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On May 24 2010 02:15 travis wrote:
It's all about money and politics. What do you guys think big ol' companies like activision do. They try to do what nets them the most money.
Blizzard's sc2 development team - sure, they care about us. Activision does not give the tiniest shit about us. And they are clearly in control of bnet 2.0. It's all about money!
Every single thing people complain about is a decision to try to get more money. Why do you think they would do it already knowing the SC1 fanbase is going to hate it.
I honestly don't think Activision is involved in this. When you go by the interviews with Blizzard, it's pretty clear that they themselves are passionate about their new Bnet and are responsible for most of the decisions regarding it. Activision is just a publisher, they have no idea how to make online services, so the ball is indeed in Blizzard's court.
Basically Blizzard has what I call "vision blindness". They have a vision for a new product they are making, and they become so obsessed with making that vision come true that they will sacrifice whatever it takes in order to make it a reality. We've already seen their sacrifices regarding LAN, chat channels, replays, and so on. Hell, we've even seen it with KeSPA and how KeSPA claims that Blizzard pretty much ignores everything they say unless they bow down to Battle.net 2.0's feet and lick its toes. And even though I don't exactly trust KeSPA, I think in this case they are being truthful since Blizzard has been basically demanding that everything use Bnet for anything regarding their games.
Of course, the reason why I call it "vision blindness" is that when the vision has any kind of flaw, they ignore it entirely and only give bullshit responses like "we know better" and ignore any kind of negative feedback. It doesn't matter how much we bitch about chat channels or clans or LAN or RealID or anything. They will force us to eat anything they serve, even if they have to drag us kicking and screaming. I mean just look at Bnet right now. We've brought up countless issues regarding it, and how many of them have been addressed? Not only that, but we haven't even been able to change their response regarding multiple problems. Chat channels have been bitched about every single day since before beta started, and their answer is still "We know better. We aren't doing it." Same goes for almost everything else Bnet is lacking. Making their "social network paradise" vision come true is just that important to them, so much that even SC2 itself is starting to become of the many sacrifices.
It's not about casuals, hardcores, or even Activision. It's all about the vision. Allll about the vision.
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Christ I knew bnet2.0 was shitty but FrozenArbiter's post really hits home on what a gigantic cock up they have made of this whole thing, I mean hell didn't they delay the game like a year to make bnet2.0 the best thing ever? yet they keep talking about adding very basic functionalities till after launch.
Just horrendous.
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Kyrgyz Republic1462 Posts
*sigh*, however stupid all this looks to us here, I can see where they are coming from. If you think about it from the point of view of a casual gamer, the things that they do make a lot of sense. I hope they are just trying to make the game as casual-friendly as they can before launch, and will eventually add those features requested by the hardcore community. After all, this community is very very small in the big picture.
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the sc2 development team made a great game
but do you really think they had any say in the direction of bnet 2.0?
just read the old interview with dustin browder. he sure didn't sound like he was excited about bnet 2.0 to me, he just sounded like a spokesman that had to hype it up. he even made it clear that sc2 would be good but we were going to be disappointed about bnet 2.0
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The problem is that Blizzard SAYS that esports and a competitive community is their goal. This isn't Sakurai ignoring the small hardcore smash bros community and making a casual game like smash bros brawl, this is Blizzard agreeing with us in principle, and then failing to deliver.
I hope it is just having a lot on their plate and eventually things will be great. But there hasn't really been any progress since the beginning of beta...
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On May 24 2010 02:47 travis wrote:
the sc2 development team made a great game
but do you really think they had any say in the direction of bnet 2.0?
just read the old interview with dustin browder. he sure didn't sound like he was excited about bnet 2.0 to me, he just sounded like a spokesman that had to hype it up. he even made it clear that sc2 would be good but we were going to be disappointed about bnet 2.0
That's because Blizzard has separate teams for their games and Bnet. According to Blizzard, they have their own separate Battle.net team that essentially does their own thing while doing some minor cooperation with the game-development teams. Dustin Browder has never been all that knowledgeable about Bnet because he doesn't call the shots on it. Look up names like Greg Canessa and Rob Pardo for those who actually work on it.
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I agree with Travis.
Because I really, really want to believe he is correct.
I really do trust Blizzard, but I really don't trust Activision at all. And frankly, I am getting Starcraft 2 regardless because it is a phenomenal game. The fact that Battle.net 2.0 isn't exactly what we expected just means I'll be spending less time on Battle.net and more time actively playing games and watching VODs.
All in all, it's worth putting up with some minor frustration in Battle.net 2.0 to play Starcraft 2. It's worth it because the awesomeness of SC2 > the stupidness of BN2.
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On May 24 2010 02:54 Seltsam wrote:
I agree with Travis.
Because I really, really want to believe he is correct.
that's basically why i believe it too lol
i blame activision for that xbox live guy being hired in the first place
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On May 24 2010 02:57 travis wrote:Show nested quote +On May 24 2010 02:54 Seltsam wrote:
I agree with Travis.
Because I really, really want to believe he is correct. that's basically why i believe it too lol i blame activision for that xbox live guy being hired in the first place
I think that is a reasonable assumption. Blizzard has had such a long standing history of fantastic service to the gaming community, and the first hint that something might go wrong is the first big undertaking after the activision merger? I doubt that is coincidence. Besides, Blizzard has been so good in the past that I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt.
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Reposting what I posted on Beta forums
"I have trust in you Blizzard. You should understand that if you made it more like warcraft 3 bnet it would be easier and better. Sometimes putting more effort ends up worse than putting less effort but with the right idea. Here briefly let me summarize what bnet needs cause I dont have any more breath to write about it:
What Battle Net needs to have:
• Ability to Use More than 1 In-Game Account not just Identifier. All is attached to email anyway
• Identifier could be a small 3 letter tag, no need a 2nd name. What game uses such 2 name system?
->Or why need identifier? You cant type instead of O -> 0 instead of A-> 4 or put a dot/dash at the end of your name? That's how war3 worked
Look at war3 - does ppl making accounts WePepsiInfi, Insomnia. Sky etc etc confuse them with real pro players??
• So after created In-Game Account we enter a default Chat Channel belonging to our country
like Frozen Throne DEU-1 Frozen Throne FRA-1
From there we can enter any chat channel we type.
• In Chat Channels people can chat in the channel, use chat commands like whisper to each other, see other account names in that channel.
• Doubleclick would open the profile of the clicked account.
• In Chat channel you can right click some other's account and add to friend list by account or invite for Arranged team ladder
• So You provided Map Protection. Thus make it so that a person who downloaded someone else's map to be able to host it.. Like Dota could be hosted by anyone right/
• Remove Divisions, add Global Ladder. Like war3 was - it is working pretty nicely by matching system. It may not be Levels if you dont want to but something else. Many people point out - what's the point in someone saying he's ranked 4th in Bronze?
• Remove Achievements What is an achievement? Winning 5 games as Zerg? Winning 10 games as Protoss? No Blizzard, achievements should be given to Tournament Winners including ladder tournaments.
• Create Clan/Team
Create a team under the same rules you created in war3 with a Team Tag and Full Name (only 10 people can create a team, may get disbanded if inactive etc)
• Icons - should be gained much harder, less icons.
The above are 100% what I base on my 2 year exp in SC1 and 7 Years in Warcraft III Battle Net and seemingly others share the same."
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A lot of things seem to make more sense once you realize the person responsible for Battle.net 2.0 used to work for Microsoft. He's trying to put a console gaming platform on computers. Us computer gamers are totally different from console gamers, in that we need chat, we need LAN, we need things that so we can communicate with hundreds, if not thousands of players at a time and not just our buddies playing.
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On May 24 2010 02:47 travis wrote:
the sc2 development team made a great game
but do you really think they had any say in the direction of bnet 2.0?
just read the old interview with dustin browder. he sure didn't sound like he was excited about bnet 2.0 to me, he just sounded like a spokesman that had to hype it up. he even made it clear that sc2 would be good but we were going to be disappointed about bnet 2.0
This is pretty spot on. Blizzard has a completely different team on battle.net and as far as I know, I think Dustin Browder even said himself that they hardly even talk to the bnet 2 development team. This is really bad if there is no communication going on between the two.
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On May 24 2010 02:59 Seltsam wrote:Show nested quote +On May 24 2010 02:57 travis wrote:On May 24 2010 02:54 Seltsam wrote:
I agree with Travis.
Because I really, really want to believe he is correct. that's basically why i believe it too lol i blame activision for that xbox live guy being hired in the first place I think that is a reasonable assumption. Blizzard has had such a long standing history of fantastic service to the gaming community, and the first hint that something might go wrong is the first big undertaking after the activision merger? I doubt that is coincidence. Besides, Blizzard has been so good in the past that I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt.
I guess if you want to believe that, then it's fine. I still feel that it's mostly Blizzard's fault than anything regarding Activision. Keep in mind that I'm not saying Blizzard is incompetent, just that they're human. Game designers aren't superhumans who have some mystical understanding of games that mere mortals could never hope to understand. Most of them are simply passionate gamers like us who just want a fun game. Obviously there are things that Blizzard is experienced in, but there are also a lot of things that they don't have much experience in.
A good example of this is e-Sports. I'm not saying this to be arrogant or insulting, but I truly do feel that the community is a lot more knowledgeable about competitive gaming than Blizzard is. After all, it's the community who created the BW pro scene in the first place, and it's the community who takes the time to painstakingly analyze every single facet of the game and everything it needs to be good, whereas Blizzard probably does no more than simple hearsay on things the community has discovered. Remember that SC2 only had macro mechanics because of fan feedback after all. So in many ways I do feel that Blizzard is moving in the wrong direction with Bnet because they've made multiple decisions that would have NEVER been done if someone from the competitive community was in charge of Bnet, instead of just some X-box LIVE developer who's probably never played SC in his life. Nobody in their right mind would allow a Bnet to go live with region-lock, no chat channels, no online replays, etc. But that's what happening right now, and it's a damn shame.
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On May 24 2010 02:47 travis wrote:
the sc2 development team made a great game
but do you really think they had any say in the direction of bnet 2.0?
just read the old interview with dustin browder. he sure didn't sound like he was excited about bnet 2.0 to me, he just sounded like a spokesman that had to hype it up. he even made it clear that sc2 would be good but we were going to be disappointed about bnet 2.0
Well you know, let's leave (my) nerd rage aside for a moment. Imagine you build up this service from scratch. Forget the Starcraft or Warcraft Battle.net. Just something completely new. The first logical steps that come to mind are social features and --->> easing in the player in to the "multi-player-experience". Recreating the beginner, the step-by-step learning experience they had so much success with in World of Warcraft. And there are clear signs now, right? Little guides on what counters what, practice league, some little challenges like "win 5 games with terran", etc. Just this very basic stuff Blizzard TODAY highlights in their philosophy of creating gaming.
When would you say should that be done? For release of course. No question. Any other time than right from the start would be bad. Because you need to bind the player not in 5 months, but from the very first minute.
I get that, i do understand the model. You have this, probably, great single-player and afterwards go like "hey, why don't you try multi-player a bit? What would you say is your level? Try following this tutorial, check out our tipps and tricks and be sure to browse our great knowledge database. Oh you lost? No problem buddy, try going against this guy. See? Ah isn't competitive gaming great? Why don't you take a break, i'm sure you're tired from all this 'playing', chat up your facebook friends. Oh and congratulation you won an achievement. Oh and another one! You are on a roll tiger!"
Ok. This shit gives you great reviews. And good reviews give you bags full of cash eventually. And right when shit gets stale, Blizzard will squeeze down an expansion down your throat. Plus Blizzard knows hardcore players play anyway. Why hurry up with features the casual gamer wont be using for quite some time? Give em things like the Editor, because casuals will profit from UMS. But let em test this game for us with all their passion deep into the night, they don't cost us anything, muahahaha.
I don't know about you guys but shit like that makes me really want to violate the EULA.
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Bnet 2.0 actual status makes a lot of sense to me.
Let's imagine you are Bnet 2.0 Lead designer. You want to make it a platform for competitive gaming, and why not esports. What are you going to put in it ?
-> Chat channels ? Yes, must have for tournaments at leat
-> Clan system ? Of course, those are the roots of competition
-> Advanced tournament system ? Yes, that's the first step to esports
-> LAN mode ? there wont be any esports possible ithout that
Etc etc.
Now imagine you want to create a platform which goal is to attract as many casual gamers as possible, especially those playing on console systems and not PC yet, or playing on Blizzard games other than RTS (like WoW players).
What are you gonna implement into Bnet 2.0 ?
-> Chat channels ? Nope, casuals will never use them. Having a friends list is enough.
-> Clan system ? Nope, casuals will never use them. They aren't playing for competition but for fun.
-> Advanced tournament system ? see above
-> LAN mode ? LAN is for hardcore gamers. Casuals play from home, and dont move from it. And since pretty much everyone has a broadband connection nowadays, no reasons to implement it.
That's it for the competitive side. Now for the casual side :
-> Facebook friends list ? Yes, best way to attract casuals who arent playing PC yet
-> Soft ranking system which doesnt show how bad you are to the rest of the world ? Yes, casuals dont play for competition. The recent change to Copper league goes to the same way - no matter how bad you are, you are still good enough to be in Silver league. No frustation guaranteed in SC2 !
-> Priority to mods and custom games/heroes available in custom games : best way to attract casuals through DotA and others mods
-> Novice maps, achievements everywhere, play coop vs AI : totally casual gamers oriented. Achievements specifically appeal console players
As a conclusion, BNet 2.0 is perfect as it is. It's just purely oriented towards casual gaming and not competitive play/esports.
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On May 24 2010 03:11 Spawkuring wrote:Show nested quote +On May 24 2010 02:59 Seltsam wrote:On May 24 2010 02:57 travis wrote:On May 24 2010 02:54 Seltsam wrote:
I agree with Travis.
Because I really, really want to believe he is correct. that's basically why i believe it too lol i blame activision for that xbox live guy being hired in the first place I think that is a reasonable assumption. Blizzard has had such a long standing history of fantastic service to the gaming community, and the first hint that something might go wrong is the first big undertaking after the activision merger? I doubt that is coincidence. Besides, Blizzard has been so good in the past that I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt. I guess if you want to believe that, then it's fine. I still feel that it's mostly Blizzard's fault than anything regarding Activision. Keep in mind that I'm not saying Blizzard is incompetent, just that they're human. Game designers aren't superhumans who have some mystical understanding of games that mere mortals could never hope to understand. Most of them are simply passionate gamers like us who just want a fun game. Obviously there are things that Blizzard is experienced in, but there are also a lot of things that they don't have much experience in. A good example of this is e-Sports. I'm not saying this to be arrogant or insulting, but I truly do feel that the community is a lot more knowledgeable about competitive gaming than Blizzard is. After all, it's the community who created the BW pro scene in the first place, and it's the community who takes the time to painstakingly analyze every single facet of the game and everything it needs to be good, whereas Blizzard probably does no more than simple hearsay on things the community has discovered. Remember that SC2 only had macro mechanics because of fan feedback after all. So in many ways I do feel that Blizzard is moving in the wrong direction with Bnet because they've made multiple decisions that would have NEVER been done if someone from the competitive community was in charge of Bnet, instead of just some X-box LIVE developer who's probably never played SC in his life. Nobody in their right mind would allow a Bnet to go live with region-lock, no chat channels, no online replays, etc. But that's what happening right now, and it's a damn shame.
A lot of what you say here has merit, and of course Blizzard isn't flawless. But I think that there has been way more anti-Blizzard nerdraging than is really warranted. Given the lack of information that we have, I think it's unreasonable to start assuming that Blizzard has suddenly become a money-grubbing company who just wants to see a good profit margin and nothing else. Mind you, I am not discounting it as a possibility, but that's the conclusion a LOT of people in this thread seem to be automatically coming to. I just think that if we are going to be assuming anything at all, we should be assuming that Blizzard will come through for us in the end, since they have a history of doing just that.
Although it may be safer to just not assume anything and take everything with a grain of salt. Even if it's not perfect on release, it's an online game. They can patch stuff as it goes. Also, with these coming weeks of offline time, I will continue to place my faith (as it has been well-earned) in Blizzard until I see some seriously concrete evidence that I shouldn't.
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On May 24 2010 03:22 Seltsam wrote:
Given the lack of information that we have, I think it's unreasonable to start assuming that Blizzard has suddenly become a money-grubbing company who just wants to see a good profit margin and nothing else.
Ever heard of this game called World of Warcraft?
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On May 24 2010 03:25 shlomo wrote:Show nested quote +On May 24 2010 03:22 Seltsam wrote:
Given the lack of information that we have, I think it's unreasonable to start assuming that Blizzard has suddenly become a money-grubbing company who just wants to see a good profit margin and nothing else. Ever heard of this game called World of Warcraft?
Yes. I've also heard that their customer service is impeccable. Plus, that's an MMORPG, a genre which inherently attracts very casual gamers.
Starcraft 2 is an RTS, and one whose predecessor is famous for competitive play. It seems like an important distinction to make. Again, Blizzard has had such a rich history of gamer-conscientious decisions that I will continue to assume their continued competence until proven otherwise.
EDIT: I shouldn't say MMOs attract "very casual gamers." That is not accurate. What I mean is that it attracts a totally different type of gamer, and that the additions/changes/features in that game will reflect that.
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<rant>
I just love how "easy" Blizz is making it to add friends.
Now you can add all you facebook friends with two clicks!
You can add your friend just by typing in their email!
You can even just right click their name after the game!!
BUT YOU CAN'T ADD THEM BY THEIR F***ING USERNAME!!!!!!!!!!
</rant>
Productive Comment: It is far more noob-friendly than SC:BW or even WarCraft 3. It still fails. Especially because of the year delay. I expected it to be able to order Chinese take-out or deliver pizza from in game. (no doubt it soon will, but still won't have chat channels.)
EDIT: Well, I take back the noob friendly part. I just tried to play with a friend who I played WC3 with a while back. We always met in a channel, talked about what we were going to do, then played. He has never tried to use Bnet2.0. Here's how it went.
Phone Text from Him: In game chat?
Me: lol
Him: Channel yellow
Me: lol, nice try.
Him: How do I get in channels? Can I whisper you in game so I can use my keyboard?
Me: No and No, just tell me ur email and I will friend u.
Him: What do u mean no channels/whisper. My username is RubiX.
Me: I need ur email to friend you.
Him: email@domain.com that's gay...
Me: Tell me about it.
True Story.
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On May 24 2010 03:29 Pigsquirrel wrote:
<rant>
I just love how "easy" Blizz is making it to add friends.
Now you can add all you facebook friends with two clicks!
You can add your friend just by typing in their email!
You can even just right click their name after the game!!
BUT YOU CAN'T ADD THEM BY THEIR F***ING USERNAME!!!!!!!!!!
</rant>
Productive Comment: It is far more noob-friendly than SC:BW or even WarCraft 3. It still fails. Especially because of the year delay. I expected it to be able to order Chinese take-out or deliver pizza from in game. (no doubt it soon will, but still won't have chat channels.)
I take it you are another one of those who missed blizzard saying that they did not change the buddy system at all, they just disabled parts for this particular patch. You ARE going to be able to add players by their username in the finished game.
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EPT
