EPTEdit: Especially when ya'll setting high bars like Shakespeare, Tarintino, A Song of Ice and Fire, Lord of the Rings, The Bible, Dostoevsky et al. SC1 doesn't even come in sight of any of that stuff, neither does SC2.
[Story spoilers!!] Heart of the HOTS continued - Page 23
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MoonfireSpam
United Kingdom1153 Posts
Edit: Especially when ya'll setting high bars like Shakespeare, Tarintino, A Song of Ice and Fire, Lord of the Rings, The Bible, Dostoevsky et al. SC1 doesn't even come in sight of any of that stuff, neither does SC2. | ||
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Aeh
Germany31 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:01 MoonfireSpam wrote: I think there is too much nostalgiafaggotry circlejerking in here. Those SC1 clips were pretty mediocre too. It's all first girlfriend syndrome. ^this Thought the same | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:01 MoonfireSpam wrote: I think there is too much nostalgiafaggotry circlejerking in here. Those SC1 clips were pretty mediocre too. It's all first girlfriend syndrome. Edit: Especially when ya'll setting high bars like Shakespeare, Tarintino, A Song of Ice and Fire, Lord of the Rings, The Bible, Dostoevsky et al. Oh come on ... the original SC1 end cinematic is MUCH MUCH MUCH cooler than the ones from either HotS or WoL. You cant beat a Carrier being suicided into the Overmind ... not for an RTS game. Sadly Blizzard is turning this into a stupid social drama. This is just an RTS and not "high literature" and as an RTS it should be about RACES and not A LOVE (or revenge) STORY. | ||
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Andre
Slovenia3523 Posts
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Bagi
Germany6799 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:01 MoonfireSpam wrote: I think there is too much nostalgiafaggotry circlejerking in here. Those SC1 clips were pretty mediocre too. It's all first girlfriend syndrome. Edit: Especially when ya'll setting high bars like Shakespeare, Tarintino, A Song of Ice and Fire, Lord of the Rings, The Bible, Dostoevsky et al. SC1 doesn't even come in sight of any of that stuff, neither does SC2. Tarantino? Really? SC1 has imho good writing for a video game (note: with games the bar is set much, MUCH lower). Mengsk is a good example of this, even though it's made very clear that's he's a megalomaniac traitor, there is still something likable and charismatic about him. Listening to his speech at the end of the terran campaign gets me pumped to this day. In SC2 he's just a ugly, comical supervillain without any redeeming qualities. | ||
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SoulTakerz
Canada353 Posts
-Zeratul Hots/Sc2 definitely need more memorable dialogs if nothing else | ||
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Sawamura
Malaysia7602 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:11 Rabiator wrote: Oh come on ... the original SC1 end cinematic is MUCH MUCH MUCH cooler than the ones from either HotS or WoL. You cant beat a Carrier being suicided into the Overmind ... not for an RTS game. Sadly Blizzard is turning this into a stupid social drama. This is just an RTS and not "high literature" and as an RTS it should be about RACES and not A LOVE (or revenge) STORY. I am all right with Love(Revenge) story but it shouldn't be the main focus of the whole plot solely on Jimmy and Kerrigan . There was a lot of bad blood in broodwar that wasn't answered in sc2, sudden changes to the terran war machine, Jimmy forgetting he lost almost everything first kerrigan and his friend fenix to kerrigan and also forgetting his oath he will take that QoB and hunt her down with everything he has . Zeratul being force to kill his matriach and yet in wing of liberty he puts his aside his vengeance because some how he got this prophecy . I find it hard to put behind so much history and storyline that was seen in broodwar the admirable general duke taken down by kerrigan and everyone who some how manages to get trap in to the webs of kerrigan is probably left with just a broken and empty shell living with the sole mind to have vengeance on what she has done . Kerrigan in broodwar was totally evil, manipulative and clever also just looking from her actions she has taken, she really enjoys toying with people lifes rather than it being some kind of a dark voice behind the scene telling her to do no good. Neither of the three races being pictured to be fighting on a epic scale invasion as seen in broodwar in which it was a battle for the survival of each race all in one expansion . | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:24 SoulTakerz wrote: "You speak of knowledge, Judicator? You speak of experience? I have journeyed through the darkness between the most distant stars. I have beheld the births of negative-suns and borne witness to the entropy of entire realities... Unto my experience, Aldaris, all that you've built here on Aiur is but a fleeting dream. A dream from which your precious Conclave shall awaken, finding themselves drowned in a greater nightmare" -Zeratul Hots/Sc2 definitely need more memorable dialogs if nothing else The thing is that in the original campaigns for SC1 you had this "outside pressure" to do what you had to do next, but in both the SC2 campaigns there is ZERO SENSE OF URGENCY. It is all reduced to personal drama and on some side missions you can evolve your troops somewhat. For a great replayability AND URGENCY the campaign should force you to choose between two units and then you would not have some important units for the final battle. They dont do that and you can take your time doing what you want to do with some pretty overpowered units / abilities which arent there in the multiplayer. Terrible decision to go this way, because the "choose evolution states for your units" is a nice concept, which could have been in the multiplayer (instead of some clicky abilities which REQUIRE SKILL and make the game harder for low level players of race X ... stuff like Blink for example). On March 16 2013 18:34 Sawamura wrote: I am all right with Love(Revenge) story but it shouldn't be the main focus of the whole plot solely on Jimmy and Kerrigan . There was a lot of bad blood in broodwar that wasn't answered in sc2, sudden changes to the terran war machine, Jimmy forgetting he lost almost everything first kerrigan and his friend fenix to kerrigan and also forgetting his oath he will take that QoB and hunt her down with everything he has . Zeratul being force to kill his matriach and yet in wing of liberty he puts his aside his vengeance because some how he got this prophecy . I find it hard to put behind so much history and storyline that was seen in broodwar the admirable general duke taken down by kerrigan and everyone who some how manages to get trap in to the webs of kerrigan is probably left with just a broken and empty shell living with the sole mind to have vengeance on what she has done . Kerrigan in broodwar was totally evil, manipulative and clever also just looking from her actions she has taken, she really enjoys toying with people lifes rather than it being some kind of a dark voice behind the scene telling her to do no good. Neither of the three races being pictured to be fighting on a epic scale invasion as seen in broodwar in which it was a battle for the survival of each race all in one expansion . The whole SC1 campaign had outside pressure and the need to defend against Zerg or rescue people. In SC2 you are the one who is the aggressor and picks the targets and that takes any pressure out of it. That is the bad part which makes the story rather boring. Not even the Xel'Naga threat is visible that much, because in WoL they only got the artifact to return Kerrigan to a human state again without killing her. | ||
Liquid`Jinro
Sweden33719 Posts
SO TILT. | ||
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figq
12519 Posts
- introducing all units of a race - having some fun with unusual environments and game rules, and occasional story twists It got those very well. It was (deliberately!) easier than WoL, so that casuals don't give up and can at least finish the campaign - there's been an alarmingly high percentage of casuals in WoL who tried to beat the campaign and gave up. Overall, I think HotS is actually a better campaign than WoL, even though WoL certainly took more effort to make. Special points for the music. At some places it's really strong. The text lines were at times way too simplistic, but not something we haven't seen already in WoL. The voice acting was at times absolutely great. These folks put their soul into this, I even teared up at some point. It's one of the most emotional stories I've seen in a game. Sure, StarCraft now turned almost into a love story, I say, why not, I like it. | ||
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Rabiator
Germany3948 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:43 figq wrote: The campaign is not meant to serve such high purposes - for those are the books. It's centered around: - introducing all units of a race - having some fun with unusual environments and game rules, and occasional story twists It got those very well. It was (deliberately!) easier than WoL, so that casuals don't give up and can at least finish the campaign - there's been an alarmingly high percentage of casuals in WoL who tried to beat the campaign and gave up. Overall, I think HotS is actually a better campaign than WoL, even though WoL certainly took more effort to make. Special points for the music. At some places it's really strong. The text lines were at times way too simplistic, but not something we haven't seen already in WoL. The voice acting was at times absolutely great. These folks put their soul into this, I even teared up at some point. It's one of the most emotional stories I've seen in a game. Sure, StarCraft now turned almost into a love story, I say, why not, I like it. Screw the books. You didnt need any to understand the first campaigns and they were awesome. | ||
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Shebuha
Canada1335 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:01 MoonfireSpam wrote: I think there is too much nostalgiafaggotry circlejerking in here. Those SC1 clips were pretty mediocre too. It's all first girlfriend syndrome. Edit: Especially when ya'll setting high bars like Shakespeare, Tarintino, A Song of Ice and Fire, Lord of the Rings, The Bible, Dostoevsky et al. SC1 doesn't even come in sight of any of that stuff, neither does SC2. "This game has better story because of x, y and z, and a, b and c in this game don't make sense at all." "nostalgia fag." yeah. k. cool. | ||
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NEEDZMOAR
Sweden1277 Posts
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figq
12519 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:44 Rabiator wrote: There're many flaws with the first campaigns too, but back at that time we were actually kids so we had fun with it. Just like some kids now will have fun with these campaigns.Screw the books. You didnt need any to understand the first campaigns and they were awesome. One example - I always thought Mengsk was awfully portrayed since the beginning of all games. He's supposed to be this highly intelligent terran mastermind, instead his every word is so *obviously* insincere and manipulating, and he is so wannabe-sound-smart-but-actually-totally-boring-and-dull. | ||
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Bagi
Germany6799 Posts
On March 16 2013 18:43 figq wrote: The campaign is not meant to serve such high purposes - for those are the books. If I read a book, it certainly wont be a book about a damn video game. Either you tell a good overall story with your games or you don't. "Read the books" is just a cop out. | ||
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Gatesleeper
Canada300 Posts
On March 16 2013 16:06 Lauriel wrote: Thing 1: It's pretty funny that you don't want to use the term "retcon" and then proceed to use it repeatedly, including in three separate definitions. Thing 2: For someone who doesn't find my opinions worth commenting on, you certainly spent a lot of time digging through my posts to find all the things I wrote you disagree with. I'm almost flattered. Thing 3: The actual question you had is confusing with all the disjointedness of your post, but I'll take a stab at it. "How can you in good conscience continue to argue that the whole idea of the "Primal Zerg" doesn't rewrite everything we've come to know about the history of the Zerg race..." Because we lacked the full spectrum of the lore behind them to start with? I'm sorry, was there a Tolkien-esque, leather bound volume written about the complete history of the Zerg that I'm not aware of, or are you going off of the info we had from SC1/BW that basically amounts to a paragraph worth of description, and using that as the entire and complete origin of the race? If fleshing out a history of an aspect of a story is your description of the term "retcon" (which it really seems to be), then doing so would practically never be allowed in fiction. However, it happens all the time in the works of some excellent writers. (The Hobbit, anyone?). "...or that the "Amon's taint" plotline is a good explanation for Kerrigan's character progression and not a retcon." They were already going in this direction at the end of Brood War. Did you think they didn't have ideas for who Duran worked for? Did you think they didn't already know where they wanted to take the story? Did you not expect that there was going to be a bigger, badder villain out there for them to focus on in Starcraft 2? I know I did, and I was freaking 12 when I played the game, so I'd hope you picked up on that when you played it. People are screaming and yelling bloody murder about this in this thread, when in reality, I would bet that this is very much the story they wanted to tell from the end of Brood War. The setup was already there for it. Also, just out of curiosity, why do you care so much about what I think? I'm just a guy on the internet, just like you. Cheers. Edit: I just realized you're the person who re-started this thread, and now I'm not even sure why I'm bothering. The way you even started the discussion is so biased and condescending that it's clear the only reason you're even here is to try to flex your literary critic muscle on the internet. By the way, how'd the results of that poll turn out for you? Re:Thing 1: I don't even know what you're talking about here, I think you must have misread a sentence somewhere. Re:Thing 2: I read or skim every post in this thread, including yours. Like I said, I found you to be the worst and was just kinda hoping you would go away and stop posting, but you've been the most vocal proponent of the Pro-HotS camp so I had to comment. Not to convince you of anything, because obviously that's not gonna happen, but just in the service of general public discourse. There's a reason this discussion is happening on a forum instead of PMs. On the Primal Zerg: What I'm about to type out seems so self evident to me that I feel like I'm falling for a troll who's trying to waste my time. But, since I cant recall someone explaining fully why Zerus is a massive retcon, here is a very long post: You're right, there wasn't a ton of literature on the history of the Zerg before HotS. But what we had (the games, the chapters in the SC1 manual) was enough, it was a perfectly suitable body of knowledge that made complete sense within the context of the Starcraft universe. If I never heard another new word of the history of the Zerg, I would've been happy. There's really not much to it, because there's really not much to Zerg, they're mindless aliens with a simple history. If it was simple matter of "fleshing out" the history, then that would've been fine, I suppose. Unnecessary, but fine. But what we got instead was huge retcon of the Zerg's history on Zerus. The Zerg/Zerus thing comes pretty close to a total rewrite. Before HotS, we understood that the Zerg were a parasitic organism that the Xel'Naga enhanced to become the prototype of what we recognized as Zerg. Shortly after, they created the Overmind to control these Zerg. From there, the Overmind become sentient, tried to kill the Xel'Naga, and then started traveling through space assimilating "countless" species (I've always been dubious about this "countless" number of species, because in Starcraft 1 and 2 we've only seen a couple of dozen different type of Zerg units, but whatever, it's an RTS games, you can't have "countless" different units). What HotS tells us instead is that not all Zerg on Zerus were under the influence of The Overmind, which is a retcon, and something we've never heard before. Instead, we have these "primal" Zerg, who were created by the Xel'Naga, but not put under the influence of the Overmind when the Xel'Naga created it. This is a mere revision of Zerg history, where the rewriting happens is as follows. Before HotS, we understood that the Zerg we were familiar with was the product of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years of evolution, of assimilated creatures from many different worlds. It was unclear as to whether any of the Zerg strains we saw originated from Zerus. But then, in HotS, when we go back there, they have Primal Zerglings, Banelings, Hydralisks, Roaches, Mutalisks, Guardians, and Ultralisks, did I miss any? Zerglings are assimilated dune runner creatures from Zz'gash. Mutalisks are assimilated mantis screamers from the Dinares Sector. Roaches are assimilated zantar slugs from Garxxax, and were only created in the year 2501, making it doubly impossible for them to be on Zerus. Hydralisks are assimilated sloth creatures, home world unspecified, but I don't think sloth creatures exist on volcanic ash planets, which is of course Zerus pre-retcon. This retcon, in my opinion, makes the history of the Zerg less meaningful because instead of a race that's been constantly evolving over a number of years, becoming better and better versions of themselves, the Zerg we have now in HotS don't seem all that impressive at all. Where did all that evolution go? We go back to Zerus, and these Primal Zerg, these directionless creatures that haven't even managed space travel, are just as strong as anything the Overmind/Kerrigan controlled Zerg managed to produce. They're literally just the same units with different skins. I guess they just threw out all those "countless" assimilated strains? The 5 or 6 strains native to Zerus were the ones the Zerg stuck with, huh? Re: Amon. This one's a lot simpler. When we heard of the "higher power" Duran was working for in Brood War, I, and everyone else, assumed he was talking about the Xel'Naga. And we were half right. What we were presented with in WoL/HotS wasn't the Xel'Naga per se, but a single entity known as Amon/The Dark Voice, a renegade Xel'Naga. It's a dumb idea, and I have no idea why they went in this direction. I guarantee that this particular plot point wasn't set in stone after Brood War, hell, even after Wings of Liberty, a mere three years ago, we never heard of this Amon character, I just assumed the Dark Voice spoke for all Xel'Naga. Anyway, the existence of Amon, and the fact that he supposedly corrupted the Overmind by himself without the consent of the rest of the Xel'Naga, is a retcon, and a poor one. For the game to tell us that the Infested Kerrigan we see in SC1/BW was always under the influence of this renegade Xel'Naga is another terrible retcon. Because SC1/BW already had an established storyline that went in the same vein: While the Overmind was alive, Kerrigan was under its influence. When the Overmind died, Kerrigan was 100% in control of her actions. This plot point made total sense, and explained why Kerrigan was so eager to stop the second Overmind from forming. To then overwrite that and say, "well actually, she was under the influence of a third party all this time too" is sloppy writing. The reason they did it was so they can excuse to Raynor, Zeratul, the audience, Kerrigan's terrible sins in the past. Now we get to say "Oh, all those terrible things she did in Brood War no longer count because she wasn't herself." Ugh, horrible stuff. I guess Blizzard really wanted to have Kerrigan as a protagonist and not a villain in SC2, so they had to whitewash her history. Which is weird, because she was firmly a villain for most of SC1/BW, and we the audience were fine with playing from her perspective. Edit: I just realized you're the person who re-started this thread, and now I'm not even sure why I'm bothering. The way you even started the discussion is so biased and condescending that it's clear the only reason you're even here is to try to flex your literary critic muscle on the internet. By the way, how'd the results of that poll turn out for you? Ah, another take on the "you're just trying to be cool" argument. I really don't get why this one keeps getting leveled at anyone who says they hated this game. Surely, "the reason I'm even here" isn't because I'm a Starcraft fan who wants to discuss its storyline with other fans, no, it must be because I'm trying to be "cool" or "flex my literary critic muscle on the internet." Right. As to the results of the poll, I'm not gonna hide my disappointment, I didn't expect so many people liked it. 60% of people had a favourable or very favourable response to the story, which is higher than I expected. On the other hand, 28% of people expressed a strong dislike to the story, and the rest were lukewarm. So, about 2/3 approval overall, which is good or bad depending on who you ask. What I was most surprised about was that a lot of people enjoyed the HotS story more than the WoL one, which I felt was slightly better written, introduced more interesting characters, and had less plot holes. | ||
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Osmoses
Sweden5302 Posts
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YyapSsap
New Zealand1511 Posts
They effectively killed off what made zeratul, raynor, kerrigan, mengsk etc an interesting in-depth character that was actually engaging and meant something to the story line. I can't believe zeratul is suddenly a gandalf to this story line.. From a video game story perspective, SC1 and SC:BW were pretty damn good. When Tassadar (probably one of the most charismatic heroes from the entire SC universe) sacrifices himself by channelling his psionic powers to the Gantrithor to kill the overmind still gives me groosebumps to this day. When you had to kill Fenix, it was actually pretty sad to kill such a cool character that symbolised the strength of the protoss.. The main plot in SC and its expansions, its twists and unravelling of something greater in the form of Duran etc were so much more interesting than this melodrama with a sprinkle of goodvsevil101. I wonder if its just me but I found the voice acting on most of the characters and their design pretty damn bad. Something just didn't feel "right". It just didn't capture that "feel" from BW and SC1 like Zeratul for example. He sounded like a damn tauren chieftain. Note: Why the hell would Stukov even help Kerrigan?!? She killed off all the UED forces including his friend DuGalle. And whats with raynor suddenly going back to the original raynor by saying "You killed Fenix" then suddenly back to the WoL raynor. So many flaws.. | ||
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Greenwizard
48 Posts
On March 16 2013 17:01 paralleluniverse wrote: Lauriel is right. None of these are retcons. On the primal zerg, there was nothing revealed that directly contradicted previously established continuity. The closest would be the retcon that Zerus was a volcanic world, now it's a lush jungle. But maybe different parts of the planet have different environments. In SC1 it was explained the zerg were created without an Overmind at first, so they were free before the creation of the Overmind. There's no retcon here. On Kerrigan as the Queen of Blades being different from pre-infestation Kerrigan and Amon's corruption, this also doesn't directly contradict previous continuity. In SC1, Kerrigan clearly says that she likes who she has become and is in full control. It obviously implied that she has free will as the Queen of Blades. But in SC2, it's reveal that she didn't: that Sarah Kerrigan is a separate personality from the Queen of Blades. But this isn't a retcon, because she could have said those things due to not having free will and because of Amon's corruption. On this point, it's awful storytelling. It clearly goes against the original storywriter's intent that Kerrigan as the Queen of Blades had free will, that the Queen of Blades is precisely Sarah Kerrigan. But it's not a contradiction. It's taking the story in lame direction, completely destroying the character that was built up in SC1. So you can argue that is bad, because it is, but it's not a a recton. They should have kept Sarah Kerrigan as the Queen of Blades, a powerful and evil villainess, that enjoys by her own free will, being powerful and evil And if you played the last mission on WOL you will see something that contradicts your weak excuse that they are the same person and it's a wierd personality change. It is all explained in a very short moment , when you use the xel naga artefact at one point the Sarah says "She is getting weaker" ... or something like that. What does that mean to you ? | ||
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Gatesleeper
Canada300 Posts
Now finish that sentence and tell me that the HotS cinematics were just as good. Go ahead, say that, if you can live with yourself afterwards. | ||
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