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Hey everyone. As you may have noticed, English is not my native language. If any part of this text is unclear or gibberish, please let me know. This may be a good solution if we want a long campaing in HotS. And brace yourselves, wall of text incoming...
Context: skip if you already know it
+ Show Spoiler +Okey dokey. May seem awkward. But here are my thoughts.
Blizzard´s announcement of making just around 20 missions for HotS single player saddened us a bit As many of us summarized so finely, "we want moar". On Blizzard´s side, however, we have that they don´t want the campaign to be that long, because people aren´t finishing it.
Right, maybe they are focusing the wrong problem. Many people are just not interested in single player; plus, the campaign lacks rhythm sometimes, so people jump out of the boat. But Blizz believes that a shorter campaign would be more "finish-able", and it does make sense. A game is a little like a movie or a play; long equals boring, unless the script, the acting or the pace is awesome. So, we like it or not, the campaign is going to lose weight, that´s the path their taking (I´m also sure they read the feedback about the story, lines and characters, and may or may not be trying to fix this).
But here´s the deal: we want moar missions, more immersion into the storyline (we´ve been waiting 12 years for it!); they want people to actually play the whole damn thing they spent years working on.
I therefore respectfully propose a solution that may please both sides.
TL;DR: : We want moar, they want less, let´s figure out how can everyone be happy; here´s my ideas.
The idea: Make extra missions that are REALLY optional
Some people say that WoL´s story was something like only 10 missions long; the other 17 or so were filler. They were sometimes cool, sometimes not, but none of them would change the ending of the game. Blizzard wanted you to feel like you had the option to not play them, yet, you had to play them in order to have all the units and credits, in other words, all the gameplay content. Plus, how would you know if, by skipping them, maybe you would lose some important piece of the story going on?
WoL´s "side missions" weren´t side missions at all.
How about make side missions that REALLY are side missions? Something you would play just for fun and flavor. Missions that make clear they are free to play or not; they dont add content to the plot, dont give you power ups that you WILL need in the final missions. They´d be unnecessary - optional.
In a Blizzcon panel, a single player designer said there will be a "Destruction of Worlds" feature in HotS: Kerrigan owns an intergalactic army, she doesn’t have time to lead every single invasion. So, sometimes in the campaign Izsha will pop out and say "Hey, there´s this brood, they´re kinda bored, you want them to invade Planet Y or Planet X?" Planet Y gives you, say, extra minerals when your drones are mining, Planet X, hm, grants another thing  . You choose which planet they will invade. They do it. Profit! You won’t see it happen.
But what about if you could see this happen? You don´t need to. You´ll have the (macro/ability/whatever) reward whether you play the mission or not. But if you choose to it will be like this: everything must make clear the mission won´t affect plot or latter gameplay. You open the mission, its a simple mini-game that´s easy to understand. Not an intricate mission. Probably a Brood Mother leading things, Kerrigan is not involved. Zerglings running, things dying. End of mission. Maybe challenge-like, something fun you play many times and get better at it.
The reward? Achievements, infested jukeboxes, giant skulls or other souvenirs to fill the Leviathan with, portraits for multiplayer, pets for Wow or something for Diablo III... cool stuff, or even just achievements. So casual players don´t feel bad if they just skip them out.
Everyone wins! Because:
1) People who are not that interested in Starcraft lore won’t have to play those mini-gamish missions to know how the story ends;
2) We, lore whores, can flavor our beloved universe for a little longer;
3) There will be more than 20 missions, but only 20 will actually mean something to the storyline; in other words, the plot won’t seem as down watered as it seemed at WoL.
This is the idea peoples! If you like it spread the word!
Thx everyone
PS: I do have another idea… but the other idea is a little nuts.
EDIT: If you like it please upvote in reddit.
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Seems like a good idea.
The "side missions" in WoL also didn't add much to the plot (other than to cast the Dominion as completely evil and Raynor as completely good), even though the player expected them too.
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On November 01 2011 10:24 jorge_the_awesome wrote:
Seems like a good idea.
The "side missions" in WoL also didn't add much to the plot (other than to cast the Dominion as completely evil and Raynor as completely good), even though the player expected them too.
Yeah. There were too many missions for too little stuff happening. That´s why shortening the plot to 20 missions is not a that bad idea. I would welcome a more paced/intense plot if they don´t take away from us our precious zerg experience hours!
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I pretty much agree. I had heard before that the campaign might turn out to be only 20 missions long, but I didn't know for sure. I like the idea of side-missions and perhaps that's your best shot at convincing Blizzard to give us a more reasonable amount of missions (but I'm not being too realistic here.)
If their only excuse for making this expansion so short is that people don't play through the whole thing, they should be concerned about the quality of the game. I mean, IMO, WOL's SP was decent but it was pretty shallow and boring next to BW. I ran through it on brutal in one day and then tossed it aside. Never had much to say about it.
Also keep in mind that they sold us WoL for $60, a reasonable amount given the quality of the game, its engine works well, the design is great, it comes with 30 missions, a map editor - overall a very nice platform. Assuming that the expansion sells for $50 (just a guess), it's hard for me to imagine that that's what it's worth -- I mean, it already has its core engine, less missions, less units, less everything. Overall it didn't cost nearly as much to produce - why should it be worth more than $30?
I have to say, I'm very disappointed. Provided the missions are as short as WOL's (average of 15 minutes or something?), then the game could be over in 5-6 hours. I guess they're capitalizing on the fact that people "have to" buy this game regardless because without it you're bascally SOL.
I don't know if LotV is going to be the last release of the Starcraft franchise, giving us a "case closed" kind of deal - or if they'll leave the door open for something like Starcraft 3 (I'm thinking too far ahead maybe, sorry)... but I think it would be pretty sad if they cut corners and gave us an unsatisfactory, incomplete set of missions and we ended up with an unfinished game.
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The door will definitely be open for SC3.
Also, I thought the "Destruction of Worlds" Would involve a mission. Just not one really a part of the story line. (ie not involving Kerrigan as a unit).
I do like the idea of true 'side missions'.. ie pure achievement/'cool stuff' ie no "gameplay" boosts or Main storyline effects.
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I love this idea... not more plot, not much more effort for Blizzard, but it'd give the people who want it more single player content. So where do I sign?
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The big problem with WOL campaign is that the story was completly bland with good guy Raynor against evil Dominion... and from what i've seen it's going to be the same thing in HOTS ( what have they done to Kerrigan  )
Anyway I think this only an excuse from blizzard to make a shorter campaign, it's obvious that they are late on their schedule for the expansion and more mission means more delays.
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Seems like I good idea in theory. I guess it would be something to think about as Blizzard.
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Hmmm... This is actually a really good idea. Maybe post on the Battle.net forums? Although somehow I don't think Blizzard will take much notice
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On November 01 2011 21:01 NoodleFish wrote:
Hmmm... This is actually a really good idea. Maybe post on the Battle.net forums? Although somehow I don't think Blizzard will take much notice
I really want to. But I can't because my 6-month license is gone and I´m using Starter Edition right now (temporary money issues). I´ll ask a friend to post it for me. Meanwhile, please keep this thread going and upvote the post in reddit (http://redd.it/lvwd4), because Blizzard actually has an eye on TL and reddit.
On the Destruction of Worlds mechanic (outrageous cool idea btw), here is a quote from Starcraft Wiki:
During the campaign, players can use the Destruction of Worlds mechanic to add a planet's resources to the Swarm's own resources. This evolves the swarm, not individual units. Old brood mothers will contact Kerrigan, wanting to rejoin the Swarm. Izsha will identify worlds to destroy, each of which gives a benefit. For instance, one might enable drones to harvest more minerals, or give overlords more control.
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Russian Federation1613 Posts
Do you really think that there are so few missions because Blizzard don't want to make campaign long?
But i definitely agree with increasing of mission count.
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I agree with your idea.
Maybe they could give us more non-campaing content too, like the challenges from WoL which were fun and cool.
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To be honest I never played any RTS for the storyline when playing single player. I just played it on hardest just to beat it. The stories are usually forgettable. In fact all I remember from the story is that everyone is after raynor, there is corruption and propaganda, tychus is controlled in a shitty manner, and then raynor shoots him in the face and kerrigan is human again.
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Wouldn't playing against the computer without any sort of story or reward be just like playing a VS AI match? That is a bunch of unnecessary padding that would in fact make most people not finish the campaign.
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No, you got it wrong Koreish. There would be story, actually, that´s the point. More zerg lore being explored. More exposition for zerg characters. But nothing that affects the final outcome. So the story doesnt get down-watered as it did in WoL.
About the rewards: in WoL, you HAD to play all the "side" missions or you would not have the units. They werent "side" missions at all. I think real side missions, that give you no units, mutagens or whatever, just story immersion, would be really fun for those who enjoy singleplaying and the lore, but wouldnt make the game any longer for those who would wish a shorter game (and who wants a shorter game? Well, Blizzard does...).
But no gameplay rewards (units, abilities) doesnt mean no rewards at all. There could be rewards like achievements, souvenirs... anything that wouldnt be necessary at the final mission.
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I'd be down for something like this but maybe not exactly what you are thinking. I just want more crazy SP/Co-op Challenges that won't be filler for the story. Maybe they could make some crazy hard post-ending missions?
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On November 01 2011 09:57 nerak wrote:
Everyone wins! Because...
Everyone except Blizzard, who has to spend more money to get people to make missions. And they don't want to do that...
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I don't know. I sort of feel that if someone doesn't want to take the time to complete the single player they won't do it in 20 missions or 40 missions. If someone doesn't want to do it you can't make them. I think that Blizzard should just make more amazing content.
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Cool idea, in an ideal world I'd like to see this. But the commercial reality is that these extra missions:
1. Probably won't create a significant number of extra sales;
2. Will cost Blizzard more money to make;
3. Will delay the release date (which is bad for us as well as Blizzard).
Everyone wins!
Because of the above, nope.
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United States7483 Posts
I'm okay with fewer missions if the missions are harder and longer/more intense.
WoL campaign didn't have any missions I would consider to be even remotely challenging, even on brutal.
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