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[Story Spoilers!] Origins of Zerg

Forum Index > StarCraft 2 HotS
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decemberscalm
Profile Blog Joined July 2009
United States1353 Posts
March 14 2013 04:11 GMT
#1
I have to say I absolutely enjoyed the Heart of the Swarm campaign. The entire time, I constantly thought: well this is cool. It did bring up some questions which I will ask in the spoilers.



Warning: Lots of campaign spoilers are discussed.


PLEASE DON'T CLICK IF YOU HATE SPOILERS AND HAVE NOT COMPLETED THE CAMPAIGN.
+ Show Spoiler +
Last warning



+ Show Spoiler +
Did the origins of Zerg get retconned? I ask this after playing through the primal zerg missions.

1. Primal Zerg strains contain strains assimilated from the swarm not on Zerus.
My primary example will be the Zergling, who according to lore came from the Dune Runners of Zz'Gash. The swarm assimilated this creature close to the Koprulu sector, so it seems highly unlikely primal zerg would contain such a strand.
Abathur seemed to think the primal zerg stole designs from the swarm. This could be a possible answer. With broods going feral and leaders going separate ways a section of the swarm could have landed on Zerus, feeding the strain to the Primal.
A counter argument against this is that lifeforms constantly change on Zerus. Strains don't make sense in terms of Primal Zerg as presented by HotS. It would only make sense if Primal Zerg reflected SC1's description of pre-overmind Zerg.

2. The original description of Zerus is an ashy, volatile, and volcanic world. We find Zerus as a lush, jungle planet. The first Zerg were parasitic organisms that infested and took over creatures. Pre-overmind they sought only to assimilate host creatures that would advance their evolution. The behavior of primal Zerg in hots reflects a more queen of blades approach: adsorbing all biomass. Primal Zerg apparently just eat creatures and grow stronger. I completely "wut" when I was playing through dinosaur Zerg world.



All this being said, I don't actually care if anything was retconned, in fact I expected it. This is Blizz after all, but I bring this discussion because I am a big lore nerd. It was certainly a fun campaign though

What do you guys think? Am I missing something here?
naastyOne
Profile Joined April 2012
491 Posts
Last Edited: 2013-03-14 04:34:29
March 14 2013 04:32 GMT
#2
Well, Overmind doesn`t nececerely tells truth, you know. So, if the descriptions are based on th Overmind, it does mean they could be altered, i mean, the entire controll thrugh the microorganims could be a feature introduced by bad xel-naga.

The fact that Primals know about the fallen one, and changes to the swarm, indicates that there was some, not nececerely frindly iteraction between the swarm and primals.
Mindcrime
Profile Joined July 2004
United States6899 Posts
March 14 2013 04:40 GMT
#3
You're not missing anything. It was retconned.
That wasn't any act of God. That was an act of pure human fuckery.
NB
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
Netherlands12045 Posts
March 14 2013 04:42 GMT
#4
the most bullshit thing i found is kerrigan could fly...... like REALLY? SHE COULD FUCKING FLY! It would make everything so fucking easier
Im daed. Follow me @TL_NB
decemberscalm
Profile Blog Joined July 2009
United States1353 Posts
March 14 2013 04:45 GMT
#5
On March 14 2013 13:42 NB wrote:
the most bullshit thing i found is kerrigan could fly...... like REALLY? SHE COULD FUCKING FLY! It would make everything so fucking easier

I laughed so hard at the moment. Thought, am I on something man, because this is getting silly.

Leviathan has tractor beams man.
Freeborn
Profile Joined July 2010
Germany421 Posts
March 14 2013 04:59 GMT
#6
1.Actually if you talk to Abathur on Zerus he will mention how pissed he is that the primal zerg already adapted the swarms hydralisk design and how quickly they did it.
So that explains all the primal variants of swarm units.

2.The next point is that young planets are usually volcanic and ashen but they can develop quickly into lush worlds when the atmosphere cools down, as happened to Earth as well. Though that would probably take a long time.

That is also it a bit countered by the fact that the ancient primal zerg was supposed to have lived when Amon took the zerg.

And the thing about zergs being parasitic - I am not sure how that fits in with the whole evolution idea. Does the parasite change host DNA? or does it switch hosts and change it's own dna?

Eating something seems like a valid way to obtain DNA. Although in general I got the feel that most of that stuff was not very well thought out. I also found the various primal zerg talking in their different animal growls a bit silly.

The primal zerg should have been unable to talk with only the ancient one being different due to his advanced state of evolution.
Story wise and also in terms of presentation and believability Zerus was the weakest part of the campaign.
The missions themselves were a lot of fun though.
6BiT
Profile Joined December 2011
513 Posts
March 14 2013 05:06 GMT
#7
I completely "wut"


This

Originally we were told Zerus was an ash world, but come HotS its a giant jurassic park lol
stuff & things
grindl
Profile Joined December 2010
United States6 Posts
March 14 2013 06:01 GMT
#8
Retconned is putting it mildly. It's like they took the entire Zerg backstory, said "huh, these names are cool", and trashed the rest.
Skarjak
Profile Joined November 2010
Canada17 Posts
March 14 2013 06:34 GMT
#9
Agree, they completely retconned the entire Zerg race. Pretty indicative of the ability of Blizzard's story team...

Basically, take your SC1 manual and put in the shredder, it doesn't mean anything anymore. Certainly the entire Zerg section has been rewritten. If at least they had been rewritten into something interesting, but instead we end up with the Zerg being "noble savages" who were corrupted by "an ancient evil". Hard to get more generic than that.

Basically the Zerg are orcs.
decemberscalm
Profile Blog Joined July 2009
United States1353 Posts
Last Edited: 2013-03-14 06:42:07
March 14 2013 06:41 GMT
#10
On March 14 2013 13:59 Freeborn wrote:
1.Actually if you talk to Abathur on Zerus he will mention how pissed he is that the primal zerg already adapted the swarms hydralisk design and how quickly they did it.
So that explains all the primal variants of swarm units.

2.The next point is that young planets are usually volcanic and ashen but they can develop quickly into lush worlds when the atmosphere cools down, as happened to Earth as well. Though that would probably take a long time.

That is also it a bit countered by the fact that the ancient primal zerg was supposed to have lived when Amon took the zerg.

And the thing about zergs being parasitic - I am not sure how that fits in with the whole evolution idea. Does the parasite change host DNA? or does it switch hosts and change it's own dna?

Eating something seems like a valid way to obtain DNA. Although in general I got the feel that most of that stuff was not very well thought out. I also found the various primal zerg talking in their different animal growls a bit silly.

The primal zerg should have been unable to talk with only the ancient one being different due to his advanced state of evolution.
Story wise and also in terms of presentation and believability Zerus was the weakest part of the campaign.
The missions themselves were a lot of fun though.

1. The primal zerg didn't seem like they actually assimilated strains or anything like that. Each individual would eat essence to evolve itself, or at least that is how it seemed to be presented. This weird representation of just tons of animals eating whatever they can to absorb it's essence contradicts pre-overmind zerg: assimilate only what will move them towards perfection. They did have weird hatcheries that were basically big mobile zerg, and some sort of tribes like organization. If the Primal Zerg are organized enough from Tribes, I don't see why they haven't gone off world. Overlords were present since the overmind took the swarm off Zerus. Too much interfighting and inner strife perhaps.

2. From the manual : "The Zerg left the lifeless, burning world of Zerus and laid waste to every planet they found along their path towards the Protoss Homeworld." It is possible. It would have to be billions of years ago when the Zerg left. The milky way is absolutely massive though, and the Zerg might not have found faster means of transportation yet.
Keep in mind that the aeon of strife ended relatively recently, at 500 BCE. Seems unlikely, but at least tangible.


The manual gives a pretty nice idea how the Zerg evolved
http://ftp.blizzard.com/pub/misc/StarCraft.PDF






On March 14 2013 15:34 Skarjak wrote:
Agree, they completely retconned the entire Zerg race. Pretty indicative of the ability of Blizzard's story team...

Basically, take your SC1 manual and put in the shredder, it doesn't mean anything anymore. Certainly the entire Zerg section has been rewritten. If at least they had been rewritten into something interesting, but instead we end up with the Zerg being "noble savages" who were corrupted by "an ancient evil". Hard to get more generic than that.

Basically the Zerg are orcs.


Oh god, it hurts. It hurts, stop it.
chaosfreak11
Profile Joined April 2011
Singapore367 Posts
March 14 2013 08:27 GMT
#11
On March 14 2013 14:06 6BiT wrote:
Show nested quote +
I completely "wut"


This

Originally we were told Zerus was an ash world, but come HotS its a giant jurassic park lol


It has been a long time since Zerus was an ash world. The climate changed and it became a fertile land.
Fen1kz
Profile Joined July 2010
Russian Federation216 Posts
March 14 2013 08:33 GMT
#12
Dont take it seriously
sc1 had its own scenario
sc2 is just like wc3
Zergs/Orcs had left their crushing world Zerus/Draenor, led by Amon/Archimonde with help from Narud/Mannoroth, with curse of Overmind/Demon Blood, and suddenly one zerg/orc named Sarah/Thrall free them from this possession
labbe
Profile Joined October 2010
Sweden1456 Posts
March 14 2013 12:08 GMT
#13
By now it's easier just listing things in the SC universe that WASN'T retconned in SC2, than listing things that was.
Psychlone
Profile Joined August 2010
Canada90 Posts
March 14 2013 12:51 GMT
#14
In the SC1 manual, it says the primal Zerg were closer to the Larvae: some kind of wormlike/leechlike parasitical creature that latched on another creature to take it over and absorb the DNA.

It's not necessarily completely retconned, if the Primal zerg still come from Larvae. The Jurassic Park theme feels a bit silly though.
Qikz
Profile Blog Joined November 2009
United Kingdom12041 Posts
Last Edited: 2013-03-14 13:02:31
March 14 2013 13:01 GMT
#15
On March 14 2013 17:27 chaosfreak11 wrote:
Show nested quote +
On March 14 2013 14:06 6BiT wrote:
I completely "wut"


This

Originally we were told Zerus was an ash world, but come HotS its a giant jurassic park lol


It has been a long time since Zerus was an ash world. The climate changed and it became a fertile land.


This, if anything I see Xerus as being like Earth in the fact since the Overmind was such an old creature (he knew of Amon so he must have lived a very, very long time) I imagine that he left Xerus after evolving early when the planet was still lifeless and due to not being able to use warp technology until the first Starcraft game, in the time it took them to push towards the Korpulu sector could have been millions of years. There's never been any date given as to when the zergs evolved and there's a large chance that the primordial swamp where you get the swarm hosts is actually where the Overmind initially spawned from.

That ooze could have been on the planet well before the swamp and jungle started to grow. Also with the primal zerg being like larva, don't forget they've been in a constant state of battle for survival for centuries so they've evolved to take their own forms, much like the swarm did (but differently)
FanTaSy's #1 Fan | STPL Caster/Organiser | SKT BEST KT | https://twitch.tv/stpl
monkh
Profile Blog Joined April 2010
United Kingdom568 Posts
March 14 2013 13:09 GMT
#16
What did people think of the final zerus mission fact it was almost a clone of a diablo boss fight?
Daeden.620
Andre
Profile Blog Joined August 2009
Slovenia3523 Posts
March 14 2013 13:37 GMT
#17
Nothing is retconned wtf.

In the mission where you go to the spawning pool the ancient one shows that the original zerg was a larva, you can see it if you watch closely. The primals adapting everything is what also surprises Abathur as they ninja the hydralisk immediately.

Zerus being a jungle is because the climate changed over time(thousands of years i think).
You must gather your party before venturing forth.
Ramiz1989
Profile Joined July 2012
12124 Posts
March 14 2013 13:44 GMT
#18
On March 14 2013 22:09 monkh wrote:
What did people think of the final zerus mission fact it was almost a clone of a diablo boss fight?

Nothing special, it was more like "again?" feeling, it wasn't really copy of Diablo 3 boss, since that Boss isn't invented for the first time in Diablo 3 anyway, it happened a lot in the past, seen bosses like that in WoW mostly, even before the Diablo 3. It is getting generic, but I liked 3 bosses before that(that also were a lot like bosses from WoW or any game from that genre).
"I've been to hell and back, and back to hell…and back. This time, I've brought Hell back with me."
mango_destroyer
Profile Joined August 2010
Canada3914 Posts
Last Edited: 2013-03-14 15:55:20
March 14 2013 15:51 GMT
#19
On March 14 2013 22:09 monkh wrote:
What did people think of the final zerus mission fact it was almost a clone of a diablo boss fight?


I thought it was kinda cool to have them all clones of d3 boss fights

the first leader who shot fire in a straight line = diablo
the second leader where you are stuck in room and he runs around ramming into walls = the butcher
the third leader who pops all those banelings = azmodan
the last one with the tentacles coming down = belial

Sorry for not remembering the names of the leaders :p

ZeromuS
Profile Blog Joined October 2010
Canada13407 Posts
March 14 2013 16:20 GMT
#20
On March 14 2013 13:45 decemberscalm wrote:
Show nested quote +
On March 14 2013 13:42 NB wrote:
the most bullshit thing i found is kerrigan could fly...... like REALLY? SHE COULD FUCKING FLY! It would make everything so fucking easier

I laughed so hard at the moment. Thought, am I on something man, because this is getting silly.

Leviathan has tractor beams man.


To be fair, EVERY zerg on the planet was being shuttled back to the leviathan somehow. And you know what, she is the most powerful zerg so who knows, maybe she can float less so than fly. That or leviathans can pull things with super psionic tractor beams like you said,
StrategyRTS forever | @ZeromuS_plays | www.twitch.tv/Zeromus_
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