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Kerrigan really behaves extremely weird in WoL. Either horrible storywriting or there is something to it that we don't get yet. I'm hoping for the latter.
Raynor doesn't live up to his promises either; as DocM said so well, he in fact wants to save Kerrigan despite having sworn to kill her back in BW. He (the Raynor in BW) is not the kind of guy who promises to kill someone and then just forgets about it. WoL didn't make it clear how he was able to change his mind like that.
Where is Duran? He had a lot of influence in BW, even though he hid it well. Now the Hybrids show up, Zeratul digs up ancient Xel'Naga stuff and he doesn't make a single appearance... Has he been dropped out of the plot entirely? Is he actually pulling some strings from behind the scenes?
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I wrote a thread about a similar issue on the b-net forums :p
Heres some copy pasta :o.
So I just finished the campaign. It was pretty bad. I don't mean the actual gameplay. The level design was absolutely mind blowing. I can't praise blizzard level designers enough for it. How they managed to make 29 missions for a single race remain fresh was pretty amazing. Much Props to you guys <3. I mean the narrative. It was really bad. Of course, Blizzard is hardly known for their original, dramatic stories, but generally their past narratives, while derivative, still enhanced the overall game play experience. SC2 fails in this department, The Wings of liberty storyline was nigh-unbearable. And I don't think I'm the only one who thinks that. Its a pretty common criticism amongst fans and critics alike. Alec and Quinn, respectable reviewers from RPS (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com) note: Show nested quote +...Raynor is a terrible, terrible character and I’m amazed they hung so much of the game’s presentation and marketing around him.
Quinns: Raynor’s fine on paper, as are the rest of his crew. The haggard rebel, the criminal, the nerdy scientist, the by-the-book spit-and-polish captain and his antagonism with the criminal. But in execution it’s boring Liquid'Jinro, of TL.net notes Show nested quote +Good missions, but the way it was resolved just felt like I was watching an 80's pre-show recap of events And more from Starcraft fans on the internet. Show nested quote +The missions and units and everything except how the story was presented was good. The news reporter thing was stupid and I only clicked it b/c I click everything anyway. The game felt a little too much like being an errand boy rather than progressing the story sometimes. Most of the game really felt like WoW quests rather than an awesome story. I played most of it on Brutal, a lot on hard, and on the last mission I got 66% on brutal and died so I was like Ill just play on casual so I can get to the last mission. Oh wait that was the last one. Yeh so really good except too many quests that didn't really matter. ANd talking to the people on the ship felt like a chore rather than fun 90% of the time. Show nested quote +I find the cut scenes to be agonizing to sit through. Glad to hear that at least some people share my opinion. They are well rendered, but the writing and delivery are pure pain to me. I agree with people who view it as Wing Commander with a bit more polish. Of course, it certainly isn't unilateral consent. But it certainly represents a very legitimate criticism. And while Blizzard games have been criticized for everything ranging from inaccessible learning curves, lack of learning curves, derivative designs, inability to emulate predecessors, a host of other issues, incidentally, unbearably terrible narratives were not among them. So what exactly makes WoL's story so unbearable? Is it, as Veronica of another thread on the B-net forums voicing a similar concern notes? That: Show nested quote +
After 12 years and countless millions earned from WoW Blizzard's writing has actually degraded
? Well, in all likelihood, probably not. The issue lies in blizzards particular style of writing (and design in general), and how it simply doesn't translate into a character driven narrative. Blizzards always done things by "the rule of cool". Apparently, that why every single set of shoulders in WoW have so many long metal spikes that they should be classified as lightning hazards and why everybody emits purple light from their eyes. Even the horses. This is surprisingly bearable, even "cool", in a game like Wc3 or SC1. Its works great in those games because there are so many characters, and each have only a few lines. In order to make them memorable and distinguishable, they HAVE to be caricatures and stereotypes who just spout one liners all day. Which for the most part, they were. Raynor and Kerrigan and Zeratul were fantastic characters, but only work when presented as story elements, not 3 dimensional characters. Because as far as there presentations goes, they weren't. Instead, they worked because they implied 3 dimensional characters lurking behind their roles as story elements. Objectively, the writing in SC2 isn't any worse then it was in Sc1. But Sc2 doesn't go for a similar presentation as Sc1 or Wc3. It attempts to be a character driven narration, while the writing is still a relic from when characters were simply story elements. Yet at the same time there is some awareness of this, but it simply dilutes the factor so not only are the characters not, or ever were, complex characters, but they're not even cool anymore. The end result is probably is a narrative that is sadly, the worst one blizzard ever wrote. So all i got to say Blizz, for your upcoming expansion pack... plz fix. Lets kick this writing department into overdrive mmk? and fix b-net 2.0 while your at it :p.
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Blizzard has already used the "everyone works together to stop a greater threat" plot before: remember Brood War? How everyone fought against the UED despite it not making any fucking sense for the Terrans and the Protoss to side with the ZERG (of all people) against other humans. Seriously, Brood War's plot makes no sense at all, yet people worship the ground it walks on because it's filled with PLOT TWISTS AND BACKSTABBING, oh my!
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On August 02 2010 01:41 spinesheath wrote:
Kerrigan really behaves extremely weird in WoL. Either horrible storywriting or there is something to it that we don't get yet. I'm hoping for the latter.
Raynor doesn't live up to his promises either; as DocM said so well, he in fact wants to save Kerrigan despite having sworn to kill her back in BW. He (the Raynor in BW) is not the kind of guy who promises to kill someone and then just forgets about it. WoL didn't make it clear how he was able to change his mind like that.
Where is Duran? He had a lot of influence in BW, even though he hid it well. Now the Hybrids show up, Zeratul digs up ancient Xel'Naga stuff and he doesn't make a single appearance... Has he been dropped out of the plot entirely? Is he actually pulling some strings from behind the scenes?
Duran theory:
+ Show Spoiler +Oh Duran is there...Dr. Narud, his name is Duran backwards, and they have the same style facial hair. Coincidence? I think not
Plus, he's working on research that involves the ancient races and artifacts. Continuing his work that was revealed in BW, but under a new guise if you ask me.
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On August 02 2010 00:57 Unentschieden wrote:
Retconning would be changing past events to fit the current plot. That didn´t happen, the events of Broodwar remain unchanged. They did however supply a bit of background to why Kerrigan was infested. That didn´t make sense back in SC and BW.
The infestation in BW made sense given the background story of the zerg, which seems heavily retconned. The whole Xel'Naga plot in SC2 makes them seem completely different from how they were introduced in the background story of SC and BW - there you were given the impression they were like mad scientists obsessed with evolving "the perfect creation". Zerg being the last experiment seeing as they destroyed the Xel'Naga that created them. But still retaining their obsession with perfecting themselves led to the assimilation of uniqe and powerful species into the swarm - Kerrigan being a high level psionic agent therefore would be an obvious choice for infestation.
The overmind being a slave doesn't really make sense either, as it turned on its creators and set upon its path of assimilation and destruction. Presenting the zerg as unwilling tools of destruction like the Orcs in WC was truly disappointing, it would be like suggesting the Borg in Star Trek were controlled by someone with a remote. -_-
The hybrids presented by Duran in BW seemed more likely to set up for a forced unification of the zerg and protoss by remaining Xel'Naga determined to finish their experiments in perfection rather than heralding in some mysterious force hell bent on destroying the whole galaxy for no reason whatsoever. There wouldn't even be any reason for them to do so lore-wise, seeing as they pretty much ruled the galaxy alone and could've destroyed it thousands of years earlier. 
The whole plot in SC2 seemed recycled from WC3, and was a cheap way to disguise they really didn't have any innovative story to tell. I have no idea how something as cliché like that could be the best they could come up with 12 years after the original game.
On August 02 2010 01:48 Radios wrote:
Blizzard has already used the "everyone works together to stop a greater threat" plot before: remember Brood War? How everyone fought against the UED despite it not making any fucking sense for the Terrans and the Protoss to side with the ZERG (of all people) against other humans. Seriously, Brood War's plot makes no sense at all, yet people worship the ground it walks on because it's filled with PLOT TWISTS AND BACKSTABBING, oh my!
It made more sense. Kerrigan losing control of the swarm, Mengsk losing control of his empire, and the protoss being faced with the combined strength of the UED and their controlled swarm. For the three parties involved it would make more sense to beat the new kid on the block and maintaining the balance of terror, rather than risking losing it all to the UED.
It all semed more realistic, since there were purely military and political goals involved, rather than "the fate of the galaxy!!",
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I wanted to start a new topic and proclaim that Blizzard needed to fire their art crew. This tread seems relevant enough to that crusade. So, ... Blizzard needs to fire like everyone.
The story, as has been pointed out, was quite terrible. The Hybrids look like Night Elf Demons or something; the Protoss look more like elves than the Eldar of Warhammer; and Raynor got hair?!
But that is all the aesthetic. In the story, doing missions was quite fun. What killed my buzz was when Mengsk's Blood Elf son showed up and Raynor had a personality shift. Was Raynor drinking throughout the whole game because he couldn't kill Zerg on Char? And now hes got that chance and is a reformed man?
And General Mega-Man? Seriously!
Starcraft 2 was good when there was no important story. As soon as its gets to important story, it feels uncomfortable.
The things is, Blizzard needs to go through the entire SC2 team, find out who likes elves and then terminate their role on SC2 development. That there is a cutscene that shows off a bunch of dead marines coupled with the sad music means the developers have no idea what is going on. Between 'elite' marines and 'elite' Mengsks and 'elite' Horner... I just have to wonder if these guys even played Broodwar. Elf=Elite, and that shit is boring.
Broodwar introduced many characters, the likes of which like none have returned. There is no general duke, we get some European stereotype of an American general. Tosh (the Jamaican, seriously?) should have been Samir Duran-- of which Raynor wouldn't know what was up but BW vets would. And how did Kerrigan go from assassin of the Zerg to ultralisk+life? Her reveal in this game was piss poor, as her execution.
Yeah yeah, the missions are well designed and fun, but the story sucks. Makes me not want to purchase HOTS. I guess if they add Reavers into the map editor, I might be so inclined 
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What if HotS and LotV run in parallel to what happened in WoL. Like you would be controlling the Zerg attacking the Terran and probably Protoss as well. I don't know if it could hold to anything but it was just an idea I've been toying with.
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On August 02 2010 01:08 Ineluctable wrote:
They should hire/learn from the people who wrote Mass Effect 1 and 2. They know how to make a fairly generic plot (save the universe from x super bad guy) very interesting.
I actually wrote a comment in gametrailer's sc2 review about how sc2 was basically a really bad mass effect 2. I got slammed with thumbs down I also played ME2 very recently (after beating ME1 the week prior). Was an amazing game. Of course, not all the brancing missions were interesting. But the player was certainly rewarded when they went on missions that uncover more of the plot, something SC2 failed to do. The reward in SC2 came (for me) when raynor boards valerian's ship. But that was hours into the game.
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On August 02 2010 02:34 RetroDeatRow wrote:I wanted to start a new topic and proclaim that Blizzard needed to fire their art crew. This tread seems relevant enough to that crusade. So, ... Blizzard needs to fire like everyone. The story, as has been pointed out, was quite terrible. The Hybrids look like Night Elf Demons or something; the Protoss look more like elves than the Eldar of Warhammer; and Raynor got hair?! But that is all the aesthetic. In the story, doing missions was quite fun. What killed my buzz was when Mengsk's Blood Elf son showed up and Raynor had a personality shift. Was Raynor drinking throughout the whole game because he couldn't kill Zerg on Char? And now hes got that chance and is a reformed man? And General Mega-Man? Seriously! Starcraft 2 was good when there was no important story. As soon as its gets to important story, it feels uncomfortable. The things is, Blizzard needs to go through the entire SC2 team, find out who likes elves and then terminate their role on SC2 development. That there is a cutscene that shows off a bunch of dead marines coupled with the sad music means the developers have no idea what is going on. Between 'elite' marines and 'elite' Mengsks and 'elite' Horner... I just have to wonder if these guys even played Broodwar. Elf=Elite, and that shit is boring. Broodwar introduced many characters, the likes of which like none have returned. There is no general duke, we get some European stereotype of an American general. Tosh (the Jamaican, seriously?) should have been Samir Duran-- of which Raynor wouldn't know what was up but BW vets would. And how did Kerrigan go from assassin of the Zerg to ultralisk+life? Her reveal in this game was piss poor, as her execution. Yeah yeah, the missions are well designed and fun, but the story sucks. Makes me not want to purchase HOTS. I guess if they add Reavers into the map editor, I might be so inclined
Your post doesn't make any sense. I can understand being disappointed with the story, but here you are rambling on incoherently about elves and shit. How do elves come into this at all and how do those mentioned characters resemble elves in any way? How is Warfield "General Megaman" when cybernetics are all too common amongst the Terrans? General Duke is dead, Samir Duran DOES make an appearance (But I won't reveal it to you; that would ruin the fun), and Kerrigan was a tank in SC1 , too (500 life, regeneration, 50 damage attack, psi storm, etc).
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On August 02 2010 03:05 SushiBoat wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2010 01:08 Ineluctable wrote:
They should hire/learn from the people who wrote Mass Effect 1 and 2. They know how to make a fairly generic plot (save the universe from x super bad guy) very interesting. I actually wrote a comment in gametrailer's sc2 review about how sc2 was basically a really bad mass effect 2. I got slammed with thumbs down I also played ME2 very recently (after beating ME1 the week prior). Was an amazing game. Of course, not all the brancing missions were interesting. But the player was certainly rewarded when they went on missions that uncover more of the plot, something SC2 failed to do. The reward in SC2 came (for me) when raynor boards valerian's ship. But that was hours into the game.
Really? Because I thought that scene was among the worst in the game.
First off, there's an entire fleet. How can the Hyperion actually get close enough to board the flagship without getting fired upon? From the perspective of the crew, that move is tantamount to suicide. Secondly, Raynor/Tychus could have gotten killed fighting those guards and then Valerian would have been fucked. I know, they have plot armor, but it's just dumb. Finally, if Raynor shot Valerian in the back, his entire gambit would have been for naught. The entire scene felt entirely contrived. For someone as smart as Valerian, he should have messaged Raynor as soon as the fleet warped in and told him what was going down instead of relying on a thousand bad/random decisions.
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Good job whining and manipulating the truth. Kerrigan was a human and therefore is vulnerable to getting - tired, or depressed. (She was dark and cynical in sc1...)
This is another one of those threads where all of idiots are out, making sc2-bashing posts and pretending they're intelligent. Ehh I've lost faith in TL again.
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On August 02 2010 01:57 sushiman wrote:
The infestation in BW made sense given the background story of the zerg, which seems heavily retconned.
No, originally the overmind attacked the Terrans to assimilate a Psi-capable-being into the swarm so he could use that new breed to take on the Protoss. Thats why Psi-emitters attracted Zerg back then and why Kerrigan was abducted.
The problem was that Kerrigan had NO role in the Zerg invasion of Aiur. It´s like they halfway realised that she´d make a great Villian for a addon, so they keept her "safe".
The "retcon" is that the Overmind had a good reason to save her, she was supposed to replace him from the start. Since she is still somewhat Terran it´s possible to remove the Zergmindcontrol from her which was the point all along according to Wol.
I hope they also give Kerrigan a good reason why she didn´t at least take care of Mengsk at the end of Broodwar. Obviously they couldn´t have one race actually "win" for the sake of sequels but she kinda stopped "because she could".
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thinking Zerg is evil, is like thinking a predator is evil when it eats another animal 
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in SC1 there were quite a few reasons why the storyline seemed so much better
a) it covered new ground. lets face the facts, stuff is way more exciting when its new rather then, "oh wait i saw this before in XYZ"
b) the races definitely seemed to be more unique, instead of just banding together in 3 seconds they had to solve their own problems first, i.e. the terrans are greedy bastards and they are always infighting to gain a monetary advantage instead of actually caring about the zerg. the protoss also seem to care more about rank and tradition and 1/2 of the protoss missions practically end up in pvp
also there always seemed to be some ambiguity of who the bad guys were because at the end of the day all SC1 was just 3 different races trying to control the universe in their own way, true the zerg seem more evil, but they have no choice in the matter, the humans definitely seem to choose evil on a more everyday basis but cmon they're us in the future you dont really want them to be the bad guys...
SCBW definitely changed that whole dynamic with the Xel'naga actually playing some sort role albeit through artifacts and temples, but definitely changing the playing field but still there was KERRIGAN she was awesomeness incarnate, playing everybody in the solar system until she had full control of the swarm }:-)
Disclaimer: the rest of this post is highly opinionated enter at your own risk!
Enter SCII OMG Burning Legion AHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!
*rehash of WC3 * nobody bad or evil only tragic lame characters...lets all band together and destroy what makes us different! sounds like the mutiplayer? no no this is the single player!
honestly they should have a guy that when you click on his portrait enough he says "this IS WC3 in space!"
btw since this is a SC2 thread i wonder if anyone actually remembers which in-game hero said the already famous line "this is NOT WC2 in space"
but enough with the SC2 bashing, honestly at this point in time was anyone expecting a game like SCI? even the most naive person could see that this is a different era for Blizzard, whether its b/c of Activision-Blizzard, or WoW or Dustin Browder...ad absurdium
things change over time, for all those who were blessed to play SC in its heyday, it was awsome!
john lennon died and so did mozart, but time marches on
...for whom the bell tolls
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On August 02 2010 03:39 0mar wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2010 03:05 SushiBoat wrote:On August 02 2010 01:08 Ineluctable wrote:
They should hire/learn from the people who wrote Mass Effect 1 and 2. They know how to make a fairly generic plot (save the universe from x super bad guy) very interesting. I actually wrote a comment in gametrailer's sc2 review about how sc2 was basically a really bad mass effect 2. I got slammed with thumbs down I also played ME2 very recently (after beating ME1 the week prior). Was an amazing game. Of course, not all the brancing missions were interesting. But the player was certainly rewarded when they went on missions that uncover more of the plot, something SC2 failed to do. The reward in SC2 came (for me) when raynor boards valerian's ship. But that was hours into the game. Really? Because I thought that scene was among the worst in the game. First off, there's an entire fleet. How can the Hyperion actually get close enough to board the flagship without getting fired upon? From the perspective of the crew, that move is tantamount to suicide. Secondly, Raynor/Tychus could have gotten killed fighting those guards and then Valerian would have been fucked. I know, they have plot armor, but it's just dumb. Finally, if Raynor shot Valerian in the back, his entire gambit would have been for naught. The entire scene felt entirely contrived. For someone as smart as Valerian, he should have messaged Raynor as soon as the fleet warped in and told him what was going down instead of relying on a thousand bad/random decisions.
I agree that the believability of the whole scene is questionable. But they introduced valerian (finally) and started to move the plot along. Before valerian is introduced, what is actually happening? Collect artifacts for mobius. Find random resources for Tosh. Help horner expose the stupidly portrayed dominion. Unfortunately, shortly after valerian's introduction, you're on char working to stop kerrigan and the game is over.
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10387 Posts
On August 02 2010 03:48 scrdmnttr wrote:
Good job whining and manipulating the truth. Kerrigan was a human and therefore is vulnerable to getting - tired, or depressed. (She was dark and cynical in sc1...)
This is another one of those threads where all of idiots are out, making sc2-bashing posts and pretending they're intelligent. Ehh I've lost faith in TL again.
Gosh you're a genius!! I guess when the invasion half a fleet hit Char, she just went "FUCK IT" and waited for them to come kill her! Blizzard's writers just fucked up all the characters that were from SC1 and BW, like the guy who wrote the story for SC2 didn't even really read the story from the original.
Also that Fire and Fury scene, where Raynor gives that "inspirational speech".. made me want to fuckin barf. Blizzard games' dialogue actually used to be very good..
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All I can say is
Starcraft 1: Rated M for Mature
Starcraft 2: Rated T for Teen.
Have fun making money, Blizzard.
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On August 02 2010 01:56 Thegilaboy wrote:Show nested quote +On August 02 2010 01:41 spinesheath wrote:
Kerrigan really behaves extremely weird in WoL. Either horrible storywriting or there is something to it that we don't get yet. I'm hoping for the latter.
Raynor doesn't live up to his promises either; as DocM said so well, he in fact wants to save Kerrigan despite having sworn to kill her back in BW. He (the Raynor in BW) is not the kind of guy who promises to kill someone and then just forgets about it. WoL didn't make it clear how he was able to change his mind like that.
Where is Duran? He had a lot of influence in BW, even though he hid it well. Now the Hybrids show up, Zeratul digs up ancient Xel'Naga stuff and he doesn't make a single appearance... Has he been dropped out of the plot entirely? Is he actually pulling some strings from behind the scenes? Duran theory: + Show Spoiler +Oh Duran is there...Dr. Narud, his name is Duran backwards, and they have the same style facial hair. Coincidence? I think not
Plus, he's working on research that involves the ancient races and artifacts. Continuing his work that was revealed in BW, but under a new guise if you ask me.
Great post, I was wondering what happened to Duran and this makes lots of sense.
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I wonder what is going to be Kerri's role in HotS, maybe she won't be main Zerg leader at all? It's less likely as she is supposed to be a key in defeating Xel'Naga but something unexpected has to happen there to make it interesting and make people buy it.
It would be interesting to see Zerg leaders change multiple times in the expansion campaign.
On August 02 2010 06:52 Adjudicator wrote:
All I can say is
Starcraft 1: Rated M for Mature
Starcraft 2: Rated T for Teen.
Have fun making money, Blizzard.
From wikipedia
Rating(s)
ELSPA: 15+
ESRB: T (originally M)
OFLC: (AUS) M
OFLC: (NZ) R16+
PEGI: 16+
Rating is basically the same. I think devs simply gave up about challenging original SC (before BW)story. Even old unit costs (except for Vulture only?) are changed to make new units more appealing :/
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I didn't mind the fact that it was corny that much but for me the problem was that the story pretty much didn't advance at all. We already knew about the hybrids. We already knew about pretty much everything in the campaign in fact. The only real advancement is the last mission and the Zeratul stuff...
+ Show Spoiler +Other things I hate :
-No Duran (I like some of the theories here though)
-Following the Dominion. The game ends with Raynor surrounded by the Dominion pretty much. I mean, seriously, what's stopping them from just killing him there and ending the rebellion.
-Tychus. Everything about him, from his character to his story. It wasn't just corny, it was bad.
The one thing I have hope for:
Mengsk knowing that he has to kill Kerrigan and having facilities making Hybrids. Good chance that he works for Duran or whoever Duran works for.
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EPT
