|
I honestly think you put too much thought into it and hold it to a higher standard than you should, it's excellent for what it is and is supposed to be.
As for demographics, yeah you are right, the age of gamers has shifted, and that's because people never stopped being gamers once they started for the most part, so the people who were the 16 year olds back in 2003, are 26 year olds now, and still gaming.
This doesn't mean they aren't marketing to their target audience correctly because they are still targeting younger audiences, it's the idea that once they get the younger audiences hooked, they will continue being their audience into adulthood, whether or not the material is targeted at their age group then.
|
On March 20 2013 21:58 wo1fwood wrote:
I'd also just like to quickly note that now that I have finished with my thoughts and whatnot, that it is unlikely I will write a review on a Blizzard title again. I can only handle so much critical analysis and especially in this instance, somewhat disenfranchising thoughts, and I know you probably have similar feelings regarding this. So I should apologize for what I had to do here as I felt it necessary to explain how unacceptable I've felt this kind of writing/execution is from a company that supposedly is one of the "best" in the business (they do so many things right, why not this).
Also this was intended to go in the Campaign forum, so I would request that it be moved there when that subforum goes up.
Hell no I dont. Take your elitist bullshit elsewhere.
I personally very much enjoyed the story and thought it was a big step up from wol. I say goodbye and goodriddance if you are moving on from reviewing anymore of these games, you are just not that good at it.
i think the fact that you were already disjointed at blizzard for their latest releases has seriously hindered your ability to enjoy what they have released here (i could be wrong)
Yeb. I see so many of these critics of HOTS that when you dig deep enough with them in arguments start talking about the evils of activition and how D3 has ruined the good reputation of blizzard. They don't know or seem not to care that there are almost completely different teams working on these projects and chris metzen who made this story was also the story writer for sc1. It is not some evil activision dude in suite trying to milk peoples money with bad stories. Not in this case anyway.
|
Read most of OP, haven't read thread.
You leave out a lot of reasons to hate the SC2 story, you could literally fill a book with it. I've argued my brains out in in the HotS story discussion thread, but I'm pretty sick of doing that now. That thread is over 50 pages, I haven't read it since page ~36. On page 1 of that thread I made a poll which right now has over 1000 replies, and 54% of people responded favourably to the HotS story.
I don't understand it at all. It's like how at least 45% of the country will vote Republican in every Presidential election. Like, you have all the facts, the answer is clear, but you choose to remain wrong in the face of that.
There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me.
You don't need to read this fucking novel of a post to know that the HotS/SC2 storyline was terrible, you just need a functioning adult brain and to have played through both games. If this post makes me sound extremely cynical, it's because I am. First, cynical about Blizzard for making this game and and insulting the consumer by pretending it's good. And second, and this the part that really, really makes me sad, cynical about how so many of those consumers ate this shit sandwich right up and asked for seconds. They then went on Yelp.com, gave the meal a favourable review, and downvoted and criticised any negative reviews of the same meal.
|
On March 23 2013 19:03 DaveVAH wrote:Show nested quote +On March 20 2013 21:58 wo1fwood wrote:
I'd also just like to quickly note that now that I have finished with my thoughts and whatnot, that it is unlikely I will write a review on a Blizzard title again. I can only handle so much critical analysis and especially in this instance, somewhat disenfranchising thoughts, and I know you probably have similar feelings regarding this. So I should apologize for what I had to do here as I felt it necessary to explain how unacceptable I've felt this kind of writing/execution is from a company that supposedly is one of the "best" in the business (they do so many things right, why not this).
Also this was intended to go in the Campaign forum, so I would request that it be moved there when that subforum goes up. Hell no I dont. Take your elitist bullshit elsewhere. I personally very much enjoyed the story and thought it was a big step up from wol. I say goodbye and goodriddance if you are moving on from reviewing anymore of these games, you are just not that good at it. Show nested quote +i think the fact that you were already disjointed at blizzard for their latest releases has seriously hindered your ability to enjoy what they have released here (i could be wrong)
Yeb. I see so many of these critics of HOTS that when you dig deep enough with them on argiments start talking about the evils of activition and how D3 has ruined the good reputation of blizzard. They don't know or seem not to care that there are almost completely different teams working on these projects and chris metzen who made this story was also the story writer for sc1. It is not some evil activision dude in suite trying to milk peoples money with bad stories. Not in this case anyway.
I really dont like postings such as this. Calling the OP Elitist who spreads bullshit after writing a carefully thought out thread with good formating pictures wordings and arguments is just outrageous.
If you disagree with him, then formulate your points and explain them and provide facts why you disagree with him and why you think the story of hots is a good one.
I think that for responds of this kind you should receive a warning. I do not mind if you disagree with the OP but I do mind the way you are doing it. You are not argumenting you are just talking down on him without providing any argument facts or real content.
|
On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:Read most of OP, haven't read thread. You leave out a lot of reasons to hate the SC2 story, you could literally fill a book with it. I've argued my brains out in in the HotS story discussion thread, but I'm pretty sick of doing that now. That thread is over 50 pages, I haven't read it since page ~36. On page 1 of that thread I made a poll which right now has over 1000 replies, and 54% of people responded favourably to the HotS story. I don't understand it at all. It's like how at least 45% of the country will vote Republican in every Presidential election. Like, you have all the facts, the answer is clear, but you choose to remain wrong in the face of that. There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me. You don't need to read this fucking novel of a post to know that the HotS/SC2 storyline was terrible, you just need a functioning adult brain and to have played through both games. If this post makes me sound extremely cynical, it's because I am. First, cynical about Blizzard for making this game and and insulting the consumer by pretending it's good. And second, and this the part that really, really makes me sad, cynical about how so many of those consumers ate this shit sandwich right up and asked for seconds. They then went on Yelp.com, gave the meal a favourable review, and downvoted and criticised any negative reviews of the same meal.
Wow, so much hate. o_O
I get the feeling that there's something entirely different bothering you in your life and you just use HotS as a vent.
It's just a game after all.
|
On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:
Read most of OP, haven't read thread.
You leave out a lot of reasons to hate the SC2 story, you could literally fill a book with it. I've argued my brains out in in the HotS story discussion thread, but I'm pretty sick of doing that now. That thread is over 50 pages, I haven't read it since page ~36. On page 1 of that thread I made a poll which right now has over 1000 replies, and 54% of people responded favourably to the HotS story.
I don't understand it at all. It's like how at least 45% of the country will vote Republican in every Presidential election. Like, you have all the facts, the answer is clear, but you choose to remain wrong in the face of that.
There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me.
I'd be happy if someone who liked it could at least explain why. Like, make some kind of list of the story's, the dialogue's or the characters' strong points, because I'm not seeing any.
You don't need to read this fucking novel of a post to know that the HotS/SC2 storyline was terrible, you just need a functioning adult brain and to have played through both games. If this post makes me sound extremely cynical, it's because I am. First, cynical about Blizzard for making this game and and insulting the consumer by pretending it's good. And second, and this the part that really, really makes me sad, cynical about how so many of those consumers ate this shit sandwich right up and asked for seconds. They then went on Yelp.com, gave the meal a favourable review, and downvoted and criticised any negative reviews of the same meal.
Overall, thanks for your post, mirrors my feelings exactly. As for the "too high standards" argument, some seem to think that us critics are comparing the HotS story to some kind of high literature, thus being unfair. That is simply not true, we (including the OP) are gamers, and we're obviously comparing it to other games. It is entirely possible for a game to have ok storytelling; why would it be impossible to write a non-self-contradictory, consistent story for a game? Of course, you need to accommodate gameplay into a story which creates some constraints, but why would that force you to be inconsistent? Why, for example, if gameplay requires a character to behave differently in a subsequent mission, is it impossible to spend a moment in a cinematic explaining that change in behavior? I promise you, there are millions of millions of writers who could easily do that. It is generally true that video game stories tend to use cliché and aren't exactly inventing the wheel. But good storytelling, i.e. witty dialogue, good continuitiy, believable character motivation, atmosphere and suspense can make up for that. Blizzard failed to deliver any of that.
Oh, and that link you gave - oh my gosh. Heart and soul? I'm speechless.
|
On March 23 2013 19:33 Holy_AT wrote:Show nested quote +On March 23 2013 19:03 DaveVAH wrote:On March 20 2013 21:58 wo1fwood wrote:
I'd also just like to quickly note that now that I have finished with my thoughts and whatnot, that it is unlikely I will write a review on a Blizzard title again. I can only handle so much critical analysis and especially in this instance, somewhat disenfranchising thoughts, and I know you probably have similar feelings regarding this. So I should apologize for what I had to do here as I felt it necessary to explain how unacceptable I've felt this kind of writing/execution is from a company that supposedly is one of the "best" in the business (they do so many things right, why not this).
Also this was intended to go in the Campaign forum, so I would request that it be moved there when that subforum goes up. Hell no I dont. Take your elitist bullshit elsewhere. I personally very much enjoyed the story and thought it was a big step up from wol. I say goodbye and goodriddance if you are moving on from reviewing anymore of these games, you are just not that good at it. i think the fact that you were already disjointed at blizzard for their latest releases has seriously hindered your ability to enjoy what they have released here (i could be wrong)
Yeb. I see so many of these critics of HOTS that when you dig deep enough with them on argiments start talking about the evils of activition and how D3 has ruined the good reputation of blizzard. They don't know or seem not to care that there are almost completely different teams working on these projects and chris metzen who made this story was also the story writer for sc1. It is not some evil activision dude in suite trying to milk peoples money with bad stories. Not in this case anyway. I really dont like postings such as this. Calling the OP Elitist who spreads bullshit after writing a carefully thought out thread with good formating pictures wordings and arguments is just outrageous. If you disagree with him, then formulate your points and explain them and provide facts why you disagree with him and why you think the story of hots is a good one. I think that for responds of this kind you should receive a warning. I do not mind if you disagree with the OP but I do mind the way you are doing it. You are not argumenting you are just talking down on him without providing any argument facts or real content.
its 3 AM here and I cant ever hope to top a 10 page argument in kind. And it is wasted in team liquid since most seem to hate the story for some reason or another but you guys are very much a minority. Battle net forums, reddit, Amazon and metacritics all have high praises for HOTS so the story/campaign stands very well on its own without my arguments. OP's writing just reeks of elitism in my opinion and the fact that he went ahead and said "I know you will all agree with me here" really just tops that. He is preaching to the choir here and he knows it.
Edit: it looks like even in TL you must have very strong dissenters to the idea that the story was bad so guys like this (quote below) are fretting openly about it. It is a highlight of a great story when it has strong and passionate defenders even in a very hostile environment.
On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me. You don't need to read this fucking novel of a post to know that the HotS/SC2 storyline was terrible, you just need a functioning adult brain and to have played through both games. If this post makes me sound extremely cynical, it's because I am. First, cynical about Blizzard for making this game and and insulting the consumer by pretending it's good. And second, and this the part that really, really makes me sad, cynical about how so many of those consumers ate this shit sandwich right up and asked for seconds. They then went on Yelp.com, gave the meal a favourable review, and downvoted and criticised any negative reviews of the same meal.
FYI Gatekeeper. I am 29. I have read songs of ice and fire and most of G.R.R.Martins other books. I have played the baldur's gate series, planescape torment, witcher series, sc1/bw and many others. The problem is most likely with you and not the quality of the material here.
|
On March 23 2013 19:49 zimms wrote:Show nested quote +On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:Read most of OP, haven't read thread. You leave out a lot of reasons to hate the SC2 story, you could literally fill a book with it. I've argued my brains out in in the HotS story discussion thread, but I'm pretty sick of doing that now. That thread is over 50 pages, I haven't read it since page ~36. On page 1 of that thread I made a poll which right now has over 1000 replies, and 54% of people responded favourably to the HotS story. I don't understand it at all. It's like how at least 45% of the country will vote Republican in every Presidential election. Like, you have all the facts, the answer is clear, but you choose to remain wrong in the face of that. There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me. You don't need to read this fucking novel of a post to know that the HotS/SC2 storyline was terrible, you just need a functioning adult brain and to have played through both games. If this post makes me sound extremely cynical, it's because I am. First, cynical about Blizzard for making this game and and insulting the consumer by pretending it's good. And second, and this the part that really, really makes me sad, cynical about how so many of those consumers ate this shit sandwich right up and asked for seconds. They then went on Yelp.com, gave the meal a favourable review, and downvoted and criticised any negative reviews of the same meal. Wow, so much hate. o_O I get the feeling that there's something entirely different bothering you in your life and you just use HotS as a vent. It's just a game after all.
If you ask me, yes, people half-assing things and getting away with it creates a lot of avoidable mediocrity in the world, robbing others of the good that should have been and could have been. HotS is hardly the only example of that.
Have you said "It's just a game after all" to any of the many, many people who said they "love" StarCraft in the past? Why not? Love is a strong feeling and a big word, and it's just a game! Progamers devoting their lives to it? This site being up for 10 years? Masses of people spending hours over hours on it? It's just a game!
If nothing else, the disappointment follows from that love. Also, from the love for a good story in general, and the love for quality.
|
I know the reason behind why it was done, obviously to feature in a "cool" way a Terran unit from the game but also in connecting the storyboard concepts of the Viking, but the decision to feature this questionable and suicidal strategic move (yes I do realize this is reflective of Wings TvZ and Ultra switches) in this cinematic harkens back to the previous brand of storytelling of the last installment, and made me cringe on an otherwise enjoyable entr'acte (as we realize later this is some sort of nightmare or vision, so maybe you could argue that it's a creative license of sorts, but it still would be out of place as imagery from a the mind of fully matured adult
While I cringed at the Viking suicide tactic for the same reason . I find your point about adults having dreams without irrational actions off-base based on personal experience. Quite a few of my nightmares involve 3rd parties doing contrarian things just to force me to do things that are the opposite of what I originally planned to do in my dream (hence why they end up being a nightmare).
The other thing however is in talking about my interest in the possible psychological ramifications of being the Queen of Blades and PTSD, Blizzard didn't seem to deem this important to touch upon in the slightest. The only time you see this is from the opening cinematic, and never again. I can't help but feel this is a missed opportunity to explore something that games rarely ever do, the psychological ramifications of trauma (ME sort of did, but even there it was very cursory).
I decided to not buy HOTS because of the single player campaign and how Blizzard underperformed in developing Battle.net. But I was willing to change my mind on that decision if I saw the storyline improving for the better.
It didn't but as I was sitting through videos on the campaign I was wondering where Blizzard could've turned around the narrative and plot disaster that was Wings of Liberty and you are just making me realize this was one of their opportunities to fix the story.
One of the things Brood War establishes is that all zerg units are severed from the Overmind. This is why the Zerg even though they were defeated ALL OF THEM just rampaged on Aiur and still kicked the Protoss asses instead of some of them surrendering or retreating like beings with higher mental capacities would because most of the zerg are just animals that work on instinct. Anything that isn't similar to them is food.
Of course this also means the Zerg who do have higher critical thinking capabilities are also free to think in the manner they deem fit. That's why the Brood Wars happened. Eventually the Cerebrates and Kerrigan regained their composure and decided they would reunite the Zerg swarm under a new banner. Most of the Cerebrates decided the best way to do this was to merge and form a new Overmind but Kerrigan and a few other Cerebrates decided they would be top dogs and merge with no one.
Kerrigan since the beginning of Broodwar was performing of her own free will.
WoL contradicts this towards the end of the campaign when we see Nova I mean Kerrigan with Nova's face cry out for help from Jim. At that point they indicate human Kerrigan is trapped within Zerg Kerrigan.
That means Kerrigan has a split personality where the human side wasn't acting of her own free will.
If they had continued exploring the idea that Kerrigan had PSTD they could've confronted this discontinuity and have KErrigan reflect on the fact that she wasn't under Zerg control since Broodwar and she lusted for power. It still wouldn't make sense but by acknowledging this fact they could've made WoL ending more palatable by bullshitting us that while Kerrigan does have her own free will a part of her admired Jim's willingness to still try to be one with her even after all the betrayals and atrocities she committed. It's not uncommon for beings to have illicit thoughts they consciously don't want to have but their subconscious will bring up on occasion.
They could've exploited that quirk of human nature to make WoL a lot more believable.
This is supposed to be the turning point in the game, but there's something here that that Anita Sarkeesian is exploring in her Tropes vs Women in Video Games videos that I wanted to mention (I don't agree with everything she says, but there are a number of important things she talks about). I'm noting this because the emotional breakdown and lack of fortitude in the character development of Kerrigan at this moment seems to disempower her a lot, and subverts the idea that Kerrigan was one of the best ghosts in all of the Koprulu sector.
It's ironic you bring up Sarkeesian because your perception of this situation is flawed.
If we recall her explanation of "Woman in a Fridge" Kerrigan is given the same plot a male character is given to purposefully make them relevant again a stagnant storyline. The subversion to this trope is that since Raynor is man and not a woman it turns out his death was fake instead of permanent. If the genders were reversed Kerrigan would've stayed dead and Raynor would be trapped to play his part in an even shittier story.
For no apparent reason, Kerrigan is pissed to see Zeratul and initiates a fight. Wait, why? Sarah Kerrigan as a human never met Zeratul, so why is she so angry at him and starts the fight? Wasn't it Kerrigan that was always manipulating Zeratul to do her dirty work in Brood War? Didn't she even force Zeratul kill his own Matriarch? Shouldn't this be reversed? ....
Ripped the thoughts right out of my mind. This scene was so dumb.
So in looking over this material and understanding, a number of questions and possible outcomes immediately become impossible, or directly contradictory to this source material. These include the separate evolution of the Zerg, and even how they take the essence of others (in fighting, which is not what a parasitic organism does), any of Amons alterations, plans, or side experiments, the ancient spawning pool and the narrative treatment of is as a primordial and naturally indigenous thing, Zerus being a lush Triassic-like world, Zerg having psionic abilities and Primal Zerg not having a psychic link, and a host of other smaller problems surrounding these more primary of issues.
The only thing I forgot was that Zerus was an ash world. Something about the jungle was trigerring alarms but I couldn't figure it out. It's unbelievable how much of the previous game they are retconning and for no good reason.
What Blizzard should've done was instead of have Kerrigan track down Zerg on the homeworld that would've been barren of life, is to track down the Cerebrates that were never in the Koprulu sector in the first place. It was made abundantly clear that the OVermind sent out cerebrates with the explicit goal of finding any species that could help them combat the Protoss. It was made ambiguous if recalled all of its teams after the Terrans were discovered. Who's to say it didn't order some of them to continue with their normal goal of just finding new genetic strains to experiment with. They didn't just have to go back to the Koprulu sector to achieve their results. They could of stayed in the other sectors and increased the Swarms chances of finding new material faster than just wasting time going all the way to Koprulu from where ever else they were.
Of course this solution runs into the problem of contradicting a point made in the book after the Broodwar concluded that Kerrigan had hunted down and killed off every remaining cerebrate and some how the single one (we originally played as) that was under her command got assassinated *shrugs*. Yet Blizzard had no problem contradicting novels made explicitly to explain the Wings of Liberty campaign a few months before it came out. Nothing could stop them from doing the same for a book made years ago.
This also begs the more important question as to why Kerrigan doesn't or didn't know about Zerus already, removing the necessity of Zeratul in the first place.
This thought hadn't occurred to me. Good observation. Your article has been very good so far.
I also wondered why they in the cinematic had to show Mengsk and that he had acquired the artifact. I am left with the idea that, once its revealed why it was used in the first place, that Mengsk will inadvertently revive Amon, but that hypothesis is debunked almost as immediately as we learn of the artifact's purpose. If that's the case then, showing us the artifact preemptively like that, seems like it would undercut the final cinematic in that Mengsk isn't helpless. I originally didn't catch this and so the final cinematic was more impactful in the reveal, but in retrospect this decision seems in an odd place.
This touches on why I'm mad at Blizzard's writing. As much as I despise the retcons I understand how someone would want to tell a different story. What I found even less forgivable was the atrocious directing decisions in WoL. This level of incompetence harks back to how Blizzard undermined Finley's betrayal in WoL by having Mengk's voice acting as the voice in Tychus's head as he is released from prison "mysteriously."
There are other examples of this unrefined work like the way Duran was handled in Hots and that female Doctor in WoL. Blizzard has been so sloppy in execution its surprising that a decent number of the original team that crafted the SC1 and Broodwar are still doing this story today. It's like they lost the passion for their work and just only care about paying the bills.
Anyway, regardless of the logistics or back-story, I actually vehemently disliked this decision to bring him out of the closet and dust him off, as it felt like an incredibly cheap and lazy tactic on Blizzards part to try to curry favor with the older audience, or those who've played Brood War at the very least. Why couldn't you use a scientist who worked with Narud, like maybe work Branamoor (the head researcher for project blackstone) into the equation instead?
Well if Blizzard was smart they could've curried enough favor by giving us more cool sequences like the opening of HOTS (suicide Viking notwithstanding)
What I found painfully bizarre was that after all the CGI was done I still didn't see what the inside of hatchery was like. I still didn't get a sense of how Zerg infest machinery. They never once made a sequence in the Zerg environment. I just don't understand why they didn't think of it or did think of but thought it wasn't feasible.
We can also further extrapolate that Sarah Kerrigan is patient zero and that because the Overmind was killed so soon after her birth that it was never able to find a way of incorporating psionic powers into the swarm.
***Your memory of SC is wrong. The overmind did give the zerg psionic abilities. More specifically he gave them defenses against psionic abilities. That is why the Zerg invaded and were able to conquer Aiur.
It was explained in writing after the zerg acquired the kydarian crystals to power up these nascent defenses they acquired after assimilating Kerrigan. I maybe spelling that crystal's name wrong.
The first clue is that along with their marketing tactics and press statements, there is a less discussed and more subtle issue with their 'brand'. Their style of storytelling is specifically aimed at reaching and hooking non-adults (likely the 16 and younger crowd). This business practice in fact looks conspicuously like the tobacco industry who continually market to children because of the saying "once you get them early..." And this seems to be Blizzards modus operandi exactly, and can be directly witnessed in how their stories are presented to the audience. They lack depth, they use tropes of all kinds and clichéd techniques in every possible place they can, and generally lack the maturity and subtle nuances in behavior or character motivations, or story aesthetics.
I fully agree with your assessment that they are deliberately changing the story. Why they are doing it I don't agree with because pinning down motivations is a lot harder to achieve since you can't directly observe thoughts.
Personally I have my own suspicions on why they went this way but going into that isn't important. What is important is making it clear to Blizzard they have slipped a lot in quality and they are devalueing their brand with their sloppiness. They also need to be told that telling new stories is fine but if you want to do this you need to do one of two things.
1)just be upfront you don't care about the previous stories you established 10+ years ago and you want to go in an entirely new direction.
This would have some negative consequences but ultimately I don't think long term sales would be impacted as much among people who just focus on the singleplayer campaign and the story.
2) Make the new stories you want to make in a different game.
It's definitely expensive to make entirely new games but blizzard hasn't been afraid of making distinct variations of the same genre. They did come out with Broodwar and WC3 in close proximity of each other. They created a TCG and are now making a digital game taking advantage of what the digital space allows over meat space. They will still support WoW and will have Titan in the future.
Blizzard could've avoided being perceived as a less professional developer if the experimented with a new type of story in a different game.
|
On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:
Read most of OP, haven't read thread.
You leave out a lot of reasons to hate the SC2 story, you could literally fill a book with it. I've argued my brains out in in the HotS story discussion thread, but I'm pretty sick of doing that now. That thread is over 50 pages, I haven't read it since page ~36. On page 1 of that thread I made a poll which right now has over 1000 replies, and 54% of people responded favourably to the HotS story.
I don't understand it at all. It's like how at least 45% of the country will vote Republican in every Presidential election. Like, you have all the facts, the answer is clear, but you choose to remain wrong in the face of that.
There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me.
Maybe a new thread should be made were the goal is to see if people change their minds after we judge WoL and HoTs without the baggage of Broodwar and Starcraft.
There are a lot of things wrong with each both structurally when looked at as independent stories.
Maybe most people who are arguing against the badness of WoL and HOTS just look at the criticisms of retcon and not living up to previous standards and focus so heavily on that they completely ignore how sloppy the editing, writing and direction and even production has been even if they are ignorant of SC and BW.
It has been 10+ years since those games came out.
|
On March 23 2013 20:09 DaveVAH wrote:Show nested quote +On March 23 2013 19:33 Holy_AT wrote:On March 23 2013 19:03 DaveVAH wrote:On March 20 2013 21:58 wo1fwood wrote:
I'd also just like to quickly note that now that I have finished with my thoughts and whatnot, that it is unlikely I will write a review on a Blizzard title again. I can only handle so much critical analysis and especially in this instance, somewhat disenfranchising thoughts, and I know you probably have similar feelings regarding this. So I should apologize for what I had to do here as I felt it necessary to explain how unacceptable I've felt this kind of writing/execution is from a company that supposedly is one of the "best" in the business (they do so many things right, why not this).
Also this was intended to go in the Campaign forum, so I would request that it be moved there when that subforum goes up. Hell no I dont. Take your elitist bullshit elsewhere. I personally very much enjoyed the story and thought it was a big step up from wol. I say goodbye and goodriddance if you are moving on from reviewing anymore of these games, you are just not that good at it. i think the fact that you were already disjointed at blizzard for their latest releases has seriously hindered your ability to enjoy what they have released here (i could be wrong)
Yeb. I see so many of these critics of HOTS that when you dig deep enough with them on argiments start talking about the evils of activition and how D3 has ruined the good reputation of blizzard. They don't know or seem not to care that there are almost completely different teams working on these projects and chris metzen who made this story was also the story writer for sc1. It is not some evil activision dude in suite trying to milk peoples money with bad stories. Not in this case anyway. I really dont like postings such as this. Calling the OP Elitist who spreads bullshit after writing a carefully thought out thread with good formating pictures wordings and arguments is just outrageous. If you disagree with him, then formulate your points and explain them and provide facts why you disagree with him and why you think the story of hots is a good one. I think that for responds of this kind you should receive a warning. I do not mind if you disagree with the OP but I do mind the way you are doing it. You are not argumenting you are just talking down on him without providing any argument facts or real content. its 3 AM here and I cant ever hope to top a 10 page argument in kind. And it is wasted in team liquid since most seem to hate the story for some reason or another but you guys are very much a minority. Battle net forums, reddit, Amazon and metacritics all have high praises for HOTS so the story/campaign stands very well on its own without my arguments. OP's writing just reeks of elitism in my opinion and the fact that he went ahead and said "I know you will all agree with me here" really just tops that. He is preaching to the choir here and he knows it. Edit: it looks like even in TL you must have very strong dissenters to the idea that the story was bad so guys like this (quote below) are fretting openly about it. It is a highlight of a great story when it has strong and passionate defenders even in a very hostile environment. Show nested quote +On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me. You don't need to read this fucking novel of a post to know that the HotS/SC2 storyline was terrible, you just need a functioning adult brain and to have played through both games. If this post makes me sound extremely cynical, it's because I am. First, cynical about Blizzard for making this game and and insulting the consumer by pretending it's good. And second, and this the part that really, really makes me sad, cynical about how so many of those consumers ate this shit sandwich right up and asked for seconds. They then went on Yelp.com, gave the meal a favourable review, and downvoted and criticised any negative reviews of the same meal. FYI Gatekeeper. I am 29. I have read songs of ice and fire and most of G.R.R.Martins other books. I have played the baldur's gate series, planetescape torment, witcher series, sc1/bw and many others. The problem is most likely with you and not the quality of the material here.
Ratings and reviews are obviously taking multiplayer into account or even focusing on it, but that isn't what we're talking about here, most of TL seems to agree that HotS multiplayer is good. You smuggle in the false conclusion that everybody who praised the game thought the story was well written. I sampled through three reviews linked in Wikipedia and Metacritics and all of those had a word or two to say about the storytelling, some of these words being "silly" and "overwrought". The giantbomb.com critic who gave 100 out of 100 called the love story (which is supposed to explain nothing less but the whole motivation of the protagonist) "somewhat out-of-left-field romantic cheese". I'm not going to read all of them, but my random sample of three doesn't leave me with the impression that the popular opinion deems the story "great" as you claim.
|
Jims love/guilt for Kerrigan stems not from their brief time together but rather as Jim's reconciliation for the loss of his own wife and children. He needs to save kerrigan because he wasnt able to save so much else in this war.
Likewise Kerrigans fraility/vengence are based in her murder of her parents and the subsequent abuses of the confederacy. This is a frightened girl who was a monster before the Zerg ever found her. And in the swarm she found the family she never had.
TLDR: These are two broken characters whose actions reflect past injuries.
|
On March 21 2013 06:59 Xenocide_Knight wrote:Show nested quote +On March 21 2013 06:44 Splines wrote:Has the quality of the story really changed since Brood War?Do you remember this mission? + Show Spoiler +In it, Raynor and Fenix agree to attack the neutral nation of Kel-Moria, steal their minerals and kill their security guards. Fenix even mocks them for being 'greedy' because they stay out of the war and focus on economy instead, all the while stealing their stuff. Worse still, Fenix shoots a hole in their command centers so queens can enter and invest the miners allowing them to be used as involentary suicide bombers in the next mission. Woah. That's some seriously dickish move right there! If you can accept this as canon, without feeling that Fenix' and Raynors characters have been ruined forever, you can accept anything in SC2. This is the most character-breaking moment in the franchise by far. If this kind of disregard for storytelling was in SC2, the shitstorm would have been uncontrolable. I don't know if you're trolling but your description of that mission is laughable. I question if you actually know the story of BW, or even watched that video that you linked. Kel-Moria isn't a neutral nation, Fenix isn't mocking them, he's incredulous that they would still keep trying to mine resources instead of running when the UED are slaughtering everyone, Fenix helps infest the command centers because that would help Kerrigans assault, ... Just watch the video again. Also, explain exactly what you think Raynor and Fenix's characters are like. You want dick move? Protoss glass entire planets with billions of innocents on it just to slow down the zerg invasion.
Please don't throw the troll-card around if somebody has a different opinion.
Kel-Moria is neutral the same way Switserland was neutral during WW2. You can blame them for not taking a stand against an obviously evil nation going rampant, but infesting them is still 'not nice'. I bring this up because the 'Raynor steals artifacts from Tal'darim' has been thrown around a lot as how out-of-character and bad storytelling that was and this supposidly didn't happen in BW.
Protoss glassing planets was kind of the important character development of the Protoss as a whole in SC1. They initially didn't care about humans but Tassadar eventually rebelled against the orders of the Conclave and wanted his bretheren to see humans as more then cattle. Yes, that was a dick move, but the theme of the Protoss campaign is that they stop being dicks.
I think it's quite possible for you and others to love the Original/BW story more, but only because you like it's high points better then SC2's high points. All these topics about pointing out plot holes are looking at the wrong things to compare because plot holes have always been present and no Blizzard game ever made can stand up to this kind of methodical deconstruction. Never could, and probably never will. Go play Planescape Torment (again). Chris Avalone games, each time you dig deeper, you find more awesome!
Anyway. It's actually nice to see the reactions to HotS.
From the moment SC2 was announced, there have been a lot of people active on the forums trying to fuel a hate campaign against it. Their high point, and the low point of all SC2 forums intelligence was when they convinced everybody that HotS was going to be a full priced stand alone expansion. Saying HotS was going to be an expantion would get you branded as troll. Every 'fan' site of every gaming franchise i've been a fan of has been completely taken over by hate threads these last years. However, it seems the haters here are slowly running out of breath and some people seem to be getting sick of the constant negativity surrounding the community. HotS is getting a much better response so far. Maybe one day the general forums on teamliquid will be back to normal.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to see Day9 enjoy this game.
|
I'll say it again and I'm not ashamed. I enjoyed the story of HOTS. I had alot of fun with the campaign. The story isn't as BAD as alot of people are making it out to be. The story isn't great and nor is it good. It's decent. WoL's story was decent as well. The script could've been alot better, yes, but I enjoyed it for what it is.
Honestly, though, SC1 and BW story was also decent at best. It was a great story for its time but looking back at it now it was very simple but was executed quite nicely. Wasn't hard to understand at all. Yes, I've played the first 2 games.
The only REAL BIG disappointment for me as I said before in another post was how they handled Narud/Duran. It could've been done so much better and the payoff for the people who have played the first 2 games would've been great. They didn't have Narud/Duran mention anything from brood war. How he used the UED/Stukov and Kerrigan/Swarm to further his own agenda. How neither of them had the slightest clue and etc. That could've been done to further Kerrigan and Stukov's characters in some way.
The love story, yes, was cheesy but I guess you could say it was always hinted at back in the first game at some points but nothing major. We don't know what went down on the ship in between missions  but lets not kid ourselves.
|
[B]On March 23 2013 20:09 DaveVAH wrote:
its 3 AM here and I cant ever hope to top a 10 page argument in kind. And it is wasted in team liquid since most seem to hate the story for some reason or another but you guys are very much a minority. Battle net forums, reddit, Amazon and metacritics all have high praises for HOTS so the story/campaign stands very well on its own without my arguments. OP's writing just reeks of elitism in my opinion and the fact that he went ahead and said "I know you will all agree with me here" really just tops that. He is preaching to the choir here and he knows it..
Almost every review of the game highlights the story as its weakest point. You can like it, but that doesn't make it good. And holding to high critical standards doesn't make someone elitist, it makes them someone who wants to see things improve. Ultimately that is the purpose of criticism.
As for the somewhat blind defence of HOTS some people are coming out with, it's nothing but 'shoot the messenger'.
What is good about it, if the OP is so wrong about what he's saying? And no, 'I liked it' doesn't count as an argument.
|
On March 23 2013 19:00 Keldrath wrote:
I honestly think you put too much thought into it and hold it to a higher standard than you should, it's excellent for what it is and is supposed to be.
As for demographics, yeah you are right, the age of gamers has shifted, and that's because people never stopped being gamers once they started for the most part, so the people who were the 16 year olds back in 2003, are 26 year olds now, and still gaming.
This doesn't mean they aren't marketing to their target audience correctly because they are still targeting younger audiences, it's the idea that once they get the younger audiences hooked, they will continue being their audience into adulthood, whether or not the material is targeted at their age group then.
They "targeted me" with Diablo 1 , Warcraft 1 and later Starcraft 1 when i was 14, so following this argument i must assume that the dumbed down ones are not only the games but the new audience itself too.
But i disagree with this statement because a good and a well written story is for everyone ,regardless age or sex or what salt in your mind and now we are facing a retarded plot that litterally none can take seriously.
imho 
|
On March 23 2013 19:49 zimms wrote:Show nested quote +On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:Read most of OP, haven't read thread. You leave out a lot of reasons to hate the SC2 story, you could literally fill a book with it. I've argued my brains out in in the HotS story discussion thread, but I'm pretty sick of doing that now. That thread is over 50 pages, I haven't read it since page ~36. On page 1 of that thread I made a poll which right now has over 1000 replies, and 54% of people responded favourably to the HotS story. I don't understand it at all. It's like how at least 45% of the country will vote Republican in every Presidential election. Like, you have all the facts, the answer is clear, but you choose to remain wrong in the face of that. There were people in that other thread that argued to their last that the HotS story was good, using all manner of disgusting arguments that I don't even care to repeat here. For many of these wretched people, no amount of writing, discussion, analysis or evidence is going to change their minds. In fact, I'd be very interested to know if there is anyone that had a strong, favourable opinion about the storyline of SC2, read OP's entire post, and changed their minds. If there is even one person like that out there, it would surprise and elate me. You don't need to read this fucking novel of a post to know that the HotS/SC2 storyline was terrible, you just need a functioning adult brain and to have played through both games. If this post makes me sound extremely cynical, it's because I am. First, cynical about Blizzard for making this game and and insulting the consumer by pretending it's good. And second, and this the part that really, really makes me sad, cynical about how so many of those consumers ate this shit sandwich right up and asked for seconds. They then went on Yelp.com, gave the meal a favourable review, and downvoted and criticised any negative reviews of the same meal. Wow, so much hate. o_O I get the feeling that there's something entirely different bothering you in your life and you just use HotS as a vent. It's just a game after all. He should at least try not to call those who disagree with him "wretched people". And of course, normally shouldn't care so much about the fact that the majority disagrees with him. Whatever, after all.
These threads in TL don't even reflect the real force of appreciation that HotS is enjoying, because of two factors. First, TL is wildly elitist place compared to the average SC2 fan, and a lot of the nostalgia turns into belligerence every now and then. Second, the people who enjoy HotS just don't care enough to write full length essays why they do and what is so awesome about it, nor do they care to argue with those who seem so eager to convince the whole world how bad HotS is.
|
I love you reviews but I don't agree with you
|
On March 23 2013 19:10 Gatesleeper wrote:
Read most of OP, haven't read thread.Like, you have all the facts, the answer is clear, but you choose to remain wrong in the face of that.
Yeah, what the hell! People can't have other opinions! They can't enjoy something I don't!
|
Finally manned up to read the whole thing and may I say very well written and thorough story knowledge.
To me I believed in that there could be a love story, but it definitely exploded into what the entire campaign was all about and it made me dislike Kerrigan very much. She was cool man, now she's just a subject to love and revenge.
I don't really get why they would cleanse her from Zerg to then make her Zerg again, story-wise.
In WoL I thought it was some scheme of greater things to get an even stronger Queen of Blades, to infest Nova.
There wasn't a lot of epicness to this story and I think it very much took the Terran perspective of the Zerg, so I feel like I almost played two Terran campaigns in a row, god I hated that mission where you have to level Hyperion up.
That was not what you wanted to do, at that current stage, you wanna do Zerg stuff, not be a band of brothers helping each other out.
I'm a Protoss player and so I'm most in love with the Protoss side of things and I'm sure there will stuff actually happening in Legacy of the Void, actually some change to the settings of things.
I don't wanna be Zerathul getting help from Kerrigan and Jim Raynor to fend of Narud and his evil plannings.
|
|
|
|
|
|
EPT
