SC2 Campaign aimed for 13 year old boys?

upgrade your SCVs with Dual fusion cutters, SNAP!

the whole Hanson storyline just felt extremely weak. Good missions, but the way it was resolved just felt like I was watching an 80's pre-show recap of events

It took me quite a few tries to kill off four hatcheries on Brutal for that achievement. Not losing a single structure also seems quite hard and maybe even impossible unless you scale the difficulty down.

It really does feel like WC3 though, only this time we find that Arthas was created specifically to fight the Burning Legion. Not to mention it retcons Tassadar's death a little, he was supposedly destroyed so utterly that no trace of him remained, physically or psionically, yet he appears as a ghost. Zeratul the time traveler seems pretty silly too.

On the mission with the drill it was a pain in the ass to collect the relics, because every time I went off to grab one, the massive air assault came. On hard mode its not that big of a deal, but on Brutal, urgh. I just don't wanna deal with that just yet

Prophecy Missons, man were they fun. Best missions in the game imo.

after a few of the news ones it stops doing that EVERY single time, or at least in different ways. There is however one where the news anchor claims that he always brings the news in the most "fair and balanced" way,

thanks RELOADED

especially the mission where u survive against the zergs andvancing and matt horner saves you

Zero hour third mission, playing on Brutal first time I left the base to go kill the enemy, prob had around ~16 marines 5 medics, and as I'm killing an enemy spine crawler, fucking like 8-10 mutas come, lots of lings, few hydras then an ULTRA unburrows. I was like WTF, I can't even tech stim yet or combat shields, and they throw an Ultra at me?

I just finished the whole protoss side campaign, back to Terran now

Short Version:
The only missions that were really interesting story wise were the Protoss ones. They progressed the story forward far more then the Terran missions. Which is a shame since it's not their campaign.
If they try and take the Zerg and make them like the Orcs in WC3 I'm gona cry.
The core story comprises about 4-5 missions. And it's also very weak and underdeveloped.
6 years and $100 million? For what? 3 real Cut scenes?


The first two or so missions I was actually shocked at how bad the dialogue and overall feel was. I had no idea that the Character Tychus Findlay(Is this guys voice Uncle Ruffus from the "Boon Docks"?) was going to be mostly comic relief. By the end of the 2nd mission I was already thinking I'd been duped. By the end of the 3rd mission I just decided to turn off my prejudices and give the game all the chances it needed. Just like you do for bad movies that can be fun if you just go along with it.

So I play about 15 more missions all the while thinking "is the story ever going to start?". Almost all of the first missions advance the main storyline very little. It is filled with all these subplots that are more or less entertaining but don't do much for the main plot. We collect pieces of the artifact which we'll need later. But really that could of been compacted into 1 mission. You could tell they were stretching what seemed like very little to begin with even more thin.

It makes me wonder what happened at Blizzard and what were the reasons behind splitting the story into 3 separate campaigns. I remember someone at blizzard. Maybe Dustin Browder saying there was just so much to tell or something. Simply not true. A mater of fact the whole Terran campaign seems out of balance. Like it's trying to tell a story line it was never intended to tell. And in the end couldn't. I'm referring to the Protoss missions. It was fun to play the Protoss but why were they needed? It would of been cool if we learned something interesting from them but really they were the biggest part of the actual story. The Main plot didn't even get kicked off until Zeratul came into the game. Without those missions nothing would of made sense. This just looks like very poor planning or very rushed. Neither or which makes sense because were looking at roughly 6 years of development and $100million?

Whats even more bazaar is that with all these pointless sub plots the main story was really underdeveloped. So many missed opportunities. For instance. In the final mission Kerrigan is returned to her human form. And from the looks of it she seems to be her old loving self. Yet we hardly got to see Kerrigan at all in WOL in her Zerg form. She showed up only to say a few words and have Jim out smart her or straight up beat her in every mission. The only real interactions came from the Protoss missions. Even though we knew Kerrigan from SC and SC:BW, in WOL she is basically a minor character. In the context of this story, does anyone even care what happens to her? Her character was just extremely underdeveloped.


By the time I reached the end it became apparent that the core of the story. What it was all about, comprised about 4-5 missions. Get artifact. Meet Valerian Mengsk. Learn everything you need to know from Zeratuls missions. Go get Kerrigan. The only remarkable subplot was trying to broadcast that tapped recording of Emperor Mengsk. It could probably of been considered a main plot as well. But was overshadowed by Kerrigans story.

There just wasn't much there. Which is unexplainable because as I said above. 6 years and $100 million. And nothing to show for it but 4-5 missions of actual progression of SC lore.

By far the largest disappointment was that I got a very heavy feeling of Warcraft leaking in. In Warcraft 3 the we all kinda found out that the Blood Thirsty Orcs who were the "bad guys" weren't so bad after all. Turns out they just made a few mistakes along the way. And that their evil masters (the Burning Legion) were actually the bad guys. So now everyone can be friends and fight the real bad guys.

I thought that was pretty clever of Metzen. It really added allot of depth to the Orcs and to the whole Warcraft universe. Suddenly everything was connected in a new way. But now it seems like they are trying to do the same thing with the Zerg. In WOL we find out that the Overmind was actually a sorta good guy??? And that he came up with the whole Kerrigan plan to throw an extra dice into the Xel'Naga's plans.

This is speculation at this point because we don't know where they're gona go with the next chapter. Which will be the Zerg Campaign. But don't be surprised if come the next game we find out the Zerg were once a shamanistic race of Larva things who built a proud culture on Zerg Land.

I don't know were the story is headed but it was just scary hearing Zeratul talk to Tassadar about the Overmind being good and all. I really hope Metzen isn't a one trick pony and that they have something good planned for the direction of the story.

Overall. There was allot of Fluff. And what was there wasn't all that great. I did enjoyed it though. And I think most people will. You kind of have too. After all. You just shelled out $60 and if you go tell your friends or write a post on a forum about how it was acceptable just because it's what we got but wasn't really that great. Well. Then people might not like you.

I went in not knowing how long the campaign was, so I assumed it would be about 50 since the first 12 or so did absolutely nothing for the story line. It ended up being 26, and I can say that none of them besides the final mission and the Zeratul missions were memorable. Perhaps the biggest letdown of all was the ending cinematic. The fact the this "Queen of Blades", the biggest 'known' threat to both the Protoss and the Terran is defeated after 20ish forgettable missions? Not only defeated, but beaten by a ragtag group of rebels and half of the dominion fleet and RESTORED TO HER OLD SELF, Awwwwww how sweet. Its laughable. At the end of Brood War the admiral is so torn up about killing his best friend that he puts a bullet in his head. The softness of this ending is so far removed from Starcraft its not even recognizable.

inventing a new super-race the Xel Naga. Not necessary, the three races are interesting enough.

emperor Mengsk was not a good antagonist, he basicly does nothing througout the campaign and gets his ass kicked.

And don't forget about Matriarch Raszagal. Seriously, after all that time spent on making Kerrigan so vile and loathsome Blizzard's just going to pull the, "No, no, that was her dark side! She can be purged of such things and become good" gimmick card.

you see a damn Night Elf dancing at the back of the bar

For example after the fight scene. Raynor nearly got killed there, and only wants his Juke Box fixed? I know he is supposed to look extra cool there, but i thought that the scene is just silly.

PS: Loved that in the end Queen of Blades un-Zerged since Raynor and her were imo best chars ever if i dont count Zeratul

got to the point where we see there is a chance to bring Kerrigan back

plus she's hot

also, what was the motivation for mengsk to order tychus to kill kerrigan after her transformation? I don't really see how that could help mengsk at all. dumb.

lack of cinematic cutscenes, and those there were were really short. but ofc it helps that you have the ingame one constant

i was 100% sure there would be a lame plot twist with kerrigan still being Zerg, it was nice that she was saved, caus we all know she havent played her part of the grand battle, oh and we all saw Tychus betrayeal comming a mile away

Oh my god that whole ordeal felt terrible. Raynor KNOWS Tychus is in a shitty situation with the suit and that "someone has a gun to his head" and he does absolutely fucking nothing about it?! Oh hey of course that Xel'Naga artifact cured Kerrigan. Makes complete godamned sense. Of course the Xel'Naga would construct and leave behind artifacts that cleanse infestation of one of their child-races from a completely unknown and unimportant species. Tosh, you're a bad man for not telling me about your sinister plans, but we're still cool, right?

I think what they've done with Warcraft has spilled over into Starcraft - they just don't take it seriously anymore. They throw in easter-eggs (Night Elf at the bar, and all other kinds of silly immersion-breaking things I can't remember right now) cheesey lines and basically boil the whole game down to general fan-service instead of actual story-telling. Its like they were torn between writing a good story, and the more recent company culture of throwing in silly shit left, right and centre to make fans giggle.

The 'story' progressed so horribly slow, too. Same feeling I got from the first 11 missions I got from the next 11 - I'm just going through the motions picking up units, money and tech and playing mini-games until the final push against Kerrigan where there's a few more minigames and finally a hold-the-line shitstorm at the end.

Being able to pick which missions you did in what order left some seriously awkward situations in there, too. Oh we just beat the crap out of Mengsk and stole the Odin? Damn this rebellion is going well. Oh, Jimmy bumps into Kerrigan while saving some scientists in the next mission? THIS REBELLION IS GOING NOWHERE FFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUU-. The way I played it, and I'm sure there are many who did the same, by gradually going through each mission path, instead of picking one and going all the way (except for the Protoss one) made it feel like every character had bipolar disorder.

I like how they teach that all-important sense of urgency to players, though, through every mission having some kind of time limiter on it in some way (race to 8000 minerals, keep moving your base from the fire, keep your army mobile as you protect civilian transports), but I don't think that's going to transfer over to the online game. My brother (hardcore gamer, but not a big RTS player) mentioned he was annoyed that EVERY mission was like that and that there was literally no missions to sit back, build a huge motherfucking army with tons of surplus resources and smash down a well fortified base, maps from most RTS games of yore. Feels like they went the mini-game route to show off the versatility of the engine instead of the old tried-and-true method of RTS campaigns. But, one huge, ENORMOUS skill that never gets taught (except maybe through the challenge things, I haven't checked) is SCOUTING. Even on hard-mode they literally hand you vision of important areas of the map on a silver platter. A friend at work (casual) mentioned how he started playing online and that he was terrified that everyone knew the maps already because of workers getting into his base and spotting his exact location 'really quickly'. I think they dropped the ball on that one.

The majority of the missions were fun, not gonna deny that. The final Protoss mission was awesome and I felt really proud getting that last achievement as I was getting hammered from all angles (poor Zeratul died immediately when Overseers showed up. Oops!), but I feel like the campaign was making me suck when it comes to doing my placements tonight (if for the simple fact I've been playing my least favourite race this whole time), so I'm going to have to hammer against some Insane AI achievements to get a feel for it again.

... when Ariel turned herself into a Zerg because she is being a baby. Jim already saved her people so many times, and during "Haven's Fall" he was only killing the infested ones and not the uncontaminated ones. Also, what about the zombie movie mission? She was fine about that?

"You're infested! You're already dead." LOL lame.

Tosh, Tychus, and Nova.

why didn't Mengsk stop Tycus in the Odin during media blitz or something i was totally expecting that to happen. In a cut scene Matt said he figured out his suit was rigged to shut down his organs, how could Mengsk not use him to his advantage and what was the point of killing Kerragain besides revenge?

In SC:BW, Jim Raynor seemed to be intent on killing Kerrigan himself after she murdered Fenix. Its like they completely forgot about that in SC2

We got Raynor wants to overthrow Mengsk, doubts of Valerian's motives in helping Raynor, Zeratul's vision of the future, reason why is Tassadar still alive and had he achieved Twilight, etc. Many interesting points to develop the story further. I personally like the infestation of Dr. Hanson if you chose to side with Selendis, it gave me a pleasant surprise. Some of us might have questioned why is this happening and why is that happening, such as why is Char so easily invaded, but it could be easily answered if Blizzard explained it better.

I am asking myself why am I collecting minerals and artifacts and what happened to rebellion against Mengsk? The next thing you know is "Oh, I found this adjutant, and now Mengsk, you are dead." The Tosh/Nova and Dr. Hanson's missions have no impact in the storyline, yet (hopefully). I should just have let the colonists die. Collecting the artifacts felt like filler missions and suddenly you use the artifacts to save Kerrigan in just 3 missions after 4 years since Kerrigan defeated everyone. Blizzard should put more effort in presenting the story, such as adding plots like what had Raynor been through in the 4 years to change the mind of killing her by himself to saving her and Horner's investigation on why do everybody want the artifacts, put some dialogue between Kerrigan and Raynor in Char like "You are a lucky pig to even stand on this ground if the full might of the Swarm is here."

The way Dr. Hansen falls for the strong Raynor who has a troubled past he cant talk about; that's just cheesy beyond belief. And the other thing that really bugs me is that they have to invoke the complete destruction of the human race/universe by some outer dimensional entity. How many times have we seen that in WC?

how can Kerrigan being 'cured' by some random Xel'Naga artifact possibly sit well with any human being on this planet?

I also really dislike how everything turns into propechies and chosen's of the fate. SC1 had it's own mysticism with templars, dark energies and such, but it never stated that the whole thingy was more than a huge insterstellar collision between the 3 races and their interests. The whole chosen by the fate thingy makes character choises bland, there's hardly any proper personal motive in anything.