every single day StarCraft should become a better game in all aspects and it is impossible without continuous development process which requires money spending. And the only way to afford this is to have p2p or f2p model. And the last one shows itself much more profitable nowadays.
Without continuous growth StarCraft will die as a worldwide cybersport discipline in less than 3 years after the LotV release. Just like WarCraft 3 did but much faster due to the presence of very successful competitors. you make great points. i think it will be 5 years and not 3 though. Let me explain why. 5 years ago Frank Pierce stated they view SC2 as a 10 year esports experiment. Therefore, i think a WCS backed by Blizzard will be around for the next 5 years to fulfill this promise. After that, all bets are off. A big crossroads comes upon us after LotV is released. Will another RTS game get made so that it can be released in 5 years from now and essentially "replace" SC2 as Blizzard's showcase RTS game... similar to how SC2 replaced WC3 for that designation. After LotV is released and as Blizzard supports SC2 for the next 5 years will Blizzard make another RTS game?
You are right. I just have a different understanding of "death". Blizzard will support SC2 for more than 3 years for sure. But I don't think it will be enough.
We need viewers to attract sponsors to give money to organize tournaments to attract progamers to play better. If there is no viewers -> no sponsors -> no money -> no tournaments -> no progamers -> no cybersport -> no live Starcraft.
And who are these viewers? Progamers? People who are able to split their BIO from distruptor attack? No! 81% of current global sc2 players are Plat or lower. Let's be honest - they don't know how to play Starcraft at all. 90% of all DotA players are 3200 solo mmr or lower. Sponsors need THOSE people. Sponsors need an auditory who suck so much that they think that the problem is in their mouse or chair. These are the potential customers for sponsors.
DotA, LoL and CS:GO viewers use the same devices. They are the exact same people for sponsors. And they have much more user-friendly content for those who play bad. And they grow in geometric progression -> StarCraft rate of dying is increasing faster.
In 3 years there will be "WCS only" StarCraft with probable transition to a new game in 2 years. And DotA will be on the TV with $ billions invested every year. And that is death from my point of view.
Even if StarCraft will grow in all directions on 20% from today. DotA will grow on 800% and overall proportions will change from 25/75 to 1/99.
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I agree with OP. I've been playing tons of Starbow and have been having a lot of fun.
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+1. Blizzard just seem really lost. They are making these half baked units that are the worst of brood war and worst of new units.
So they are giving us this weird mix that is really terrible. The new economy is also really boring because its ultimately hollow, while it forces you to expand faster, it doesn't reward you for example having more than 3 bases, having 4 or 5 bases at once it meaningless once again.
Finally they should get rid of the smart cast for reals and just make the game more hard!
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Hi@ all,
this is my first post on TeamLiquid. Im 34 years old. I played BW and switched to SC 2. Im in Diamond. I played SC2 since the beginning. I think BW had his time, but you all have to realize that SC2 is not BW 2.0. The way Blizzard took was the right one! You cant just copy BW and say cool we have a new great RTS. It makes me really sad how the most people on TL think about SC 2 and especially about LotV.
1. The economy
I have a beta key and play Lotv all the time. The economy change is great! We dont need double harvesting. I know that you are forced to expand and this is the only way to play the game (except for rushes or all ins). You have to realize that this is the best way to play this game. You have more fights all over the map. Ist pure fun. You cry there is not so much diversity because we are getting punished when we not keep expanding. Diversity comes from the style how you play the game with the pressure to expand! This is the best way to play the game! It is fast and the deversity comes from the battles all over the map and how you react to it. The game itself doesnt get better, when you get more options to play the game. This is an Illusion. In LotV we now have a great economy war and multiple battles. If we sacrefice therefore a few defensive playstyles ist absolutly ok.
2. The Units
Terran: The cyclone is fun to play. Ist an innovative unit and makes mech more viable (i played mech in most SC 2 games). Im not sure about the Liberator. I need to test this unit more.
Zerg: Both Units are well designed. I dont understand why People complain about it.
Protoss: The idea of the Adept is nice, he needs some tweaking but ist a cool unit and fun to play. I dont like the distrupter so much because it overlaps with banelings a little bit. I think it would be better to get the reaver back from BW.
I like most of the unit design in SC 2 and especially in Lotv. In broodwar are many units that you wont use at all in multiplayer battles( Scout...Queens.....) but no one talks about that.
Also SC 2 is not dying. Ist smaller yes. But this has to do with our next generation. The most young people want to play easier games like Mobas. Dont blame SC2 as game for it. Playing Starcraft (BW or SC 2) is very hard and stressfull (i love it). But many People dont like it to have so much stress when they play games. It has nothing to do with SC2. It would be the same in BW (they are both Korean dominated). We have an E-Sport Scene. The Scene is small but the scene is constant and will grow when SC2 Lotv gets released. But it will not reach the level of Mobas. But this is not bad. SC2 will stay as competitive E-Sport title (but it will be Korean dominated as it was in BW, for me thats not such a big Problem because i like to play the game).
SC2 will stay very long after LotV is released until there will be the next competitive RTS (if there will ever be an another one). And i tell you one thing. The only good competitive RTS games are from Blizzard (BW, WC3,SC2). There was AoE 3 and supreme commander but they could not compete with the Blizzard titles especially not in E-Sport!!!!
Ist ridicoules how you talk about SC2 here. Since the game was released the most people on TL were shitstorming about it. Oh we have unlimited unit and building selection this destroys the game (hello we are not in the 90s anymore), gameplay in BW was better....The gameplay in SC 2 is different from BW and thats good. I like the style to play SC 2 more than BW. Most People here were shitstorming about the game because they expected BW 2.0. Im very happy that this was not the case. SC 2 is still fresh and new and the best RTS on the market.
All you can do here is complaining and whinig about LotV. You have no clue about good game design. Also Rotterdam Kevin van der Koy (SC 2 Caster) said that he hates how people talk about Blizzard when they try something new in LotV. The game is fun. Pro Gamers like the changes in LotV. Blizzard communicates with them and i hope that they will never intoduce double harvesting (this would destroy the good gameplay in LotV).
The most People here on TL will never be happy with SC2 because the only thing they want is BW. The community here makes me sad and angry. You never gave SC 2 a real chance. When i talk to People that play LotV in game i always hear that they like LotV.
I thank Dustin Browder and David Kim for this awesome game and their great work for Starcraft!!!
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On June 12 2015 22:07 AlphaAeffchen wrote:
I thank Dustin Browder and David Kim for this awesome game and their great work for Starcraft!!!
Not worth a read then. Bowder gave us failed aspects as "high-speed battles" or "tactically splitting being a skill" (autoclumping) stating superior design.
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@JCoto
Unit splitting in battle is skill... Also happend in BW against Lurkers and so on. And dont blame me for my opinion on the developpers of SC 2 pls read my post first.
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On June 12 2015 22:19 JCoto wrote:Show nested quote +On June 12 2015 22:07 AlphaAeffchen wrote: I thank Dustin Browder and David Kim for this awesome game and their great work for Starcraft!!! Not worth a read then. Bowder gave us failed aspects as "high-speed battles" or "tactically splitting being a skill" (autoclumping) stating superior design.
in terms of long term success as a competitive RTS ... the #1 non-Blizzard RTS game was made by Browder. the guy is good.
you do not get hired as a Game Designer of 1 game... and after 5 years get promoted to Vice President of Blizzard by being a lousy game designer.
Blizzard knows how to make games and they know how to hire people who are good game designers.. and they also know who to promote to Vice President.
sry guy, i'll take Mike Morhaime's judgement over your judgement every day and twice on sundays... you want to take shots at a Vice President of Blizzard then expect return fire.
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On June 12 2015 22:07 AlphaAeffchen wrote: When i talk to People that play LotV in game i always hear that they like LotV
Clearly you havent talked to me. Also care to explain why dh would destroy the game when all indications points the opposite direction? I give LoTV 5 years (at most kept alive by constant patching) until either another RTS hits the market or the RTS scene dies for some time. If sc2 wouldnt have been called Starcraft it would have never been so big. It only lives by the name of its predecessor imo.
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On June 12 2015 22:58 JimmyJRaynor wrote: in terms of long term success as a competitive RTS ... the #1 non-Blizzard RTS game was made by Browder. the guy is good.
you do not get hired as a Game Designer of 1 game... and after 5 years get promoted to Vice President of Blizzard by being a lousy game designer.
Blizzard knows how to make games and they know how to hire people who are good game designers.. and they also know who to promote to Vice President.
sry guy, i'll take Mike Morhaime's judgement over your judgement every day and twice on sundays... you want to take shots at a Vice President of Blizzard then expect return fire. If they're so damn good, why do LOTV and SC2HOTS just plain suck? Why is Casualstone an unholy mess of RNG and P2W? Why is World of Warcraft a mindless, pointless grind of level treadmilling and looting? They have good business models, but as esports they are a joke. Sorry "guy," Activision Blizzard is good at making money but the only well-designed, competitive esport game they ever made was Brood War. Then in the quest for more money, they created SC2. They got our money, but do I see myself playing SC2 10 years later like I do with Brood War and Counter-Strike? Not likely.
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