A week ago Blizzard.com started teasing its audience with spash screens showing a countdown of all its major titles from 1994 to the present. On May 19th, 2007, gamers around the world stood still as Blizzard made their humongous announcement in their Worldwide Invitational event in Seoul, South Korea. We F5ed (refreshed) our way to keep updated with information at teamliquid.net and ign.com and finally at 3:00 Seoul time (11pm PST), they announced the long awaited STARCRAFT 2!
This sequel brings StarCraft into a 3D world with many familiar units from the original game as well as new units for Protoss, Terran and Zerg races. Original StarCraft units have been upgraded with new functionality. The gameplay is fast-paced real-time strategy which utilizes a new 3D-graphics engine with realistic physics and can handle massive army sizes. Online play will make use of an upgraded version of Battle.net. There will also be a single-player campaign that continues the StarCraft story. A powerful full-featured map editor is included for our map making community which will help keep the game ever changing and always new as it did for the original StarCraft. This game will be released concurrently on Windows XP, Windows Vista and Mac OS X.
Zealot (announced in starcraft2.com) - Has a new charge ability that help them run quickly to a close range when attacking enemies.
Immortal (announced in starcraft2.com) - The updated versions of dragoons. They have powerful shields that wield a strong defense against powerful attacks but weaker attacks do not activate their shields.
Stalker (announced in starcraft2.com) - A ranged unit inspired by dragoons and includes within it the essence of dark templars. They teleport quickly over short distances.
Phase Prism (announced in starcraft2.com) - A transportation unit that can teleport armies anywhere on the battlefield.
Colossus - A large four legged vehicle that fires strong dual lasers and is mobile through uneven terrain.
Mothership - A powerful hovering unit that utilizes a great amount of resources. It can attack multiple units at a time and has three abilities - Time Bomb which slows enemy missile attacks, Planet Cracker which is a large laser that fires from below the Mothership and obliterates anything in its field, and Black Hole which creates a void that absorbs and destroys enemy air units. Only one of these can be active at a time.
Phoenix - An air unit that can overcharge guns for multiple projectile blasts. After the initial blast, the ship is unable to move or attack for a short period of time.
Warp Ray - An air unit that attacks with a blue laser and dteals more damage as it focuses on the same target. It is powerful against tough units and buildings but wastes damage on small units.
We are still pretty much in the dark regarding Zerg and Terran units.
New and updated Zerg Units:
Nydus Worm - A transportation unit similar to the nydus canal which transports small units such as zerglings from underground.
Baneling - Zerglings can mutate into suicide bombers similar to infested terrans. They fill with explosive and acidic chemicals and can roll across terrain and explode on impact.
A unit that has an "infect" ability which allows takeover of hostile organics for a limited amount of time, ending in target unit exploding and damaging units around it.
New and updated Terran Units:
Reaper - Similar to a marine, this unit can fire strong dual lasers and can traverse differences in terrain height.
There is currently no release date but Blizzard promises to take as much time as needed to make sure the game is as polished as possible.
Higher Quality Trailer and Gameplay Videos on YouTube/Google: (thanks to mr0919)
With so many units that can just jump over cliffs, I hope they really balance everything out. I'm also going to happily ugrade my computer for sc2, it looks amazing :D
no more dragoons? and those kamikaze lingz already look imba to me
At this point, the game probably is imba, especially if we just play by the demo we've seen. However, it will get less and less imba over time as they tweak stats and do more gameplay testing. Oh man it would be so awesome to be on Blizzard's SC2 QA team right now. Most testers end up hating the game they test though. I wonder how those guys feel.
I am excited to see and play the game and I will do what I can to obtain a copy of it ASAP! I hope for the game's success and am all for Blizzard putting in as much development time as needed to clean it out rather than releasing it too soon.
It's not even in its beta so it's far from perfect. I like how graphics are bumped up to be more visually pleasing but I don't like how they add so much detail that can get in the way of gameplay. I was always happy about how in StarCraft it was easy to pick out your units in a battle and it helps when you have to micro units individually. I just don't want SC2 to have one big mess of graphics when there is a late game fight (like in WC3). I would gladly trade in some of that graphics power to have a higher probability of getting my computer to run this game.
I have high hopes for the updated Battle.net as well. Hopefully, no more lag, no more drop screens, and no more waiting forever for a game. I hope they have improved team matching. It would be cool if it included bot functionality to chat outside of the game so that there would be decreased alt tabbing. I hope they solve issues with updating patches and having replays work throughout every patch.
I am also very curious about how the Korean community received this news. I would love to see the progamers get on this game. Would the current stars of today stay to be stars of tomorrow?
On May 19 2007 15:48 GrandInquisitor wrote: mnm: the embedded videos are nowhere near as nice as the TV rips in the youtube links you posted. you should note that =D
I am cautiously optimistic. It looks too close to every other current rts out there, but I have seen a total of maybe 20 minutes of it, so I can't really tell yet. Also, I freaking hate superweapons in rts games, and now the protoss has a unit with 3 superweapon-like abilities.
the game will probably be released some time next year. i remember one of the commentators mentioning this. next year spring or winter. hope it's spring
On May 19 2007 15:54 Lemonwalrus wrote: I am cautiously optimistic. It looks too close to every other current rts out there, but I have seen a total of maybe 20 minutes of it, so I can't really tell yet. Also, I freaking hate superweapons in rts games, and now the protoss has a unit with 3 superweapon-like abilities.
Either way, thanks for the newspost mnm.
Nuclear Missiles are superweapons as well and guess what? they are not used in real games.
On May 19 2007 17:44 IntoTheWow wrote: Charlie, theres a little part missing due to file cut. Its a single file (you can download it from the tracker) cut into 3 pieces.
Problem is I don't have torrent software on this computer (I'm at work).
Are the first 3 videos that aren't embedded (just linked) the same as the others that were from koreanism?
Yea they are. Cool, Is this every video? Was anyone from this forum actually there? Where's Testie?
Can we get some translations for the stuff in those videos? It seems to be all in korean. (besides the commentator)
The commentar gets translated by the girl at the beggining, then when the video si running, there are subtitles with what hes saying. The only things that could be translated are the portraits talking if im not mistaken ~
On May 19 2007 17:56 IntoTheWow wrote: The commentar gets translated by the girl at the beggining, then when the video si running, there are subtitles with what hes saying. The only things that could be translated are the portraits talking if im not mistaken ~
Yea I'm just talking about these gameplay videos:
The units speak in korean
PS- Holy shit Just found these HIGH QUALITY VIDEOS!
Excellent write-up, very clear to the point. Thanks mnm! I hope SC2 is a huge success but I think by the time it comes out, I'll only buy it and play the missions and a few games here and there on Bnet. This game seems like it will be what sc was to our generation as it will be to my 8 year old cousin's generation.
It's not even in its beta so it's far from perfect. I like how graphics are bumped up to be more visually pleasing but I don't like how they add so much detail that can get in the way of gameplay. I was always happy about how in StarCraft it was easy to pick out your units in a battle and it helps when you have to micro units individually. I just don't want SC2 to have one big mess of graphics when there is a late game fight (like in WC3). I would gladly trade in some of that graphics power to have a higher probability of getting my computer to run this game.
that is also my concern; i say that is a 3d side efect; graphics > game pace, precision, timings (Mothership - A powerful hovering unit that utilizes a great amount of resourches )
My friend just asked to borrow my starcraft cd's so he could reinstall it and play the missions again. He then informed me that sc2 was coming out, which I had known for 48 hours. Then, in an attempt to give me new information, he asked if I knew that there was a channel in Korea that televised starcraft matches. I, of course, responded by telling him there are in fact 2, (more?) and that it is a national sport in South Korea, further telling him that I followed it pretty closely.
Moral A: SC2 is already increasing interest in SC.
Moral B: I am too into starcraft. (And I am not as into it as probably half of the rest of TL.net, so what does that tell you?)
I agree with the color schema. The units should be a little more distinct from the background, as there are many doodads with lots of color now. Also, i hope they make a nicer cursor (in WC3 i sometimes lose track of it in a big battle), as that starcraft cursor green seems to used in the cursor only and nowhere else.
EPT![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/KizZBG/sc2banner.jpg)
and those kamikaze lingz already look imba to me 
