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Northern Ireland26262 Posts
On March 29 2013 09:49 lachy89 wrote:
I have no idea how long you spent typing such a long post just to nit-pick. You probably should have spent this time doing something else. It's frustrating how society currently spends far more time complaining and bitching about miniscule and unimportant details.
It was a great game, a lot of interesting quirks, no two levels felt the same, some of the mastery achievements were difficult.
After reading your post I can conclude that you are a hipster that was looking for any flaw you could find while playing the game, get over yourself it was great.
It's frustrating how society frown upon actual well-founded, long opinion pieces with the 'you should get a life' riposte. Oh noes, somebody actually uses their brain and hands to formulate a proper review of kinds. 100x more preferable than people going on message boards and basically saying 'I agree' or 'I disagree' to everything with bugger all to back that up.
Gaping and nonsensical plotholes are not 'miniscule' details. Yeah they don't overly effect me, I tend to play for the multiplayer but it's annoying some of the ones that got the game primarily for the single player. There's a bit of nostalgia in me as well from BW, so it would have been nice for some of the plotholes not to be there, or at least the characters to display some consistency between the two games.
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Ok, so I decided to go ahead and post the Zerg History section from the manual so that people can refer to it more easily.
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Did wo1fwood do a Diablo III version of this "exposure" too?
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On March 29 2013 11:02 Daumen wrote:
Did wo1fwood do a Diablo III version of this "exposure" too? ...do you mean, did I do an exposé/review of D3? The answer is no, I did not. I like to look at or do reviews on games I play in my blog though.
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On March 29 2013 11:38 wo1fwood wrote:Show nested quote +On March 29 2013 11:02 Daumen wrote:
Did wo1fwood do a Diablo III version of this "exposure" too? ...do you mean, did I do an exposé/review of D3? The answer is no, I did not. I like to look at or do reviews on games I play in my blog though.
I checked your blogs, found the Skyrim one & mass effect, also Deus Ex, but no D3 ;<
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Just finished it then.
This post pretty much summed up my thoughts on it. The plot holes were wayyyyy too abundant and I hated what they did with Kerrigan/Raynor.
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Did the OP play SC1 and BW? Dont seem like it. Anyway i just briefly read parts and bits of it as i am of limited time atm but everything i saw from the OP make me wonder if he completly missed the story of this game from start to where we are today.
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On March 30 2013 00:05 SuperGnu wrote:
Did the OP play SC1 and BW? Dont seem like it. Anyway i just briefly read parts and bits of it as i am of limited time atm but everything i saw from the OP make me wonder if he completly missed the story of this game from start to where we are today.
er... please do read the whole thing when you have more time. I think you missed most of the content of his post. He clearly has played SC1 and BW.
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Really nice review. I agree with its great game play and fun experience but the stories and such never seem to be close to what they use to.
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That was....epic! Gonna have fun reading all of it at work!
I came to the part where he said there was no sign of any more romantic feelings betveen Jim and Sarah and frankly that is not true at all and most other stuff made me go "what? did you even listen to the story?"
He listed ALL of the interactions between Jim and Sarah in SC Vanilla-BW in text form. It is shown and explained very clearly that Jim and Sarah had a platonic/war buddy type relationship. Anyways I agree with this review entirely. Even though the GAMEPLAY and multiplayer is quite fun, the boss battles are lame and unoriginal, and the plot is honestly Twilight level horseshit. I really enjoyed SC1 for its storyline and felt it was quite eloquent by video game standards. To me, SC1 to SC2 has been like Star Wars OT, followed by Prequels where they butcher all the characters you came to love.
For those that say story doesn't matter in video games, just look at Bioshock series, Mass Effect (except that ending), Final Fantasy (before they became shit), Elder Scrolls, Fallout etc. People love video games, but they also love video games that tell a good story at the same time. Mario/Zelda games were NEVER about the story, all about gameplay, so that's fine. SC1 had a great, complex story with lots of backstabbing and interesting characters that develop. SC2 drops that for characters that flip-flop, are one-dimensional and entirely predictable. Yes, the gameplay is fine, the multiplayer is deep, the missions are varied in gameplay, but the horribly B-grade movie story is just disappointing
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On March 30 2013 00:12 levelping wrote:Show nested quote +On March 30 2013 00:05 SuperGnu wrote:
Did the OP play SC1 and BW? Dont seem like it. Anyway i just briefly read parts and bits of it as i am of limited time atm but everything i saw from the OP make me wonder if he completly missed the story of this game from start to where we are today. er... please do read the whole thing when you have more time. I think you missed most of the content of his post. He clearly has played SC1 and BW.
I came to the part where he said there was no sign of any more romantic feelings betveen Jim and Sarah and frankly that is not true at all and most other stuff made me go "what? did you even listen to the story?"
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Northern Ireland26262 Posts
On March 30 2013 07:20 SuperGnu wrote:Show nested quote +On March 30 2013 00:12 levelping wrote:On March 30 2013 00:05 SuperGnu wrote:
Did the OP play SC1 and BW? Dont seem like it. Anyway i just briefly read parts and bits of it as i am of limited time atm but everything i saw from the OP make me wonder if he completly missed the story of this game from start to where we are today. er... please do read the whole thing when you have more time. I think you missed most of the content of his post. He clearly has played SC1 and BW. I came to the part where he said there was no sign of any more romantic feelings betveen Jim and Sarah and frankly that is not true at all and most other stuff made me go "what? did you even listen to the story?"
He address that, go read it if you're going to disagree afterwards, by all means do so.
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As I have the uncanny ability to piece together plot holes automatically ion my head such things rarely gives me any pause in movies, books or games. Plot inconsistensies though is a whole other ballpark and unfortunately Blizzard excels at those too.
I have to say though that when Stukov appeared in HotS I actually hoped it would be Duran/Narud in disguise, there to make the story interesting again but I gave Blizzard way too much credit 
All in all this is an amazing post and it stated most of the things I disliked about WoL and HotS. Well written wo1fwood.
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One of the things I disliked was the notion of "gaining power". What kind of power? Psionic power? Military power? Speaking of power in those terms is like watching Dragon Ball Z. "Warfield, what does the scouter say about her power level?" That may be fine for Warcraft, but that isn't what Starcraft is about. Starcraft is about forming unlikely alliances and betrayal. Taking a bath on Zerus is not going to make invading the Dominion capital planet any easier. If there was talk about being able to command larger forces then it might have been more believable. A max supply limit that grows larger as Kerrigan increases her command over the Swarm may have been a neat mechanic for the campaign. Human Kerrigan is only able to control 100 supply of units, while acquiring allies can increase that limit higher. When she's QoB Kerrigan, it could go all the way up to 200 or 300. Gives a lot more of the swarm feel. Might have been better than just having an OP Kerrigan around in every mission, but I guess some people liked that.
Another thing is I felt Kerrigan was going at her revenge in the wrong way. The more she attacked Dominion planets, the easier it will be for Mengsk to rally his people under the guise that the Zerg are the enemy of humanity and that he is the only one that can protect him. It would only allow him to expand the Dominion's military power. In Wings of Liberty you went through a good portion of the campaign to broadcast the recording of Tarsonis and discredit Mengsk. Human Kerrigan and Raynor should have kept hammering that until Mengsk lost his power. The Dominion isn't Kerrigan's enemy. Only Mengsk is. WoL made it very clear that Mengsk was running the Dominion like a dictatorship and that he didn't have a lot of support from the masses (at least from the people on Backwater. The UNN reports were mainly for comedic effect but Lockwell could possibly have been the "true" voice of the people). The one thing that allowed Mengsk to keep his power so well was the threat of the Zerg. Now that the Queen of Blades was transformed back into a human, he wouldn't have anything to fall back on.
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Northern Ireland26262 Posts
I just can't believe they turned Raynor into a little lovesick bitch I mean, fucking Fenix, let's just forget that you killed him and billions others because I fancy you a bit? Come on
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my biggest problem was that it's really realy easy, even on brutal. The only map i struggled with was the one you name a "belia-clone" yeah i dont play WoW and boss fights like that, but every map which needed sc skills were super easy. I mean there are different difficulty levels for a reason, no? Blizzard is fully aware that a good chunk of his customers are actually fucking good at this game and should make the last difficulty level REALLY hard.
I havent played a single game for over a year and pwned the last mission with my first try... that's anticlimatic. Why did i bother thinking so much on the evolution pit choices, when they dont really matter since with any unit mix you can easily roll all the missions....
Massive write up though, so props on that
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I really appreciate your post, OP.
Starcraft II concerns more on personal feelings and love affairs, especially between our hero Jim Raynor and heroine Sarah Kerrigan, while Starcraft I is all about macro stuffs, the huge wars bursted among three races, the traitors, the strategies, the plots and so on.
It's an evolution of the game itself, due to the pure RTS games are not the mainstream these days. PC games are going into two extremes, cartoon-like recreational (like LOL) & more and more realistic (like Battlefield 4, CODs). Blizzard wanna attract as many people as possible, thus combine RPG elements in the HotS. It's just an inevictable trend that should be followed. The story itself isn't that appeal as Starcraft I any more.
It's really hard for the Blizzard to balance the personal emotions as well as macro storyline in the whole universe. Starcraft II HotS is okay with me, but I really hate the RPG-like Boss killing levels. It isn't RTS at all!
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It's an evolution of the game itself, due to the pure RTS games are not the mainstream these days. PC games are going into two extremes, cartoon-like recreational (like LOL) & more and more realistic (like Battlefield 4, CODs). Blizzard wanna attract as many people as possible, thus combine RPG elements in the HotS
I gotta disagree Its a "devolution" at best and its not because RTS isn't mainstream. They've never really been mainstream and therefore the best thing to do is appeal to the core audience you know you have secured just because you're releasing a major title in the very shallow game pool. From a business sense, it makes far more sense to at least hit your guaranteed targets and then try to grab a few from other market appeals as well.
The strategy of "combining RPG elements in the HotS" would be very counter-productive as well. By trying to make it more like an RPG in the design, you start alienating the strategists who bought the RTS for an RTS. What we see are a group who bought it for the storyline and then an overwhelming amount who bought it solely for the multiplayer and the fact we're being forced to buy this thing to keep playing. The point isn't the countless ways they've caused new unsolvable errors or server/lag issues with their multiplayer base, but its how they've completely demolished their own campaign storyline by ditching the old universe and making it into quite literally "All My Children" in space with worse love scene writing than we saw in Star Wars III.
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Your expectations of SC2's story were too high (mine were a bit high as well), and SC1 nostalgia is a bit too much. If one thing I would agree with, SC1's story was simple--too simple to give rise to contradictions.
However, it was also so simple that the story was basically done at the end of BW. Yes, I really wanted to know what happens next, but the way Duran tells it, the demons win. There's no reason to think, from all the SC1 lore about the Protoss and Zerg having such complementary strengths (Form and Essence, you could say), that the Terrans or Protoss would stand up to the hybrid. As to the Zerg, their goal under the Overmind always appeared to be to assimilate the Protoss.
As we know, BW ended with the Zerg under Kerrigan's control instead of the Overmind's, so there is room to wonder, "will the zerg end up teaming up with the T and P, just like the orcs teaming with humans vs the demons in WCIII RoC?"
Where I'm going with this is that there wasn't much story to tell without a bit of retcon here and there. Zerus isn't an ash world, it's lush. Well, good for us not having to see another Char. The varied mission objectives serve the purpose of teaching new players or players new to zerg. So too bad, Valerian gets the short end of that stick in looking like an idiot. Conjure me up a great idea to teach players to build a hatchery, mine minerals, and start building economy, when human Kerrigan is the star at the beginning of the campaign.
They have to work with constraints such as where the story left off in WoL, which is, for better or worse, more relevant than the 12 year old SC1 story.
A lot of the writing does meander though, and some lines I just don't eat up like I did in SC1. Still, a lot of that could be because I'm 30, not 15. Plus, I've gone through Mass Effect disappointment for months after ME3's release, slowly visiting their forums less and less, as it's become increasingly apparent that Bioware still stonewall on the real issues of the ending, instead providing fan service DLCs. At least Blizzard listens (look at new battle.net features such as clans and global play, as well as listening to pro-gamers on balance, etc., etc.). As far as storyline, maybe they listened a bit less, or maybe they just tried and failed, but they are still listening. The out of place references to Fenix or Duran I took as them listening, not fan servicing.
And honestly, as much as I would have loved to see a reference to Samir Duran, that would have made no sense to someone who only played SC2. "Who's this black guy with the beret?" they would wonder. The Fenix reference also fails in that sense, so you're basically screwed either way, since you risk confusing people who never played SC1.
TL:DR I agree the writing is weak a lot of places, but it's almost a waste of time to worry about inconsistencies with SC1, if they at least manage to be believable between three SC2 campaigns.
Also, expectations ruin experiences. You say you had low expectations, but wanting a lot amounts to the same result of being let down.
P.S. Admittedly, I began skimming around Spock, but I also read some things you say about whether Zerg have "psi," but you don't seem to account for the psi-disruptor of BW completely throwing the zerg into disarray. Granted, it didn't damage them directly, but I have to take the copout: it's one of those gameplay mechanic things where it trumps story.
That reminds me of another problem WCII, SC1, and WCIII all had: you achieve great success as one race, then you smash it down in the next campaign, making your previous "you" look like a tool. Case in point, the UED commander you "play" as in the BW terran campaign. I'm pretty sure if it was myself as the zerg vs myself controlling terran and zerg (the latter being the UED), the terran and zerg wins. But as we know, the campaign is meant to be defeated, not defeat the player automatically. This isn't JRPG where I resolve a personal matter and come back over 9000 and smash the uber boss who previously smashed me.
I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this, except I'm pretty sure you could examine the old games mentioned and find flaws of this nature, aside from them having relatively simple stories that are difficult to bungle. It's always a bit harder with sequels. Yes, I do like ME2 more than ME1, but not for its main story, and yes, I did like the WC3 story more than WC2, but that's mostly because WC2 was just some commander blaring at you your objectives, plus the human and orc campaigns were mutually exclusive (only one can be canon, or some blend if you're writing Deus Ex games).
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