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Hopefully interesting thoughts on why SC2 is far worse than what it could be (long, no demand on it to be BW):
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On another forum Coffee Zombie wrote:
http://seanmalstrom.wordpress.com/2012/06/15/the-core-gameplay/
This post is surprisingly good for Malstrom as of late. Very, very good actually. Extremely good. Many games nowadays feel pretty bad because they're built on things that are not fundamental to playing a game. Much of this is just focusing on the how instead of the why, though. People make stuff instead of gameplay, and if gameplay is made, people tend to focus on elaborate systems instead. If both are avoided, the ugly problem of overt simplicity for it's own sake can rear it's head. But really, building a solid foundation and then expanding on it is very good.
A few brilliant examples from Starcraft 2, as examples of very simple, but very interesting things:
Farms: Terran and Zerg farms are very interesting contraptions. The zerg farm, called an Overlord is actually a flying unit instead of a building and can thus be used to scout (it can also later be upgraded into a makeshift dropship. Cheap and massable due to not consuming population cap, but slow), while the Terran farm (Supply Depot) can lower itself to the ground so it can be walked over. This is extremely useful in building walls on chokepoints near your base.
Point-based armour system: The presence of this alone creates an actual difference between the cannon and the machine gun. While the machine gun may deal great damage, armour rapidly kills off it's effectiveness. Far less so for the cannon. A percentage-based armour system needs attack types because it mostly cares about the DPS.
No-nonsense units with different numbers: This is one readily underestimated thing in modern RTS unit design. Consider the Marine and the Zergling. Both deal about equivalent (and quite high) damage with quick weak attacks, making them bad against heavy armour. The Zerglings come in two-packs, and move very fast, but attack only in melee. Meanwhile, the Marine has more HP and shoots at range (it is also marginally better against armoured targets). These kinds of traits readily synergize with the very basic traits of the species' different farms, allowing Zerg great map control (the ability to have a lot of map vision and the ability to project force around the map), while the Marines' range and Terran's natural wall-offs trivially fend off the Zerg. The range also allows Marines who find good places to hole up in to achieve 300-esque feats of endurance and slaughter.
The different character of the races is easily evident with such simple things as these, and they are also very interesting and versatile. Yet they also do one very important thing: All these traits respect the fundamental character of an RTS game: That of troop production and movement, which allow for rough simulations of real-life strategy.
The racial traits of the Protoss are, in contrast, designed to completely circumvent these basic kinds of rules. In an RTS, troop production is usually done in steps such that:
1. The player orders the unit
2. The unit's cost is paid.
3. The unit is produced, forcing the player to wait.
4. The unit is ready and emerges from the production facility, heading for the battlefield.
The Protoss process works differently. They have a mechanic called the Warp Gate which allows them to produce their units directly at any Pylon (the name of the Protoss farm) they have on the map. The Warp-in process works like so:
1. The player orders the unit.
2. The unit's cost is paid.
3. The unit emerges at the chosen Pylon.
4. The Warpgate goes on cooldown, forcing the player to wait.
This sounds like a simple adjustment but serves to undermine a great number of the natural dynamics arising from the game's foundations:
1. Protoss reinforcements are completed much faster. They can get units immediately when getting free population cap whether due to a new farm or units dying. The Terran and Zerg have to wait half a minute for their units to even come out.
1b. This means that an even army trade favours the Protoss because he has units out first. If you win narrowly you may not even have the advantage, let alone a large one.
2. The Protoss player can build his unit-producing structures later because the first unit comes out immediately. As we all know, time is man- I mean money.
3. The natural concepts of reinforcement times and resulting defender's advantage (based on which basic tenets of strategy work) cease to apply to a great extent. Regardless of how far the Protoss opponent's base is, his troops are at your door immediately and you cannot intercept his reinforcements by way of ambush. You, conversely, are bound by these basic rules of strategy.
4. The system is ridiculously efficient. Normally these kinds of abilities require taking insane risks like placing your production structures near the enemy base (called proxying them). Protoss needs a single Pylon. This is an insanely cheap cost (100 minerals for Pylon, 150 for a single production facility, 50 for a Worker/Marine or a pair of Zerglings), and has none of the other traditional disadvantages like having no production in your home base.
The mechanic is interesting, and feels cool, yes, but a simple examination exposes all kinds of problems. These can somewhat be masked away by balance tweaks like making Protoss units weak (which was done but leads to another host of problems) but the core issues are still there and will inevitably rear their ugly head somewhere.
The reason I chose this example is to highlight two things:
First, how a certain sense of rules to be respected is necessary for things to make sense and the players to have expectations. In this case, the Warp Gate tramples on established rules of how the game works at a very fundamental level.
The second one is to highlight how antagonistic multiplayer raises the bar for the cool stuff to be included. Imagine Kirby Wii as a competitive more than co-operational game, like a race to the finish for example. Kirby himself may be broken, but him being super cool does not limit the other characters' ability to be cool to a great degree at all. It's still a big bummer but not a complete catastrophe.
In a game where the players are direct enemies, however, it is a catastrophe because what you can do very drastically affects what your opponent is allowed to do. It is not enough for the unit to be cool and fun to use - it also has to be fun or interesting to face. Numbers tweaks are possible but in the end the fundamental nature of the inclusion should be "right". This is something I feel Blizzard is nowadays very much slipping on*.
*If they were ever good at it in the first place - as far as I know, the Frozen Throne expansion was directed by a WarCraft 3 pro or a similar outsider who basically went "goddamnit let me fix your game" and included things with a very distinct gameplay job to fulfill instead of just making cool stuff up and including it (Blizz's admitted MO with Heart of the Swarm). The game is still broken, balance-wise, to the point where a famous Undead pro just picked Orc against Orc. Starcraft: Brood War's famed balance is in large part a result of saner unit designs combined with professional Korean mapmakers and the near-inhuman effort and work ethic of the progamers from said country. An argument could be made that Blizzard was only ever really good in the art direction and general content department, where they have been very clearly slipping as of late (Exhibits #1, #2, #3)
http://seanmalstrom.wordpress.com/2012/06/15/the-core-gameplay/
This post is surprisingly good for Malstrom as of late. Very, very good actually. Extremely good. Many games nowadays feel pretty bad because they're built on things that are not fundamental to playing a game. Much of this is just focusing on the how instead of the why, though. People make stuff instead of gameplay, and if gameplay is made, people tend to focus on elaborate systems instead. If both are avoided, the ugly problem of overt simplicity for it's own sake can rear it's head. But really, building a solid foundation and then expanding on it is very good.
A few brilliant examples from Starcraft 2, as examples of very simple, but very interesting things:
Farms: Terran and Zerg farms are very interesting contraptions. The zerg farm, called an Overlord is actually a flying unit instead of a building and can thus be used to scout (it can also later be upgraded into a makeshift dropship. Cheap and massable due to not consuming population cap, but slow), while the Terran farm (Supply Depot) can lower itself to the ground so it can be walked over. This is extremely useful in building walls on chokepoints near your base.
Point-based armour system: The presence of this alone creates an actual difference between the cannon and the machine gun. While the machine gun may deal great damage, armour rapidly kills off it's effectiveness. Far less so for the cannon. A percentage-based armour system needs attack types because it mostly cares about the DPS.
No-nonsense units with different numbers: This is one readily underestimated thing in modern RTS unit design. Consider the Marine and the Zergling. Both deal about equivalent (and quite high) damage with quick weak attacks, making them bad against heavy armour. The Zerglings come in two-packs, and move very fast, but attack only in melee. Meanwhile, the Marine has more HP and shoots at range (it is also marginally better against armoured targets). These kinds of traits readily synergize with the very basic traits of the species' different farms, allowing Zerg great map control (the ability to have a lot of map vision and the ability to project force around the map), while the Marines' range and Terran's natural wall-offs trivially fend off the Zerg. The range also allows Marines who find good places to hole up in to achieve 300-esque feats of endurance and slaughter.
The different character of the races is easily evident with such simple things as these, and they are also very interesting and versatile. Yet they also do one very important thing: All these traits respect the fundamental character of an RTS game: That of troop production and movement, which allow for rough simulations of real-life strategy.
The racial traits of the Protoss are, in contrast, designed to completely circumvent these basic kinds of rules. In an RTS, troop production is usually done in steps such that:
1. The player orders the unit
2. The unit's cost is paid.
3. The unit is produced, forcing the player to wait.
4. The unit is ready and emerges from the production facility, heading for the battlefield.
The Protoss process works differently. They have a mechanic called the Warp Gate which allows them to produce their units directly at any Pylon (the name of the Protoss farm) they have on the map. The Warp-in process works like so:
1. The player orders the unit.
2. The unit's cost is paid.
3. The unit emerges at the chosen Pylon.
4. The Warpgate goes on cooldown, forcing the player to wait.
This sounds like a simple adjustment but serves to undermine a great number of the natural dynamics arising from the game's foundations:
1. Protoss reinforcements are completed much faster. They can get units immediately when getting free population cap whether due to a new farm or units dying. The Terran and Zerg have to wait half a minute for their units to even come out.
1b. This means that an even army trade favours the Protoss because he has units out first. If you win narrowly you may not even have the advantage, let alone a large one.
2. The Protoss player can build his unit-producing structures later because the first unit comes out immediately. As we all know, time is man- I mean money.
3. The natural concepts of reinforcement times and resulting defender's advantage (based on which basic tenets of strategy work) cease to apply to a great extent. Regardless of how far the Protoss opponent's base is, his troops are at your door immediately and you cannot intercept his reinforcements by way of ambush. You, conversely, are bound by these basic rules of strategy.
4. The system is ridiculously efficient. Normally these kinds of abilities require taking insane risks like placing your production structures near the enemy base (called proxying them). Protoss needs a single Pylon. This is an insanely cheap cost (100 minerals for Pylon, 150 for a single production facility, 50 for a Worker/Marine or a pair of Zerglings), and has none of the other traditional disadvantages like having no production in your home base.
The mechanic is interesting, and feels cool, yes, but a simple examination exposes all kinds of problems. These can somewhat be masked away by balance tweaks like making Protoss units weak (which was done but leads to another host of problems) but the core issues are still there and will inevitably rear their ugly head somewhere.
The reason I chose this example is to highlight two things:
First, how a certain sense of rules to be respected is necessary for things to make sense and the players to have expectations. In this case, the Warp Gate tramples on established rules of how the game works at a very fundamental level.
The second one is to highlight how antagonistic multiplayer raises the bar for the cool stuff to be included. Imagine Kirby Wii as a competitive more than co-operational game, like a race to the finish for example. Kirby himself may be broken, but him being super cool does not limit the other characters' ability to be cool to a great degree at all. It's still a big bummer but not a complete catastrophe.
In a game where the players are direct enemies, however, it is a catastrophe because what you can do very drastically affects what your opponent is allowed to do. It is not enough for the unit to be cool and fun to use - it also has to be fun or interesting to face. Numbers tweaks are possible but in the end the fundamental nature of the inclusion should be "right". This is something I feel Blizzard is nowadays very much slipping on*.
*If they were ever good at it in the first place - as far as I know, the Frozen Throne expansion was directed by a WarCraft 3 pro or a similar outsider who basically went "goddamnit let me fix your game" and included things with a very distinct gameplay job to fulfill instead of just making cool stuff up and including it (Blizz's admitted MO with Heart of the Swarm). The game is still broken, balance-wise, to the point where a famous Undead pro just picked Orc against Orc. Starcraft: Brood War's famed balance is in large part a result of saner unit designs combined with professional Korean mapmakers and the near-inhuman effort and work ethic of the progamers from said country. An argument could be made that Blizzard was only ever really good in the art direction and general content department, where they have been very clearly slipping as of late (Exhibits #1, #2, #3)
