On June 05 2010 03:10 pul718 wrote: I have found it interesting the number of locked threads on Blizzards forums recently. Anything negative or involving Bnet2.0, etc is getting shutdown. Blizzard doesn't want to hear it and doesn't care. Gone is the company of old when I spent all night on the Starcraft forums just before it's release in 1998. Where Rob Pardo would jump on and chat with the community asking for feedback. We are watching Blizzard to fall into line with Activision and no longer be synonymous with quality. So very sad.
Not sure what I am going to do. But just as I did with BioShock I will probably have to boycott this game on principals. BioShock had out of control DRM and I see this same style of control happening with SC2. Blizzard is dead to me now.
Blizzard isn't trying to silence any negative opinion. It's just that spamming the Blizzard forums accomplishes nothing but annoying the forum mods. As long as it's kept to a single thread, it's fine.
On June 05 2010 03:10 pul718 wrote: I have found it interesting the number of locked threads on Blizzards forums recently. Anything negative or involving Bnet2.0, etc is getting shutdown. Blizzard doesn't want to hear it and doesn't care. Gone is the company of old when I spent all night on the Starcraft forums just before it's release in 1998. Where Rob Pardo would jump on and chat with the community asking for feedback. We are watching Blizzard to fall into line with Activision and no longer be synonymous with quality. So very sad.
Not sure what I am going to do. But just as I did with BioShock I will probably have to boycott this game on principals. BioShock had out of control DRM and I see this same style of control happening with SC2. Blizzard is dead to me now.
Blizzard isn't trying to silence any negative opinion. It's just that spamming the Blizzard forums accomplishes nothing but annoying the forum mods. As long as it's kept to a single thread, it's fine.
Point taken and if the blizzard mods would have linked to the thread then I would have taken it as such. To me it wasn't that much spam really and not everyone searches or knows if a thread was already made. Especially since the one you linked is in a completely different forum not accessible from one linked on starcraft2.com. There are only 2 forums in the drop down off this link (Gameplay and General).
Although I have gotten rather cynical of Blizzard as of late and that might be coming through. Getting hard to think objectively these days. I still think they are not interested in any community feedback that doesn't fit their already planned objectives (money grubbing from my point of view).
I remember when the merger first happened, discussing its possible effect on Blizzard with another long time fan of their products. I got the irking sense that something was wrong, and evidently Vivendi knew this would happen as well. Every news link for it kept describing the relationship as being one of ownership, but not a relationship; Blizzard would continue acting on its own. Now that we're having all these issues with Bnet2.0, and WoW coming out with all these different payed services one after another, it hits me all at once. I was dupped.
The argument Kotick would like to make is that we get the entire gameplay experience simply by buying the game, which sounds great when you first hear it. But greedy business practice seems like it's seeping into the game's impact on their ENTIRE audience.
When SC2 comes out, you will have to buy several copies of the game in order to get your multinational experience. 'Blizzard' has already been in argument with several Korean companies about who has rights to their products (i.e. who gets how much money). All of these decisions are worsening the player experience.
No...worst of all, they are purposefully hampering the community of their eSport. Nay, they are hampering all eSports. Hopefully what we've seen is the worst of it. I'm not excited about the Korean population fixating on Brood War after SC2 comes out simply because the barriers of entry for the game made it too difficult to popularize.
This and the op pretty much sum up why SC2 is going to fail, why SC3 will be announced soon and WC4 and how blizzard, the company which we used to love has been corrupted and destroyed Don't expect them or "hope" they are going to make the game better, they are just going to trick you into paying for more and more and in the end result in a worse game
On June 05 2010 07:31 BrTarolg wrote: This and the op pretty much sum up why SC2 is going to fail, why SC3 will be announced soon and WC4 and how blizzard, the company which we used to love has been corrupted and destroyed Don't expect them or "hope" they are going to make the game better, they are just going to trick you into paying for more and more and in the end result in a worse game
I'd expect some Blizzard employees to start leaving if they get worked at that pace.
Thank you very much for making this topic and compiling all of that information, D3xter. Prior to this, I was planning to buy SC2 despite all the issues with Bnet 2.0 because I had confidence in Blizzard: they had a history of making great games and they looked like they were really putting their hearts into SC2.
Now, I have lost confidence in Blizzard. While I'm sure the average Blizzard employee is still doing great things for the company and for us, the SC2 fans, I believe the guys at the top will inevitably run SC2 and the company into the ground. Maybe not now, but in the long run, as Activision forces its stupid policies upon Blizzard's employees and destroys their ability to create excellent games.
By the way, psych studies have shown that Activision's profit-as-a-motivator strategy destroys creativity. It actually makes people do worse work.
With no confidence in Blizzard, I now fully expect to one day see Bnet 2.0 become a veritable paid service -- technically you'll be able to play for free, but Activision will withhold key features and capabilities that no one will want to play without. Their actions and the words of their CEO make it clear that this is a very likely outcome.
As for Blizzard vs KeSPA, although I have no confidence in KeSPA either, they are now the lesser of two evils, by far. If Blizzard takes control of the broadcasting of SCBW in Korea, I think there's a fair chance that SCBW progaming will die.
Lastly, I feel pity for Blizzard's staff. Their company has an outstanding history behind it. I'm sure they take great pride and pleasure in working there -- I know I would. But if you look at Kotick's path of destruction, it's clear that these nice people, who care more about making great games than maximizing profit, are going to be trampled by him. If I worked at Blizzard right now I would be crying on the inside. Compared to these guys, us disappointed fans are getting off easy.
To be honest if they start making it P2P and rediculous stuff like that, then i plan on pirating the game
I know talk of piracy is a bit taboo, but thats the main way the market should correct itself. If bnet is terrible, then someone out there is gonna make a better bnet and everyone moves to that - because you get a better experience that way
Lets look at the decisions Blizz has made since SC2 was announced:
1) Split into 3 games (an unpopular, money-grab decision) 2) No LAN (an unpopular, money-grab decision) 3) You can't choose which server to play on (an unpopular, money-grab decision)
I think we're all fooling ourselves that Blizz is still a great developer that treats its playerbase well. I think they've sold out since the days of SC1. They have done absolutely nothing to inspire faith in us, aside from make SC1 and BW (which was over ten years ago). I also think that balance changes in the beta have been pretty crappy - some things have never been seriously usable... Ultras, Templar Tech, for a very long time Terran Mech was terrible, etc etc. And think of all the stupid parts of Bnet2.0 that Blizz is pushing despite almost unanimous dissent from the community - no chatrooms, email-only friendslist, etc.
On June 05 2010 06:12 allyourbase wrote: The section on Infinity Ward was baffling to me. I hope Blizz knew what they were doing when they sold out to Activision...
Blizzard didnt sell out to activision. Blizzard's parent company bought Activision and merged it with Blizzard, and then put the head of Activision in charge of the holding company that owns both companies.
I don't understand how Blizzard can look themselves in the eyes after reading all the shit going on about Activision, and how almost every eager Blizzard fan have started to lose some hope in Blizzard for the first time. For the first time in the history of Blizzard they're actually taking a step back, rather than a step forward with SC2, the only improvement from SC1 is the graphics, which is just retardedly stupid.
By the way, psych studies have shown that Activision's profit-as-a-motivator strategy destroys creativity. It actually makes people do worse work.
Well, from Bobby Kotick's point of view, "good work" = "lots of sales."
The quality of the product itself as a work of art or a creative exercise is pretty much irrelevant to him and those like him. That's why he places no value on creative people and treats them like assembly line workers. He doesn't care if he has the most talented game designers, programmers, etc, because from his perspective the magic is in the way that the organization is run, and the way that the goods are packaged and sold to maximize profits.
Make video games like tooth paste. Sell it like tooth paste. Make people keep buying it, like tooth paste. That's the business model.
EPT
