I did Blizzard's job for them

On May 10 2010 08:15 Lightwip wrote:
Cool.
Can you make LAN in the map editor now?

On May 10 2010 08:16 Marradron wrote:
You could chat before in a game too .... still looks nice. Not too usefull but still nice to show how lazy blizzard was.

On May 10 2010 08:23 Energizer wrote:


Not just the beta, but the official game release. Its been stated by DB that they wont have it day 1.. but "in a future patch/expansion"

On May 10 2010 08:27 suejak wrote:
Who cares?

On May 10 2010 08:32 Roffles wrote:

People who want to chat with more than one person without being partied do.

On May 10 2010 08:25 One.two wrote:
But this is just using the editor's dialog boxes and the 16 players allowed in a custom game. Doing an entire system involving 100,000 players is probably a little bit harder.

On May 10 2010 08:45 Energizer wrote:


Because its like giving the middle finger to blizzard when they say it can't be done for release.

On May 10 2010 08:48 QueueQueue wrote:
Clever

It does suck without chat atm, however I personally didn't find the chat to be largely useful in the other blizzard games.

It would be good for clan support purposes though.

On May 10 2010 08:14 CynanMachae wrote:
Lol haha

Map editor can do that?

On May 10 2010 08:49 Puciek wrote:
You didn't find it usefull in sc:bw ? Because that's a blizzard game too

On May 10 2010 08:56 QueueQueue wrote:



No, because unless you were using private channels for something like a clan, the channels were useless. Public channels effectively lowered the IQ of anyone that sat in them to chat by 20 points. There was rarely any valid/intelligent discussion; it was mostly immature kids typing in all caps. I couldn't even consider wasting time talking to these people. Also, the bots were horrible. Not all that useful.

Channels do have their place, and I do agree that they should be implemented at some point; but mostly for the private channel functionality for clans and such.

On May 10 2010 08:46 SichuanPanda wrote:
Blizzard isn't releasing chat because of the spam that overtook D2 and WC3 chat channels, but the fact of the matter is the people who used the channels for legitimate purposes were and still are willing to put up with the spam because if its really that big a deal they can make a private/modded channel and kick as necessary. We all understand where Blizzard is coming from, but they are really just being stubborn.

On May 10 2010 09:17 leveller wrote:
Im kind of confused by this, why did you make a map with a chat? I hate that they wont have chat at release but this... doesnt make sense.

On May 10 2010 08:57 Zeke50100 wrote:
NICE.

Although can you tell me what the dimensions are for the screen? That is, if I were going to make a dialog that was the entire screen, what would the dimensions be?

Now just wait for EVERY map to implement this in as a cooler version of the game chat ^_^

On May 10 2010 09:23 SichuanPanda wrote:


Just use %'s instead of set numbers. 100% x 100% will do the entire screen, and make sure that if someone is on widescreen it is still full screen. Dimensions would be based on screen resolution so unless you want to code for every reso, you'll save a lot of time with %s.

Note: You'll have to use galaxy code for this native editor functionality won't support it.

On May 10 2010 09:12 ungood wrote:


IRC and just about every chat room ever has been dealing with spam. It's a) not an impossible problem to solve and b) not worth scrapping a feature for.

Personally, I think private channels are all that is needed. Let people register channels and moderate them themselves and the spam problem largely goes away.

On May 10 2010 09:32 WAAA wrote:


Isnt that easy, private (clan) channels moderated by people in wc3 were still very vulnerable. Spammers useing bots to make hundreds of accounts/IP's can ruin a channel.

On May 10 2010 09:32 WAAA wrote:


Isnt that easy, private (clan) channels moderated by people in wc3 were still very vulnerable. Spammers useing bots to make hundreds of accounts/IP's can ruin a channel.

On May 10 2010 09:48 KawaiiRice wrote:
Where does this file go o_O;;

Nice work yo

On May 10 2010 09:31 moopie wrote:
Even in retrospect, I'd rather have chatrooms on release, than time wasted on facebook integration.

On May 10 2010 09:51 TheYango wrote:

Except the programmers who work on Facebook integration would have nothing to do with chat rooms either way. Two completely different types of projects.

On May 10 2010 08:20 Energizer wrote:


Totally see it coming xD

But dood, sweet job!

On May 10 2010 10:11 poingy wrote:
why the heck is it even such a big deal that there's not chat rooms implemented? it's not like you can't talk to multiple people at the same time anyways?

mouse over the right side of one of your 1:1 conversation and click the tab and it pops out a list of people in the conversation... and hit the giant button on top of the list that says "INVITE TO CHAT".


I don't even understand how it's a big deal that channels don't exist in beta when their messenger takes care of almost everything you need already anyways.

On May 10 2010 10:35 Nytefish wrote:


Did you ever play on bnet? Channels were so useful for so many things:

1. Meeting random friends of friends or strangers.
2. Gathering place for teams/clans.
3. Place to go when looking for casual 1v1s (like op ToT on europe).
4. Organsing tournaments/events/clan wars/showmatches/competitions/etc.
5. Somewhere to simply idle or chat like an IRC channel.
6. Simply being able to see people rather than stare at some bland menu.

It's just a really important social aspect of the game so chat channels or something similar is simply a requirement for anyone who's not a robot.

On May 10 2010 08:26 Catch]22 wrote:


Even in retrospect, I'd rather have the beta out earlier, than time wasted on chat.

On May 10 2010 10:39 suejak wrote:

7. YELLING LIKE A TOURETTE'S SUFFERER ABOUT THE bURNING, THE BURNNNNING
8. Virtual sex
9. Undirected trash talk
10. TL-like bitching about everything

On May 10 2010 10:45 pat965 wrote:


Honestly can't tell if you're for chat rooms or not, since those reasons aren't really good or bad.

On May 10 2010 08:15 Lightwip wrote:
Cool.
Can you make LAN in the map editor now?

On May 10 2010 10:35 Nytefish wrote:


Did you ever play on bnet? Channels were so useful for so many things:

1. Meeting random friends of friends or strangers.
2. Gathering place for teams/clans.
3. Place to go when looking for casual 1v1s (like op ToT on europe).
4. Organsing tournaments/events/clan wars/showmatches/competitions/etc.
5. Somewhere to simply idle or chat like an IRC channel.
6. Simply being able to see people rather than stare at some bland menu.

It's just a really important social aspect of the game so chat channels or something similar is simply a requirement for anyone who's not a robot.

Dustin Browder: Well, we're working on the chat channels but the reason they are delayed is that we have something, which we think is much better than what we had in the original games. In the original games the chat channels were used by some of our users but they were largely misused just for spam. It was kind of a mess that they weren't focused on only one particular topic. While we definitely feel the fans sort of enthusiasm to get them back, we don't want those chat channels back. We feel like those chat channels were not a huge success for us and we can do them much better. So we will be looking into chat channels down the road that are more focused on specific topics, that are better organized around different social structures. We could certainly just jam the old channels back in but we didn't feel like those were a huge success for us. But we really want this thing back, just much more interesting than before. So we're definitely working on it and we definitely hear the users' complains, but we think we can do better down the road.

On May 10 2010 11:13 SuperXlax wrote:
So where does DB actually say chat channels won't be at release? Because in this interview he says they're making something better then the broodwar chat channels for B.net 2.0.


Source: http://starcraft2.ingame.de/sc2cl/?m=article&s=1034&id=102427&p=2

On May 10 2010 11:13 SuperXlax wrote:
So where does DB actually say chat channels won't be at release? Because in this interview he says they're making something better then the broodwar chat channels for B.net 2.0.


Source: http://starcraft2.ingame.de/sc2cl/?m=article&s=1034&id=102427&p=2

On May 10 2010 10:53 etch wrote:
Blizzard: We've explored what you've asked of us and it seems as though there's a little hiccup. Actually, um...

TL: A hiccup?

Blizzard: Yes, see to implement chat rooms... sir, the technology doesn't actually exist. So it...

TL: Wait, wait, the technology? [gestures towards Brood War] here is the technology! I've asked you to simply make it work for Bnet 2.0.

Blizzard: Yes, sir, and that's what we're trying to do, but... honestly, it's impossible-

TL: UNGOOD WAS ABLE TO BUILD THIS IN A CAVE! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!

On May 10 2010 08:15 Lightwip wrote:
Cool.
Can you make LAN in the map editor now?

On May 10 2010 11:54 Kerotan89 wrote:
And theres going to be that tiny guy who squeaks, "Hey, wasnt those features already in SC:BW/WC3/Diablo and Call of Duty, Counterstike?"

On May 10 2010 11:57 omnigol wrote:
I have no idea why blizzard is lying about chat channels I simply want to know why. Do they have some dumb theory about decreasing harassment, or increasing the amount of advertisements, or maybe facebook is paying them money to interface through the game?

On May 10 2010 11:13 SuperXlax wrote:
So where does DB actually say chat channels won't be at release? Because in this interview he says they're making something better then the broodwar chat channels for B.net 2.0.


Source: http://starcraft2.ingame.de/sc2cl/?m=article&s=1034&id=102427&p=2

On May 10 2010 12:02 nihlon wrote:


What are they lying about?

On May 10 2010 12:04 InRaged wrote:

He says it in the very next answer how could you miss that o_O

On May 10 2010 08:45 Energizer wrote:


Because its like giving the middle finger to blizzard when they say it can't be done for release.

On May 10 2010 10:53 etch wrote:
Blizzard: We've explored what you've asked of us and it seems as though there's a little hiccup. Actually, um...

TL: A hiccup?

Blizzard: Yes, see to implement chat rooms... sir, the technology doesn't actually exist. So it...

TL: Wait, wait, the technology? [gestures towards Brood War] here is the technology! I've asked you to simply make it work for Bnet 2.0.

Blizzard: Yes, sir, and that's what we're trying to do, but... honestly, it's impossible-

TL: UNGOOD WAS ABLE TO BUILD THIS IN A CAVE! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!

On May 10 2010 12:25 NicolBolas wrote:


*sigh*

What was done here is not what Blizzard wants to do with chat. What was done in Battle.Net 1.0 is not what Blizzard wants to do with chat.

For you, this primitive IRC crap would be sufficient. Blizzard isn't interested in sufficient; that's why they're Blizzard.

The Blizzard version of "chat" will not look like this. And they're not going to implement a half-assed version now, just so that they can rip it out in 6 months to replace it with something better.

On May 10 2010 12:25 NicolBolas wrote:
*sigh*

What was done here is not what Blizzard wants to do with chat. What was done in Battle.Net 1.0 is not what Blizzard wants to do with chat.

For you, this primitive IRC crap would be sufficient. Blizzard isn't interested in sufficient; that's why they're Blizzard.

The Blizzard version of "chat" will not look like this. And they're not going to implement a half-assed version now, just so that they can rip it out in 6 months to replace it with something better.

On May 10 2010 12:25 NicolBolas wrote:


*sigh*

What was done here is not what Blizzard wants to do with chat. What was done in Battle.Net 1.0 is not what Blizzard wants to do with chat.

For you, this primitive IRC crap would be sufficient. Blizzard isn't interested in sufficient; that's why they're Blizzard.

The Blizzard version of "chat" will not look like this. And they're not going to implement a half-assed version now, just so that they can rip it out in 6 months to replace it with something better.

On May 10 2010 13:15 InRaged wrote:

They released a half-assed version of the editor and even used it all these years to make the game so how can you be so sure?
And please, share with us your thoughts on what this outstanding chat is gonna be, cause from all this talking it looks like you and blizzard or up to some kind of revolution in IRC field, no less!

On May 10 2010 13:24 suejak wrote:

How is the editor half-assed?

Why are you getting so angry about this?

On May 10 2010 10:53 etch wrote:
Blizzard: We've explored what you've asked of us and it seems as though there's a little hiccup. Actually, um...

TL: A hiccup?

Blizzard: Yes, see to implement chat rooms... sir, the technology doesn't actually exist. So it...

TL: Wait, wait, the technology? [gestures towards Brood War] here is the technology! I've asked you to simply make it work for Bnet 2.0.

Blizzard: Yes, sir, and that's what we're trying to do, but... honestly, it's impossible-

TL: UNGOOD WAS ABLE TO BUILD THIS IN A CAVE! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!

On May 10 2010 08:15 Lightwip wrote:
Cool.
Can you make LAN in the map editor now?

On May 10 2010 13:15 InRaged wrote:

They released a half-assed version of the editor and even used it all these years to make the game so how can you be so sure?

On May 10 2010 13:15 InRaged wrote:
And please, share with us your thoughts on what this outstanding chat is gonna be, cause from all this talking it looks like you and blizzard or up to some kind of revolution in IRC field, no less!

On May 10 2010 13:37 Archerofaiur wrote:
Can someone explain how

no chat > Temporary chat that is later improved in patch

On May 10 2010 14:09 NicolBolas wrote:


Simple: programmer time, especially towards the end of a product's development, is very important. The term "Beta" usually refers to a feature freeze; it is supposed to be the point in development when you stop adding features so that your programmers can spend time fixing bugs to ship the game.

On May 10 2010 14:09 NicolBolas wrote:
Chat is a feature. Implementing, debugging, and shipping chat would require programmer time that probably doesn't exist at Blizzard right now. Thus, implementing it would have to come from somewhere else. So where is it going to come from?

On May 10 2010 14:17 Archerofaiur wrote:



The only thing simple, Nicol, is the mindset that decided this game could ship without even a bare essentials chat feature. That should have been in Battlenet 2.0 from day 1 and you know it.
The kind of connection experience that a passionate unpaid fan can put together using a map editor. The kind of interactive social enviroment 1998 Starcraft1 developers managed to make on a much shorter deadline.

On May 10 2010 11:57 omnigol wrote:
I have no idea why blizzard is lying about chat channels I simply want to know why. Do they have some dumb theory about decreasing harassment, or increasing the amount of advertisements, or maybe facebook is paying them money to interface through the game?

On May 10 2010 14:57 Munashiimaru wrote:


If they release chat that doesn't require facebook integration noone will use their gimp facebook chat and then they won't get their kickbacks from facebook. That's my guess anyway.

On May 10 2010 14:09 NicolBolas wrote:
Half-assed? Didn't someone just make a chat room out of an RTS's map editor in a couple of hours?

I'm pretty sure Blizzard used 3 entire asses in this editor

As Han Solo once said, "She may not look like much, but she's got it where it counts."

I don't know. I don't even know that it will be "outstanding" by any particular standard. However, they have said on several occasions that they don't want to do B.Net 1.0 style chat.

Simple: programmer time, especially towards the end of a product's development, is very important. The term "Beta" usually refers to a feature freeze; it is supposed to be the point in development when you stop adding features so that your programmers can spend time fixing bugs to ship the game.

Chat is a feature. Implementing, debugging, and shipping chat would require programmer time that probably doesn't exist at Blizzard right now. Thus, implementing it would have to come from somewhere else. So where is it going to come from?

Do you speak for all of Blizzard's customers? Do you know that they want chat more than Facebook integration?

Personally, I don't care for either. I find "chat" to be the lowest form of human-to-human communication, and I have nothing but scorn for Facebook and that sort of crap. However, Facebook is quite popular, particularly with younger players. I imagine that Facebook integration is more important to them than chat.

On May 10 2010 08:22 Nytefish wrote:


It's not that they're too lazy to do it, it's just for some peverse reason they think the negatives of chat rooms are so severe it's not even worth implementing it in the beta.

On May 10 2010 15:43 TheAntZ wrote:
Eventually, once people figure out how to use it adeptly, the map editor will be used to create a physical incarnation of God

On May 10 2010 09:39 Dox wrote:
Sure is a lot of people in this thread who got very excited at the idea of joining a custom game just to sit around and chat... You can already do that.

Chat channels will come eventually, in the meantime, enjoy the game. I'd much rather they spend their time balancing and releasing the game instead of focusing on something we can do via iRC/Party Chat/1:1 Conversation/Custom Games/MSN/Forums/a million other ways.

Obviously implementing chat channels requires more than just taking some old technology and copy/pasting it into a new product; they need artists to redesign the battle.net interface to accommodate for the new icons, frames, some internal testing, blah blah blah.

Half-assed? Didn't someone just make a chat room out of an RTS's map editor in a couple of hours?

I'm pretty sure Blizzard used 3 entire asses in this editor

On May 10 2010 21:09 Daxten wrote:
And of course Blizzard wants to maximize their money, that's ALWAYS the goal for a firm.

On May 11 2010 00:37 devolore wrote:
There is a chatroom-like feature in the works. We don't have the specifics yet, other than that it is not RealID and it is not Facebook.

On May 11 2010 05:29 Kralic wrote:
The only fact I know is customers interperet everything that they don't get in their own way. Customers hear what they want to hear. Chat will be around, frankly I could care less about Open chat channels. It might be nice when they implement them but I am not going to go on a crazy rampage stating that without them this game won't be a game.

On May 11 2010 05:41 omnigol wrote:


Your "fact" is fucking joke, and incredibly stupid. Sorry you work at target and deal with people who drank too much tap water, but Blizzard doesn't have any excuse for cutting a basic obvious feature, that is so practical it has been in almost every online game ever made.

On May 11 2010 05:53 mynameisbean wrote:
lol okay okay, wait up.

How is this any different to pre-game chatrooms?

On May 11 2010 07:54 Zeke50100 wrote:


That's completely besides the point. What we're talking about is the lack of CHAT CHANNELS. This right here is a mock-up chat channel in the form of a map to be used as a (satirical) demonstration.

On May 11 2010 08:32 Paperscraps wrote:


Basically this entire thread is spitting in blizzard's face and calling them incompetent. I don't know when it happened, but people forgot this is beta. We are not playing the game to socialize, we are playing the game to balance it. I don't understand the constant ignorant bicker over a feature which will obviously come in the future. Less talk more balance imo.

On May 11 2010 08:35 Zeke50100 wrote:


Except their reasonings for not including this relatively simple feature are pretty weak.

Dustin Browder: Well, we're working on the chat channels but the reason they are delayed is that we have something, which we think is much better than what we had in the original games. In the original games the chat channels were used by some of our users but they were largely misused just for spam. It was kind of a mess that they weren't focused on only one particular topic. While we definitely feel the fans sort of enthusiasm to get them back, we don't want those chat channels back. We feel like those chat channels were not a huge success for us and we can do them much better. So we will be looking into chat channels down the road that are more focused on specific topics, that are better organized around different social structures. We could certainly just jam the old channels back in but we didn't feel like those were a huge success for us. But we really want this thing back, just much more interesting than before. So we're definitely working on it and we definitely hear the users' complains, but we think we can do better down the road.