And We’re Off! About three weeks ago Teamliquid received an invitation to attend Blizzard’s exclusive press conference that took place on April 19th. Day[9] and I had the honor to represent our favorite website! Last year, Blizzard Entertainment revealed a lot of the multiplayer aspects of the game. However, with the beta now fully underway and beta keys being given out left and right, this year’s press conference focused on the single player campaign. Now I know that the majority of TL’s userbase cares a lot more about multiplayer balance and issues than the campaign, but I think that you’ll be pleasantly surprised with our review of the current single player build. I will also state that I have no interest in lore, so I will not be discussing any of that in this article.
For those who don’t know, Day[9] and I both attend the same school so we were very fortunate that our carpool situation was so convenient!
Wearing my winged horse shirt!
Day[9] driving
We departed from USC at around 8:30AM. After making a couple wrong turns we finally reached our destination, Blizzard HQ, in just a short one-hour drive. We were both decked out in our nerd gear, with me repping TL wearing the Teamliquid winged horse shirt and Day[9] in his awesome Macro-Micro yin-yang shirt. Upon our arrival, the Blizzard security guard told us to “make a left, then you’ll see the orc statue and the door will be to the left”. When the security guard uses an orc as a landmark, you know that you’ve arrived at the right place.
We walked into the lobby area and after filling out our NDAs, we started mingling with other representatives from other websites, such as Shacknews and Gamasutra. It was definitely nice to meet and chat with some people who are very dedicated to ESPORTS. All the Blizzard employees were extremely nice and went way out of their way to make us feel welcome—really an awesome group of people.
They soon shuffled us into the auditorium (with very plush seats, I might add), where we had an informal Q&A session with Dustin Browder, followed by a brief demonstration of the single player mode.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AJz7Oiluj4
Informal Q&A Session Recap The following is a compilation of notes I took during this informal session as we waited for the single player demonstration to load up.
Beta tournaments: He said that he found them exciting because they didn't really expect any tourneys since it was "just beta". They are seeing strategies that they didn't predict during internal testing. The balance team is excited for current situation in beta. They will be dealing with the queen rush in the next patch [author’s note: not sure what was meant by this]. They also want more diversity in the ZvZ matchup.
MBS and smartcasting: Hardcore players are happy with the amount of skill required to play the game at a high level. They haven't been hearing many negatives about it. The backlash isn't as severe as what they had anticipated.
Releasing a patch that doesn't nerf protoss: Patches have different aims. Sometimes they're based on balancing race matchups, but oftentimes not. For example, the ZvZ matchup was stale because they were only making 3 units. The reasons for the patch are that statistically speaking, protoss is winning a lot. ZvT and ZvP have only 1% win-loss differential. However PvT is at around a 55% win rate. The matchmaking system does its best to match players with their own skill level, but the data isn't necessarily reliable. One flaw he pointed out was that one player may be more significantly more skilled than another but they may end up going 50-50 against each other because of the racial imbalances.
KR vs US vs EU: In Korea, Zerg needs to be nerfed because Zerg is so dominant. For EU/US, Zerg needs to be buffed. At this point, due to limited sample size, nobody knows for sure what races are the most powerful.
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
Entry Barrier (How new players join the competitive scene): Solo play campaign is the starting experience. Then they will graduate to either play versus the AI or challenge mode. Hopefully after that, they will go online and play co-op with friends. Next they can then play 3v3, 4v4. Ideally, they play 1v1 based on their prior experiences. However in the beta none of these discussed features exist. Beta is not meant to be a demo, it's intended to be a test of 1v1 and 2v2 balance, so it isn't really good for casuals.
Lurker removal: It conflicted with other units already in the game: roaches, infestors, banelings. The lurker was originally pushed to tier 3. However at tier 3, detection was plentiful so they felt like the unit didn’t have a specific enough of a role.
UI/Hotkey adjustments: They are not planning on having a fully customizable UI but they will have customized hotkeys. For advanced players, they can even open a textfile and edit each individual hotkey.
Balancing time and resources: Dustin Browder spends equal amounts of time on balance and other things. In terms of money spent, he wasn’t sure of the exact breakdown. They are still working on solo campaign and also working on the AI.
Spellcasters: Pretty confident about their current state except for infestors. He wishes that queen has better tension with spell choice (ie MULE vs scan with the orbital command). He is happy about ghosts and their current role.
Unit Balance: They don’t want to mess with too many things because the metagame changes all the time even without patches (think of the SC1 metagame transitions over time).
Hunter-seeker missile: They are going to lower the technology requirement from fusion core down to just the tech lab, but this means that they will also bring down its power, too.
Single player and multiplayer data/balance is separate: Unit statistics such as rate of fire and HP may be different. There are also upgrades in solo mode that would be impossible to implement in multiplayer. He stressed that the solo player campaign does not train you for multiplayer.
Community feedback: Yes, it is definitely being heard and used. From the community’s perspective, it seems like they aren't listening because it takes ~2 weeks to get stuff implemented, but they are definitely reading and looking at what the community says.
Single Player Overview
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IcKvrEgSlhY
Single player basics: After each single player mission you return back to the story mode origin, which will change throughout the game. You can customize force before going into battle. You can unlock different units (such as the medic and firebat) by playing missions. You can make technology purchases (for example, the combat shields for marines). Each unit has a cheaper basic upgrade and then a much more expensive higher upgrade.
Mercenaries: Extremely high-end version of units that you already own. You can use each mercenary once or twice each mission, depending on what mercenary it is. When you purchase them in-game, they immediately arrive at the battle scene via drop pod.
Research: Missions have bonus missions (for instance, kill a brutalisk or find hidden Zerg DNA on the map) that gives you research points. There are checkpoints at 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25 research points. At each checkpoint you have 2 choices of what you can research. Once you research it, it’s final. You cannot go back and change it.
TV news reports: Based on your actions in the game, there will be TV news reports that update the situation happening in the Starcraft 2 world. Very cool feature.
Gameplay: Each mission is its own special gameplay mechanic. They don't want each one to be the same "jump in and kill the computer AI" mission. Each mission will be very distinct from each other.
After Dustin Browder’s presentation, the majority of the rest of the day was spent playing the single player campaign and the new challenge mode. We headed up to the 3rd floor where they had 2 rooms set up with computers for the press and fansites to play!
Lots of nerds playing SC2
Single Player Mode Day[9] and I split up the single player mode. I explored the different customizations, mercenaries, and the new challenge mode. Day[9] tried some of the campaign missions, and I wrote down his opinions and impressions of the game as he was playing.
Our workstation: note the variety of complimentary drinks
Customizations The single player interface is much different from that of SC1 or Battle.net. There are four different locations you can visit between missions. The environments are interactive. When you click on different characters and structures they react and talk with you, almost like how it would be in an RPG.
Bridge: This is where you can select the planet and mission you will play
Armory: You can purchase upgrades for your units and buildings. Level 1 is cheap, Level 2 is much more costly.
For example: Bunker: Level 1: Projectile accelerator (increase range by 1) Level 2: Neo-steel bunker (increase number of bunker slots by 2) Missile turret: Level 1: Titanium Housing (increase missile turret health by 75) Level 2: Hellstorm Batteries (additional volley of projectiles with each attack)
Units: All of the following have 2 unique upgrades each Infantry: Marine, Medic, Firebat, Marauder, and Reaper Vehicles: Hellion and Diamondback
Cantina: You can buy mercenaries here 3 types were unlocked: war pigs, devil dogs, hammer securities. There were also some mystery locked mercenaries. Mercenaries are upgraded or elite versions of units you already have, such as marauders.
Laboratory: Research technology You get to research extra technology each time you collect a certain number of research points for completing extra missions within levels. For example, when you have 15 points you can choose between scv-less refineries or double-pumping command centers. Your choice is final, and cannot be reversed.
Research new technological improvements at the Laboratory [1680x1050]
Challenge Mode Challenge mode is basically a set of single player UMS maps made by Blizzard and they test specific skill sets in SC2. In the current build, there are three different missions for three different difficulty levels to give us a total of nine.
Basic: Teaches you general knowledge of unit counters and army composition Tactical Command: Send the right Terran counter units. Protect three supply depots from waves. Path of Ascension: Send the right Protoss counter units. Protect three pylons from enemy waves. For the Swarm: Send the right Zerg counter units. Protect three spires from enemy waves.
Advanced: Focuses on micro tips and increasing multitasking Covert Ops: You have a small force of terran specialists (like ghosts) and you kill as many units as possible in a given time frame. Psionic Assault: Protoss version of above with high templars and sentries, except you have no time limit. You just beat as many waves of units as you can. Infestation: Zerg version with roaches and infestors. Destroy as much of enemy base as you came before time runs out.
Expert: Training for multiplayer Harbinger of Death: PvT, you can only use hotkeys and have to kill as many units as possible before time runs out. Opening Gambit: TvZ, build up a strong econ and large army while fighting off early attacks. Aim is to optimize build order. Rush defense: TvZ/P. Learn how to fight off rushes as a Terran.
There were only two missions ready to play in this build: Psionic Assault and Harbinger of Death. There are three achievement levels, Bronze, Silver, and Gold. These achievements were based on the number of kills you managed to get.
Psionic Assault was really difficult at first and I died just around the Bronze level. Then I realized that SC2 had smartcast and I was able to almost reach Gold on my second attempt. The waves come from various directions and as you get further and further into the game, the waves start coming in more frequently and eventually simultaneously from the different ramps.
Harbinger of Death was challenging due to the time limit. If there was no time limit, it would have been an extremely easy mission to finish. I forgot that you could only use hotkeys for this challenge, so I lost my carriers right away since I didn't make interceptors (I had clicked on the "make interceptor" picture). On my 2nd attempt it was much easier. I wasn't able to kill all the units but I made significant improvements from my first go-around.
Single Player Campaign We played two different campaign missions, one each from two different worlds: Bel’Shir and Xil. We decided to try the campaign with the difficulty level on “Brutal” mode, which was the hardest. Day[9] played the campaigns while I sat next to him writing down observations as well as transcribing some things that he said as he played.
Bel'Shir: Welcome to the Jungle There are 2 main goals for this mission: 1) Collect terrazine gas located around the map. 2) Prevent Protoss from sealing 7 altars And 1 bonus goal: 3) Find Protoss relics
Fight off the Protoss as you collect terrazine gas [1680x1050]
Prevent Protoss from sealing the altars [1680x1050]
-Before Day[9] started the mission, he bought all the unit upgrades first. These upgrades are permanent, so you don’t have to buy them every time you start a new mission. -Latency on single player is significantly lower than on Battle.net so it's very easy to control units. -Scouts are just as bad against ground as in SC1. -In the original single player, none of the missions were challenging in any regard, but this is very challenging. -The computer AI target fires. -Day[9] was playing extremely aggressively, but there appears to be no repercussions for that at all. -Low on money relatively quickly, had to expand. -Calling in mercenaries is necessary, they have very inflated stats relative to other units. -Day[9] just lost to scouts in single player TvP! (lol)
Xil: The Dig There are 3 objectives in this mission: 1) Recover the laser drill 2) Destroy the Xel'Naga temple door 3) The laser drill must survive
In this mission the main idea is to defend your Terran base as you destroy the Protoss Xel’Naga temple door with your laser drill.
You initially start with a drop pod worth of units. The unit statistics are different from the multiplayer version (different HP values, etc). You have to defeat small groups of units along the way. The campaign guides you very nicely in a tutorial-type fashion. After you beat the original few units they smoothly transition into you taking over a base. You have this laser drill (33 damage) that needs to kill the Xel'Naga temple door which has 100,000 HP. Your base has 2 entrances and Protoss will keep attacking you. On "Brutal" mode the computer is actually quite good. Day[9] would be having a tough time fighting them off if he didn't have that laser which will also help defend the base. Even with the help of the laser he is barely able to hold them off.
There is a new Terran unit that is not in multiplayer mode: the Diamondback. It’s an armored mechanical unit that comes out of the factory. It does 20 damage with a +20 vs armored bonus. It can move while shooting.
Both missions so far have this "rush rush gogogo" feel to it. It’s a very fast and frantic feel. Day[9] is impressed because he feels like he actually has to really try and focus to beat the mission.
Day[9] eventually loses again, but he thinks that the campaigns are awesome. To quote him directly, "it's like impressively fun." We decide to try this mission again.
It’s difficult to see the enemy in the minimap due to the colors. In a classic version of this type of map you'd expect to be able to win by just making a bunch of defensive structures but with this level it isn't possible (which is a very good thing).
Playing it a second time makes the mission significantly easier since he knows what he's doing. It seems like he's winning without too much difficulty this time. The mission takes a very long time to complete because the Xel’Naga temple door has so much HP. I think he has played this mission for about 15 minutes and it still has 17,000 out of 100,000 HP remaining. Oh sad face, the game just crashed with only 10,000 HP remaining. The game has a nice autosave function where you can restore up to a certain point.
Day[9] taking a break from SC2 to work on his presentation
Lunch Time! Sometime during the single-player testing, it was lunch time. Yay for delicious Mexican food! During the lunch break we were able to chat with Karune, as well as several other awesome Blizzard staff members such as Kenny (community team), Dan and Simeon (B.net 2.0). We’re always happy to be able to strengthen our relationships with the Blizzard staff. Also, they loved our SC2ProMod. In fact, they liked it so much that it was emailed to the entire SC2 staff at Blizzard.
For the rest of the day we experimented a little bit more with the single player modes, but for the most part we chatted with Blizzard staff members, and we also prepared for the fansite Q&A session with Dustin Browder and Chris Sigaty. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to ask all the questions we wanted since there were other sites there asking questions about things like lore… But not to worry, we definitely managed to learn a few key things about SC2! So without further ado, here’s what we learned during the Q&A session.
Fansite Q&A Session Recap Description of their balance process: Ideas could be based on forum posts, replays, Battle.net statistics etc. Basically the entire process is a lot of trial and error.
18+ rating in Korea: Not sure what's going on with that. They are looking up what happened and how to fix it.
High ground mechanic: They like how it is now. According to Dustin Browder, it gives a clear advantage at first and then it eventually disappears.
Implementation of F-keys: F1-4 will hero hotkeys for single player missions and the inevitable DotA clone. “~” will be for voice chat. F5-F8 are to be implemented as screen locations in Patch 9. It may be possible to customize and remap these hotkeys in the future.
Server isolation and its effect on the growth of ESPORTS: It will be definitely something that will be look at in the future, but at the moment there are no plans to allow people to access different servers with the same key due to lag and latency issues.
The "you are being revealed" mechanic: It is being fixed at the moment. The new plan is when you lose your last central building, only you will get a 30 second countdown to build a new central building. If you do not build one in 30 seconds, only then will it be revealed to your opponent. Also, if you make a central building again past the 30 second mark, your opponent will lose their vision of all your buildings. The 30 seconds is the current number, but based on testing it may move up to 60 seconds. Also, in the future this may end up being a toggleable option for tournament mode.
Group/online replay watching: Group replay watching is not expected to be implemented at launch. However subsequent patches are aimed to be like WoW, where the patches are significant modifications, not just minor balance tweaks. You will be able to create "groups". A Group is a concept of gathering users with similar interests together, such as mapmaking. It will be in a future patch or expansion but it won't be in the next content patch. For clans and other things there is no predicted date of release for this feature although they will look into it.
Hiding "match history" data: All professional sports are based on studying tape of the opponent. So no, they are not planning on hiding match history data. Once the tournament patch is added it'll be easy to figure out who the best of the best are (professional league). If a player wanted to hide their match history, they would need to make another account and play.
Identifiers: Still not sure of the final answer on whether or not they will keep it. The idea was that if someone wanted a very common name such as “Darth Vader”, this would enable them to do so. However due to confusion, this is still up for change. They don't know what direction they will take but they do acknowledge that this is a problem.
Overall ladder rankings: The tournament system will rank only the very top end players, but definitely not all platinum players.
Foreign font support for Battle.net: They will look into getting font support for the different versions. Replay speed (fast vs faster) and its effects on game statistics like APM: They actually were not aware of this problem but Dustin took note of it and will work to fix it right away.
As the Q&A session concluded we realized that it was time return to reality and go home.
The Aftermath The adventure didn't end there for Day[9] and myself. Day[9] really needed to get back to school because he had to present his final oral presentation in his night class. As we got into the car in the parking lot, we realized that we were extremely low on gas. We drove around for a long time trying find a gas station, even asking the car next to us as we were stopped at a red light. He pointed us in the right direction and we were so happy to see the Shell gas station. We turned so that we can be in a position to get into the parking lot…and we realize that we’re now on the on-ramp to get onto I-5. FMOL. Anyway after a few more minutes of nervousness and car beginning to lose power we finally manage to fill up the car with a full tank of very much needed gasoline.
Unfortunately for us, I-5 is the worst freeway in the world to be stuck on during rush hour traffic (fellow SoCal residents will agree with me here) and it took us much longer to get back to campus than to get to Blizzard. Not only that, but President Barack Obama was at our school so half the roads around our campus were blocked off and we were stuck on the off-ramp about a half mile away from campus for about 30 minutes due to the diverted traffic.
Luckily for us, it all ended up well as Day[9] destroyed his oral presentation thanks to his public speaking practice through his show the Day[9].tv Daily!
And with that we wrap up our coverage of Teamliquid’s visit to Blizzard HQ 2010! We hope you enjoyed it!
-LosingID8 and Day[9]
This post was made by the Team Liquid Starcraft 2 Coverage Team. For more of TL's coverage, please visit the Team Liquid Starcraft 2 Beta Page.
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
On April 23 2010 16:26 Integra wrote: Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
Envy! I'm very pleased with the way that single player seems to be going. I'm a huge lore geek, and it's reassuring to see that there will be more complex maps and missions c:
High ground mechanic: They like how it is now. According to Dustin Browder, it gives a clear advantage at first and then it eventually disappears.
What? Often you get zero advantage b/c your opponent already has vision whereas in a hit/miss system the high ground is always advantageous. Why Blizzard why?
On April 23 2010 16:26 Integra wrote: Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
WHY!!!!!
They say it right in the article. Latency issues.
It doesn't explain a damn thing, Is it that a list of available gateways that it will lag, even on your closest server, and if So why. Or is it that they just think that just because someone from Europe tries to connect to a server in USA it will lag more and therefore let's not allow people to connect at all? If so, why didn't they do it like this in SC1 or Warcraft 3?
Really really sucks to hear that they still seem to care about % winrate in matchups as if that means anything for balance and also that they think the upper-ground mechanic is fine...
Wow, they didn't know about the fast/faster APM issue on replays? That's a little alarming.
Great article, but I must admit I'm a little iffy about this whole "starcraft as two games" thing... I enjoyed the SP of the original StarCraft just fine... Ah well anyway, the only thing it worries me is how much effort is spent on the sp that could be spent on the mp but then again it's Blizzard and I can only imagine the resources they have to spend on everything.
The responses don't really do anything to help ease my worry about their lack of support for eSports though, so far it all seems like they just want to build up a league run by them and aren't too interested in support for others.
The region locking thing is probably a legal issue, which is just lame but what are ya gonna do.
Thanks for the write up. Campaign looks a lot more interesting than I thought, I guess I'll play it to get acquainted with the basic units/tech tree.
The part where you can't play on different servers is really fucking gay, and is going to split up the community, and it's wrong on so many levels , I know they want to minimize the lag with their automatchmaking system, but I'm not a fan of this at all.
Any word on the release date? Q3 or Q4 2010? Or Q1 2011?
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
I'm very worried about this! I think it's fine if the gateways only mattered in the auto match making, but if you're unable to play whoever you want to in a game as global as starcraft, it basically kills the game. The only option is for us, and by us I mean MasterOfChaos, is to crack the shit and release ChaosLauncher 2.
Also, they didn't mention anything about b.net channels?
edit* btw, just to not sound all negative: the single player campaign looks motherflippin' amazing.
I'm so glad that the singleplayer campaign will be challenging/interesting for higher level players! I wish you had listed more of the research upgrades so I could start theorycrafting my purchases
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
Damn, they're still gonna keep the high ground to low ground mechanic? I wish they reconsider it again. It really makes those ramps in the middle of the map not as key to hold. SC1 was so important in terms of holding key ramps/chokes And when the game has progressed to this point, vision is not really an issue anymore and gives the ramp defender no more advantage.
Awesome write up, thanks for all the info. Was getting a bit worried about the lack of information on single player but Blizzard seem to have it all under control! :D
Great read. Thanks for keeping us posted, a very quality post. Single player looks awesome. I watched the vid and was like, medics? Then I saw the post about it and understood all. :D
regarding the high ground mechanic, i definitely agree with you guys.
i wanted to discuss it further with the developers, however, this event was not the proper place to do such a thing, as the only time we had with the developers was during an extremely time-limited Q&A with a bunch of other websites participating.
Interesting... How does gateways and blizzard run tournaments work in wc3? I mean.. having people borrowing accounts for every tournament will get tiresome very quickly.
This is fantastic stuff. SC2 Single Player looks like it'll be quite entertaining to play. (Aww, look at those SCVS struggle to get those terrazine canisters.)
Also, I didn't notice the SC2ProMod until now. Amazing as well.
who cares for the singleplayer ... this may be fun for some weeks multiplayer is build to to be fun for many years so i hope that blizz isnt overcommiting to singleplayer and what about the gateway splitt... they say that it should be seperated but in which way? like in sc1 would be ok but do they intend to let it be like now where you arent even able to switch to another server? this would really be horrible
On April 23 2010 16:02 LosingID8 wrote: Hunter-seeker missile: They are going to lower the technology requirement from fusion core down to just the tech lab, but this means that they will also bring down its power, too.
They do realize that the power was already SIGNIFICANTLY reduced from fixing the bug - right? As in 1.6 Radius of 100% damage (tiny bit bigger than Psi-Storm) to .6 Radius of 100% damage (tinybit bigger than Thor splash), iirc. Please, please, tell me the big fixers and the balancers are in communication. If the old HSM was fine at 125 energy and fusion core, the new should be fine at both 100 energy and tech lab, imho.
singleplayer looks like the shit...wc/diablo in space- rts/rpg elements all rolled into one. maybe they will keep on extending the singleplayer storyline through the 2 expansions.. and maybe merging into a WoW like universe..where players forge their own stories in the starcraft universe...though honestly: i rather starcraft stay primarily as an RTS.
multiplayer will last for ages through esports/koreans but hopefully so will singleplayer- if not through blizzard..im sure there will be creative mapmakers: starcraft DOTA, starcraft rpgs.. looking forward to sc2 ums rpgs
Wow so coool, it all seems awesome, Blizzard really doing their job very well and TL as always gets the best coverage possible. Thanks a lot for this!
I dislike no gateway explanation, we know already that lag can be an issue so why not simply show notice about lag and latency when you want to connect to different server?
Singleplayer actually looks like a lot of fun.. I'm glad about that. And I really hope they drop identifiers. Either way, thanks for the lengthy writeup. I haven't read even half of it yet...
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
Server isolation and its effect on the growth of ESPORTS: It will be definitely something that will be look at in the future, but at the moment there are no plans to allow people to access different servers with the same key due to lag and latency issues.
I just can't get behind their line of thinking. It's extremely obvious from the get-go that server separation makes any international tournaments impossible and separates people from their overseas friends. How can they not acknowledge the importance of this? Who cares about lag, at least allow custom games on other servers to enable tournaments.
Server isolation and its effect on the growth of ESPORTS: It will be definitely something that will be look at in the future, but at the moment there are no plans to allow people to access different servers with the same key due to lag and latency issues.
For most people playing the game this shouldn't have a big impact as there will always be enough people to play with on the different servers. There are however to groups of people for who this can potentially ruin the game imo.
The first are people with a "screwed up" sleeping pattern for their time zone who are going to find a lot less people to play with. This will be annoying as hell for them but not have a big impact on the game overall.
The second group however is of much more importens. This group consists of the best players of the game. By limiting them to playing only other people on their server Blizzard is effectively hampering the growth of the game both as an E-sports and from an purely skill level perspective.
Because the server isolation only allows you to play the other people on your server you are only able to match yourself with a part of the high level players of the game. This automatically results in a few observations: 1) Tactics and playstyle on the servers may vary significantely after some time. 2) Because you can only play against a limited sample of people from this high playlevel the development of tactics and skill will slow considerably because there will be less people who can inovate the game. 3) A combination of 1 and 2 will result in a less competitive enviroment globally because apart from a few live tournaments you are unable to match yourself with the best players from around the world.
Above resoning will imo also result in a much quicker demise of the popularity of the game as people are much less interested to wach games knowing the arn't seeing the highest competitive standard as was possible.
In a worst case scenario the big tournaments will be Europeans/Americans/Asians only as we are already seeing in most of the beta. This also means there can't be a healthy development of E-sports as a whole as there will be less interest from sponsors due to the much lower audience numbers for the broadcasted games. Whichever way you look at it people from Europe won't stay awake/home to watch a tournament with only Americans and vice versa.
There might possibly be more tournaments altogether as some tournaments for example will have a European and a American counterpart. This however will on it's turn reduce the amount of VOD's that will be downloaded of the tournaments from the other continents because why download the VOD of the American tournament played last night if you can watch the European tournament played right now live?
On April 23 2010 16:02 LosingID8 wrote: Hunter-seeker missile: They are going to lower the technology requirement from fusion core down to just the tech lab, but this means that they will also bring down its power, too.
They do realize that the power was already SIGNIFICANTLY reduced from fixing the big - right? As in 1.6 Radius of 100% damage (tiny bit bigger than Psi-Storm) to .6 Radius of 100% damage (tinybit bigger than Thor splash), iirc. Please, please, tell me the big fixers and the balancers are in communication. If the old HSM was fine at 125 energy and fusion core, the new should be fine at both 100 energy and tech lab, imho.
The press conference took place before we knew about that patch, so likely the radius reduction is part of how they plan to bring down the power.
Great writeup and I'm really looking forward to the single player now, previous to the article I was like "meh, will take a look at the sp".
Regarding the gateways: There is a huge difference between not allowing cross server play at release and not allowing it ever, in other words just because it isnt available at release it doesnt mean it will never happen. So chillax because we all know why this is a bad thing, and if you dont then just read this: + Show Spoiler +
Server isolation and its effect on the growth of ESPORTS: It will be definitely something that will be look at in the future, but at the moment there are no plans to allow people to access different servers with the same key due to lag and latency issues.
For most people playing the game this shouldn't have a big impact as there will always be enough people to play with on the different servers. There are however to groups of people for who this can potentially ruin the game imo.
The first are people with a "screwed up" sleeping pattern for their time zone who are going to find a lot less people to play with. This will be annoying as hell for them but not have a big impact on the game overall.
The second group however is of much more importens. This group consists of the best players of the game. By limiting them to playing only other people on their server Blizzard is effectively hampering the growth of the game both as an E-sports and from an purely skill level perspective.
Because the server isolation only allows you to play the other people on your server you are only able to match yourself with a part of the high level players of the game. This automatically results in a few observations: 1) Tactics and playstyle on the servers may vary significantely after some time. 2) Because you can only play against a limited sample of people from this high playlevel the development of tactics and skill will slow considerably because there will be less people who can inovate the game. 3) A combination of 1 and 2 will result in a less competitive enviroment globally because apart from a few live tournaments you are unable to match yourself with the best players from around the world.
Above resoning will imo also result in a much quicker demise of the popularity of the game as people are much less interested to wach games knowing the arn't seeing the highest competitive standard as was possible.
In a worst case scenario the big tournaments will be Europeans/Americans/Asians only as we are already seeing in most of the beta. This also means there can't be a healthy development of E-sports as a whole as there will be less interest from sponsors due to the much lower audience numbers for the broadcasted games. Whichever way you look at it people from Europe won't stay awake/home to watch a tournament with only Americans and vice versa.
There might possibly be more tournaments altogether as some tournaments for example will have a European and a American counterpart. This however will on it's turn reduce the amount of VOD's that will be downloaded of the tournaments from the other continents because why download the VOD of the American tournament played last night if you can watch the European tournament played right now live?
edit: Scratching my head about the customizable hotkeys, if they allow editing of them in the txt-file then why not implement it in the GUI. Of course they might simply not have the time or not willing to put in the money it requires(money in the form of people actually realising this in code) etc but still, seems a bit...meh.
Awesome read. Single player looks SICK!!! The lore and cutscenes look pretty epic too. Although I am disappointed with the server gateways, not being able to switch servers and all.
On April 23 2010 16:31 ArvickHero wrote: Hmmm did Zeratul get a new voice actor? Something about his voice is a bit.. off
The original Zeratul VA passed away.
Seriously? How do you know?
Last year at Blizzcon during the SC2 Lore panel (which was basically the voice actor panel) they mentioned it when they were introducing the new Zeratul VA.
Im getting increasingly annoyed by the "This feature will be added at a later time" thing.Blizzard was known for release when ready policy but in SC2 i see more of cutting features down just to release it in next 4 months.
On April 23 2010 18:13 DiTH wrote: Im getting increasingly annoyed by the "This feature will be added at a later time" thing.Blizzard was known for release when ready policy but in SC2 i see more of cutting features down just to release it in next 4 months.
Im afraid this is kind of our own fault for whining we cant wait anymore! ;p
The cinematic looked way different when they announced SC2.
Also, it's pretty disapointing that the goliaths look like they are firing the missiles from their machine guns, it even looks like they are coming from their feet due to the angle at which they fly out. They should have really fixed this stuff already, considering the game is so close to release.
On April 23 2010 17:09 cHaNg-sTa wrote: Damn, they're still gonna keep the high ground to low ground mechanic? I wish they reconsider it again. It really makes those ramps in the middle of the map not as key to hold. SC1 was so important in terms of holding key ramps/chokes And when the game has progressed to this point, vision is not really an issue anymore and gives the ramp defender no more advantage.
Thats not necessarily true. Ramp defenders will still have an advantage because the ramp is a choke. You merely have to defend behind it instead of on top of it now. A little proper pre-positioning will still give a good beating to anybody trying to fight up the ramp.
Nice coverage and pretty normal expectations about the single player from me (meaning i like it). But the big issue is still the inability to play on different servers. I completely agree with Golden ghost and Scorch. Though i do think that Blizzard's looking into that is going to change that before the release of the game (they'd better), or there will be no way to make intercontinental tournaments without making new accounts for the players.
"KR vs US vs EU: In Korea, Zerg needs to be nerfed because Zerg is so dominant. For EU/US, Zerg needs to be buffed. At this point, due to limited sample size, nobody knows for sure what races are the most powerful."
Good to read this, i would love to see some good koreans play the SC2. If you won't be able to join to another server - well that sux. So teams from America or Asia can't play CW with european teams or what? The SP will be great, i hope i will get sometime to finish the thing, cause it seems very nice.
Also i don't think it is good to measure the balance by matchups. There was never 50/50 percent in every matchup in bw and still the game is as balanced as it can be.
Sounds like it is going to become a great game SP wise. My only real problem is with MP not being able to connect to different servers, how's that gonna make bigger (online) tournaments possible, if you can't even play against people from different regions?
Apart from other things, server isolation right now is extremely damaging to their beta statistics.
One issue is that it means gameplay is going to deliver highly different results according to the zones allocated. Entirely different strategy standards and therefore 'metagames' are going to emerge, and that creates a whole new problem for Blizzard.
The interview mentioned something really critical:
KR vs US vs EU: In Korea, Zerg needs to be nerfed because Zerg is so dominant. For EU/US, Zerg needs to be buffed. At this point, due to limited sample size, nobody knows for sure what races are the most powerful.
Universal patches. Region-zone based sample groups. Anyone else see the problem?
I'm actually wondering, as these differences emerge, HOW exactly is Blizzard deciding what patch 'solution' should be implemented, when there are conflicting problems that require conflicting solutions?
Is it 'whichever problem has the biggest sample size' wins?
Great report guys, the campaign stuff is starting to look really awesome, I like me some story driven action! It's also nice to see, that they are working with community feedback, and huge patches down the road from release are the way to go for SCII to truly replace BW as the king of competetive RTS. Looking forward release, just announce the date ffs!
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
I am really really disappointed with the current gateway restrictions. I think this is just blasphemy for an online game. StarCraft or not. There probably isn't a serious competitive gamer alive that doesn't have any friends over seas...
On April 23 2010 17:49 Golden Ghost wrote: Because the server isolation only allows you to play the other people on your server you are only able to match yourself with a part of the high level players of the game. This automatically results in a few observations: 1) Tactics and playstyle on the servers may vary significantely after some time. 2) Because you can only play against a limited sample of people from this high playlevel the development of tactics and skill will slow considerably because there will be less people who can inovate the game. 3) A combination of 1 and 2 will result in a less competitive enviroment globally because apart from a few live tournaments you are unable to match yourself with the best players from around the world.
Above resoning will imo also result in a much quicker demise of the popularity of the game as people are much less interested to wach games knowing the arn't seeing the highest competitive standard as was possible.
In a worst case scenario the big tournaments will be Europeans/Americans/Asians only as we are already seeing in most of the beta. This also means there can't be a healthy development of E-sports as a whole as there will be less interest from sponsors due to the much lower audience numbers for the broadcasted games. Whichever way you look at it people from Europe won't stay awake/home to watch a tournament with only Americans and vice versa.
There might possibly be more tournaments altogether as some tournaments for example will have a European and a American counterpart. This however will on it's turn reduce the amount of VOD's that will be downloaded of the tournaments from the other continents because why download the VOD of the American tournament played last night if you can watch the European tournament played right now live?
Frankly, your analysis is shit. 1) no duh, it has already happened. 2) No, because the metagame will evolve three times as fast. People who keep in touch cross-league will still know of how the gameplay works in other servers. I imagine that after the original divergence in playstyles, they will actually merge to become similar as counters to various things and new builds are tested. I think each cycle so to speak will happen faster as smart players will use lessons from high level players in other servers to help them adapt. 3) Wrong. EG vs TL? smack talking and grudge matches can and will still happen. You might be right if the top tier players were all in a vaccum and nobody knew of each other except via bnet2.0 identifiers. Yet it's a small world at the top. They already DO know each other, and they will want to compete to see who is better.
People will still watch SC games even if they know it isnt the highest competitive standard. We watch foreigner tournaments even though they are not as good as the koreans. We watch CSL even though they are not as good as the foreigners. Starcraft is starcraft man. Why download vods of another server when you could watch them now? Because you like starcraft.....
We stay awake at 3am to watch OSL / MSL finals halfway across the world because we love the game. You seriously think we wont download vods of another tournament simply because there is another tournament to watch?
Hiding "match history" data: All professional sports are based on studying tape of the opponent. So no, they are not planning on hiding match history data. Once the tournament patch is added it'll be easy to figure out who the best of the best are (professional league). If a player wanted to hide their match history, they would need to make another account and play.
1) So on that point there is no discussion. 2) Wrong. If you can't practise against good players performing a certain strategy you can't develop a good counter. 3) EG vs TL was only possible because players involved had to use other accounts as their own. For this sole purpose I can imagine the top players purchasing multiple games so they can register one on each server and although this might solve a part of the problem I wouldn't consider it a clean solution.
You watch OSL/MSL because it IS the highest competition available. So that only proves my point. And regarding the VOD's well there is just so much time you can spent on watching Starcraft and if you have to choose between a VOD of a tournament with only Americans and a live tournament with Europeans I know what I would choose.
It sounds a bit like Blizzard is out to make people purchase multiple versions of SC2
- want to play with your buddies/team mates/participate in a tourney in a different region? Buy a new copy of SC2, and make a new Battle.net account. - want to be able to hide your training matches from your opponents? Buy a new copy of SC2, and make a new Battle.net account.
Great article, BTW. I might actually play the single player mode now.
On April 23 2010 19:58 Liquid`Nazgul wrote: This hiding match data thing is so stupid. And no in professional sports people do not have access to each others training.
I'm just concerned about the availability of replays, as I think all proteams are. That and how much info is available in VODs. There must be a way to toggle some options, cause I don't think the high end players would like to have features such as unit counters and first person viewing available per default. Creative players would get studied to death and no new build order would last for more than days at the top level. Poor rA..
On April 23 2010 20:05 Mapzter wrote: It sounds a bit like Blizzard is out to make people purchase multiple versions of SC2
- want to play with your buddies/team mates/participate in a tourney in a different region? Buy a new copy of SC2, and make a new Battle.net account. - want to be able to hide your training matches from your opponents? Buy a new copy of SC2, and make a new Battle.net account.
Great article, BTW. I might actually play the single player mode now.
I agree. Remember, Blizzard's overall goal is always 'Make the most money', whatever anyone else may think. It's a corporation.
But yup, likewise, I like the challenge campaigns. It seems like noobs on SC2 won't be noobs for long. (which is good news for me, because i'm a noob!) =D
single player seem really a deep experience..I thought that campaign would be real poor due to a more multiplayer centered game...i am happy i was wrong
i`m disapointed about lots of stuff. no server-exchange / no clans / no replaywatch with friends / public matchdata / and i miss some answers (for example: will we be able to navigate through menus via hotkey? will DnD soon block incoming msgs? ...)
All the singleplayer stuff seems to be really awesome and i cant wait to play it.
On April 23 2010 19:58 Liquid`Nazgul wrote: This hiding match data thing is so stupid. And no in professional sports people do not have access to each others training.
Exactly! Remember Bill Belichick's illegal taping of training for other teams? South Park based an entire episode around it? It is a bad idea not to be able to hide your matches. And with no LAN, all training by pro teams will be transparent. Everyone time Bisu and Fantasy and Boxer play each other in the SKT1 building we will have knowledge.
And the solution to the "different region = lag, so no cross server play" problem is so bloody easy. The problem is random players meeting each other randomly and experiencing lag, and getting mad. So the SUPER EASY solution? Making cross-server play only available in custom games and by INVITE ONLY. That avoids accidentally matching with a lagger from over seas. Blizzard, seriously, you cannot fathom this??
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
Not happy with all the news, lot's of (in my opinion) *crucial* things are omitted now on purpose just to add in later patches / expansions (although that's nothing certain). Leaving the high ground mechanic as it is is also a huge mistake.
Err, so going to a Q&A where Blizz basically spat in your face "we like splitting up the community - no world wide gaming here! :D oh, and we like highground the way it is " beats meeting the President? Ok...
Well - the community thanks you at least - hope you had a good time!
Regarding match history, they didn't mention replays at this time correct? Just for sure that match history will be visible. Also I thought the last word we heard on LAN was that yes you could play on LAN after authenticating once on B.Net ? I would assume that would fall under the category of a Custom Game where your history wouldn't be saved? or am I wrong about that.
Surely replays would only be public on their quarterly tournaments or whatever.
Holy shit. Damn, this looks freaking awesome. Nice nice nice writeup! I can't wait for singleplayer... but I still don't like the high ground mechanic :/
I don't really understand what peoples problem with identifiers is. Do you want to be xXChair2452Xx?Pretty sure day[9] was probably the one who complained about this >=/ *calls in the scouts*
On another note: the Cats and "War Pigs" mercs are from the comics.
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
WTF! How could they do this? This will hurt foreign e-sports and tournies a lot
High ground mechanic: They like how it is now. According to Dustin Browder, it gives a clear advantage at first and then it eventually disappears.
Lurker removal: It conflicted with other units already in the game: roaches, infestors, banelings. The lurker was originally pushed to tier 3. However at tier 3, detection was plentiful so they felt like the unit didn’t have a specific enough of a role.
Really doesnt sound like theyre going to add any more units to zerg
I would laugh my ass off if some hella buff security guard wearing a black suit and with the earpiece said "you go down there and make a left at the (some SC unit)"
Single player seems like it has too many RPG elements to it. It reminds me a lot of a Tower Defense game and I'm not sure why they are focusing on buyable features and whatnot. The one thing I found shocking was the differences in units and features for single and multi player. I would much rather play single player to train me to play multi.
*Why does Blizzard doubt that Korean strategies are ahead of US/EU? Zerg is the most powerful race. Toss is the weakest. Nerf spawn larvae/larvae max.
*They must not really care about e-sports if there will be no global competition.
*What if they changed back to old high ground mechanic? How would that hurt things? How is the new high-ground mechanic superior to the old one? The old one made maps have a greater impact on balance (a good thing).
*You guys noticed how much better units respond in single player. What is Blizzard doing to achieve LAN latency for Bnet 2.0?
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
#"¤"#¤"$$%%@"##"
Can we all start playing BW again now? Please?
It'll hurt so bad paying money for SC2. I so don't want to encourage the dickheads at Blizzard
i don't understand why people are so upset about the split gateway issue. especially since it will be fixed eventually.
i actually like the idea of having divergent play styles at the high levels on the different servers - this can make for some very interesting games and tournaments when these players do meet up in cross-gateway tournaments (e.g. TL vs EG). for example, they said that Zerg is stronger on the Korean servers, but weaker on the US and EU servers - what happens if we get a top Zerg player from Korea vs top players from the other races in the other servers?
i have been pretty excited about the single player campaign for a while now and it does look amazing ^__^
We’re always happy to be able to strengthen our relationships with the Blizzard staff. Also, they loved our SC2ProMod. In fact, they liked it so much that it was emailed to the entire SC2 staff at Blizzard.
hahaha thats so fucking sick.
single player looks awesome
and i wonder if they are going to allow the map editor to make challenges. something like the vulture micro or pvt push breaking maps in SC1
but yea everything looks awesome. although server incompatibility and high ground is blahhhhh
Seems redundant to post in a 13 page thread, but I am super excited about the single player campaign. Blizzard has always made much more interesting campaigns than any other RTS's. SC2's promises to be pretty epic and the challenge maps will be even cooler. I love the way they're trying to ramp up people to multiplayer.
SCII looks set to become the king of the RTS for the next 10 years or so.
It sounds like Blizz is concerned about the age restrictions in Korea but fortunately for them they can release a 'censored' version for that market...
I mean... Brood war had a medic (female) being quartered.
I'm confused about the people who are complaining about the gateway thing. I'm able to party up with a friend from Australia and we play games together all the time. Am I missing something?
I'm really looking forward to the campaign mode. I've always been a bit of a lore snob and for the most part blizzard's lore for Starcraft and Warcraft have been really solid.
I'm also looking forward to super awesome micro based challenges to rub in my friends faces :D
Wasn't very happy to hear about location hot keys being F5-F8, kind of awkward for me, I hope they will allow for a remap. Overall I really liked this article, good work guys.
Sounds like an amazing day, and i'm glad to hear single player will be a challenge. too many games are so simple single player these days. also those out of mission mechanics like the cantina and armory look amazing! what a great feel they will add to the game. Can't wait to get my hands on it!
Nice writing! Even though it s a long article it very well balanced and is interesting to read. I m just a bit sad about the server parts...it s gonna be a problem for leagues first and also to play with friends in other continents
It's great that the single player will be awsome aswell.. As a complete starcraft noob this is a nice way to atleast get a bit used to the diffrent units etc etc. Go blizzard^^
I know they want to use the game engine for movies as often as they can, but are there still going to be the extremely HQ Blizzard CGI we've come to know and love? Raynor and Zeratul seem sort of meh.
On April 23 2010 16:02 LosingID8 wrote: Now I know that the majority of TL’s userbase cares a lot more about multiplayer balance and issues than the campaign,
Poll: When SC2 Comes Out I Will
Play the single player campaign (139)
68%
Start playing ladder/placement matches (48)
23%
Play custom games online (7)
3%
Open up the level editor and check it out (4)
2%
Other (post in thread) (3)
1%
Work on generating software/programs akin to bwchart and chaos and/or various hacks (2)
1%
Check out the social areas and talk to other people (1)
0%
Buy the game but not play it for a while (1)
0%
205 total votes
Your vote: When SC2 Comes Out I Will
(Vote): Start playing ladder/placement matches (Vote): Play custom games online (Vote): Play the single player campaign (Vote): Open up the level editor and check it out (Vote): Check out the social areas and talk to other people (Vote): Buy the game but not play it for a while (Vote): Work on generating software/programs akin to bwchart and chaos and/or various hacks (Vote): Other (post in thread)
The more and more I hear the Phrase "that feature will not be available at launch" SEVERELY makes me doubt the capabilities of the dev team, even more so when they add in the phrase "either in a patch OR expansion".
Can't help but feel it being intentional for a future promotional tool, which is a poor stunt.
On a lighter note, I do love the direction they made with the single player campaign. Looks kick ass! ^^
Oh and good read... hope they say something about high ground next time.
Boo lurker! Not only does it suck because it's tier 3, and gets countered by detection. It stagnates the game when it gets dark swarm cast on it. Every unit should have at least two counters and the only terran counter to a lurker with swarm on it is irradiate... limiting the amount of tactics possible. It doesn't do its intended function of killing swarms of little units without swarm (rines have range) and don't always form a limbo line.
The lurker was fine in that it added some strategic depth. Getting fast lurkers meant that a terran could not move out so zergs could safely pump drones until a terran got science vessels. People liked to do lurker run-ins and drops... It also changed the pace of the game from move and kill to holding a position down (lurkers have to burrow to attack). Changing the pace of a game is good because it adds variation, which people like, just not to the point where action stops completely and a zerg can make an invincible unit with only a single counter. Having a single counter decreases variation...tic tac toe...
If only Blizzard made a new unit that emphasized the lurker's strong points without being too similar to a terran or protoss unit, and while not overlapping with the ultralisk on tanking as the big zerg unit and attacking swarms of weak units (or other similar weak points). I feel a unit like this would be a good addition and would help the zerg diversity issue? I'm really hoping Blizzard really thinks there is a diversity issue and is not just tagging on to what the community says is true.
On April 23 2010 16:23 DownMaxX wrote: Campaign gonna be sick. Good stuff!
This man speaks the truth! Great post! I loved the video of when Raynor and Zeratul meat again. Especially the part where Raynor says "Nice to meat you too".
This was a really awesome and informative post! Love it, and i love where the single player is going. At first i said i wasn't going to play it for a while but i might do it first!
So they want to try to stop the queen rush? This is the blizzard that I hate. They tried to do this in Wow too. Its stupid. They want to micromanage balance through modifying the races. Why can't they just keep units static and let the mapmakers worry about balance? As I suspected, too much of their WoW philosophy has crept into SC2.
Wow the campaign looks high quality! Not that I expected anything else, but it looks like it will be an amazing experience in and of itself. I really love that they have extra units that won't be in multiplayer. It adds to the fluff/coolness factor without giving the balance headache. But split servers has me worried. Especially since the metagame has already evolved to be completely different. Korea OP with Z and everyone else needs a buff? It makes more sense to mix the two I think than have islands of games. Regardless, whatever they decide to do I am sure will be good - I've got faith in blizz
High ground mechanic: They like how it is now. According to Dustin Browder, it gives a clear advantage at first and then it eventually disappears.
This really blows my mind.
How can an experienced RTS game designer think it is a good idea for strategic positioning to mean less as the game goes on? Why not just have the terrain slowly erode during the course of the game so you end up with a completely flat map at the end? And then you could have gravity slowly decrease so there is no difference between ground and air units. How about the range of units just keeps increasing as the game goes on so eventually they no longer need to move to hit each other?
If someone told me they were in to Starcraft and didn't think high ground should give an advantage in the later stages of the game I would honestly assume they'd never played anything but fastest maps.
I hope somebody gets to talk to them seriously about this soon and get some more detail on what they're thinking.
High ground mechanic: They like how it is now. According to Dustin Browder, it gives a clear advantage at first and then it eventually disappears.
I think that's so ignorant and will ruin the game on the long run. Actually it was the one part where I really had alot of hope when I start reading the article (great job from TL's side btw!)
High ground mechanic: They like how it is now. According to Dustin Browder, it gives a clear advantage at first and then it eventually disappears.
This really blows my mind.
How can an experienced RTS game designer think it is a good idea for strategic positioning to mean less as the game goes on? Why not just have the terrain slowly erode during the course of the game so you end up with a completely flat map at the end? And then you could have gravity slowly decrease so there is no difference between ground and air units. How about the range of units just keeps increasing as the game goes on so eventually they no longer need to move to hit each other?
If someone told me they were in to Starcraft and didn't think high ground should give an advantage in the later stages of the game I would honestly assume they'd never played anything but fastest maps.
I hope somebody gets to talk to them seriously about this soon and get some more detail on what they're thinking.
Total Agreement. Please, get somebody scan Blizzard guys' heads for tumors or fungal growth somewhere around the era of logic and common sense.
Blizzard fucking delivers. I thought the WC3 campaigns were already light-years ahead of other RTS games in terms of sheer interactivity, but this is just ridiculously awesome.
it looked pretty old, like compared to beta quite a few patches back, especially considering that there were medics which were removed like more than a year ago.
(EDIT: I obviously hadn't read the part about upgrades, but that's another feature that looks kick-ass. I really wanna see what Firebats look like in SC2!)
The video quality looks so good though, in the cinematics as well as in those little briefings in-game. I'm excited to check out the campaign when on release.
Also, some of those Q&A questions/ response were interesting, and i'm glad to hear the Blizzard is taking community feedback so seriously, even though it was pretty clear that they were already.
Wow, SO awesome!!! (as everyone is saying) one question, though; the Diamondback sounds like a great unit (as well as a great 80s BMX bike!) what did it look like though? I assume that there is basically no chance that this will make it into the Beta or the final Game though...
Glad to see you guys out there representin' Ask Dustin to add a cow level. Maybe it could be a button on an elevator in one of the movie scenes. Raynor sees it and says, "But there is no cow level." And his buddy says, "Classified.". Yeah... good times.
haven't finished reading the article, let own the 16 page thread yet so bear that in mind.
"Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now."
Not very happy with this at all, we can see already with the beta tournaments that cross server play is going to be a big part of SC2, disappointed Blizzard is blocking this and not entirely sure why.
On April 23 2010 16:09 Ryuu314 wrote: Dang...HSM buff/nerf, Queen rushing was a strat before (O_O) ?!?!?, Zerg dilemma, shitty infestors...
Goliaths in single player? Nice. Scouts too? ROFL.
Very nice article and info!
idk, infestors did get a lot better with the latest patch, though fungle growth still feels like it needs either a damage boost, or a range boost (maybe with an inability to kill kinda like plauge).
Please for the love of god I hope they never make neural parasite as slow as it was pre-patch 9. The lack of infestors being able to move after neural parasiting something makes them far to easily sniped.
Group/online replay watching: Group replay watching is not expected to be implemented at launch. However subsequent patches are aimed to be like WoW, where the patches are significant modifications, not just minor balance tweaks.
i hate this new approach to game design. If the game isn't complete don't fucking release it. when i fork over my hard earned for a game i expect a fully functional product not a skeleton with the meat to be added over time over the internet
its one thing to have downloadable content to reward people who continue to buy/play the game but its another to release things that you couldn't squeeze out before release date.
TLDR: just let us watch replays together blizzard, its bullshit otherwise
Group/online replay watching: Group replay watching is not expected to be implemented at launch. However subsequent patches are aimed to be like WoW, where the patches are significant modifications, not just minor balance tweaks.
i hate this new approach to game design. If the game isn't complete don't fucking release it. when i fork over my hard earned for a game i expect a fully functional product not a skeleton with the meat to be added over time over the internet
its one thing to have downloadable content to reward people who continue to buy/play the game but its another to release things that you couldn't squeeze out before release date.
TLDR: just let us watch replays together blizzard, its bullshit otherwise
so true...
how hard is it to have a similar replay function like there was in sc1?
blizz are losing me on quite a few things regarding sc2. cliff advantage............
Hiding "match history" data: All professional sports are based on studying tape of the opponent. So no, they are not planning on hiding match history data. Once the tournament patch is added it'll be easy to figure out who the best of the best are (professional league). If a player wanted to hide their match history, they would need to make another account and play.
i hope theyre not serious
I can't believe the first time this was quoted was on page 7. This is a huge problem, and Blizzard's reasoning makes absolutely no sense.
The SC2 armory article on this visit/Q&A said that everyone there was given a hardcover copy of the new SC2 book Heaven's Devils that Blizzard has showed parts of on their site. If you are as disinterested in lore and story in SC as you say, then you would have no interest in the book. So... Can I have your copy?
Good thing I'm so subtle in asking...
Edit: To be exact, he said:
Stebo's Journal, April 19th, -5:00pm- The group is given free hardcover copies of the new Starcraft 2 novel Heavens' Devils shortly after the Q&A session ends.
Aw... Maybe Mr. Plott would be generous enough to give one of his to a dedicated and much valued fan. I would burn through that thing in a day, but $32 + shipping is a little high for me. Oh well.
Playing on different gateways: Blizzard is not planning on allowing players to play on different server upon release, so things will be the same as they are in beta right now.
This makes me very sad since it guarantees that I won't buy the game, and I do love Starcraft. But I love it because I enjoy playing with my friends: friends who I've met through online communities from all around the globe. If I can't play with these people then I just won't bother, my friends are what made the game for me: I'd always get bored of playing random strangers on ICCUP but never get bored of playing against my friends, similarly after a while playing random matchmaking games loses its appeal and even though we're still only in beta I'm getting bored with that.
I want to play with my friends Blizzard. What happened to the 'connected online experience' or whatever?
Group/online replay watching: Group replay watching is not expected to be implemented at launch. However subsequent patches are aimed to be like WoW, where the patches are significant modifications, not just minor balance tweaks.
i hate this new approach to game design. If the game isn't complete don't fucking release it. when i fork over my hard earned for a game i expect a fully functional product not a skeleton with the meat to be added over time over the internet
its one thing to have downloadable content to reward people who continue to buy/play the game but its another to release things that you couldn't squeeze out before release date.
TLDR: just let us watch replays together blizzard, its bullshit otherwise
so true...
how hard is it to have a similar replay function like there was in sc1?
blizz are losing me on quite a few things regarding sc2. cliff advantage............
Usually when someone prefixes a question with:
"How hard can it be..."
it probably means it's more complicated than they know.
How hard would it be to organize a marathon? You need over 100 volunteers, you need mile markers; a starting line - a finish line. You need waterhouses for waterstops, you need cups for the water. You need coolers to put the water in. You need money to pay the police. You need street cones (lots of them.) You need trash bins, porta-potties. You need a system to handle registration... ad nasuem.
I'm not comparing starcraft 2 to a marathon. Just saying that something that appears to be mind-numbingly simple in appearance/design, can be overly complex in execution. You also make it sound as if Starcraft 2 is being shipped bare bones.
We all love to watch replays in groups. however, it's not a necessity, and I'm sure we can all agree there are hundreds of issues we'd like to be addressed over group replay. The bug with fastforwarding games and APM display leads me to believe that's a little more difficult to impliment than you may think. Furthermore, Starcraft: BW did not ship with group replays - or even a replay function at all!
Now that's not excusing the lack of it. But I feel it's a rather asinine thing to complain about. If Starcraft II ships with all the features and 99% complete except group replay features, can you honestly say with a straight face that you were jipped?
I understand that releasing content gradually after a game's release can be abusive; I do not feel, though, that you can say the same about a feature like this. I'd also like to point out that major content patches could mean anything. Could mean new banners/portraits and maps. One could even argue that balance patches in of themselves are "major content" patches, considering that balance patches can significantly modify existing content to the point where you are playing almost a new game - yet nothing new has been added.
It has certainly happened before. And if we follow your logic to it's conclusion (assuming you agree balance patches that make major changes as content patches), Starcraft II should never be released until it's perfectly balanced (and that's not a reasonable request to me.)
So, the next time you preface something with "Well how hard would it be to...." ask yourself: Do you really know the work or what would need to be done to do said thing?
The reason I'm just slightly suspicious of those guys plagiarizing is because his first couple of sentences about the security guard and the orc directions sound really similar to what you guys said in your writeup.
Am I being paranoid or is something fishy going on here?
i honestly have to say, the whole "ProMod" thing is abit bullshit. this is STARCRAFT 2, NOT BROOD WAR!!!!! StarCraft 2 is meant to be played exactly the way it is being played NOW, not how it was being played MULTIPLE YEARS AGO. basically fucking around with how the real game's mechanics function is a disgrace to the game... this is meant to be a NEW game, not a "oh lets produce this game that acts almost exactly like our last one!".
On May 07 2010 04:06 HDFoxra wrote: i honestly have to say, the whole "ProMod" thing is abit bullshit. this is STARCRAFT 2, NOT BROOD WAR!!!!! StarCraft 2 is meant to be played exactly the way it is being played NOW, not how it was being played MULTIPLE YEARS AGO. basically fucking around with how the real game's mechanics function is a disgrace to the game... this is meant to be a NEW game, not a "oh lets produce this game that acts almost exactly like our last one!".
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Maybe it could be a button on an elevator in one of the movie scenes. Raynor sees it and says, "But there is no cow level." And his buddy says, "Classified.". Yeah... good times. 
