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Keep "my game is better than yours"-slapfights out of this. If the discussion devolves into simple bashing, this thread will be closed. |
On May 14 2014 08:31 Wombat_NI wrote:
Ken did you ever consider that perhaps it was more fun because of novelty, or indeed your age that just building armies and stuff was fun and engaging for you then?
I think I was 8 when BW came out, so surviving a BGH 3v3 and getting Carriers out was cool as !@#$%^&* in a way NO game can really replicate for me as a (relatively) mature adult.
I agree with this. AOE was the shit for me back when I was 10 years old. Today, I simply don't think 10 year olds are going to appreciate that thing as well. Times have changed and the genre must develop.
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On May 14 2014 10:56 Hider wrote:
I agree with this. AOE was the shit for me back when I was 10 years old. Today, I simply don't think 10 year olds are going to appreciate that thing as well. Times have changed and the genre must develop.
2 cents... the only reason why they don't appreciate AOE is probably because the graphics are worse.
In my experience, if the graphics are decent enough (or the person/child doesn't have experience with better graphics), then the major thing that matters is gameplay.
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On May 14 2014 05:40 imJealous wrote:
I think the BW/SC2 model is still very capable of producing an RTS game that can maintain mainstream popularity, its just a few small jarring things about SC2 that have kept it from being able to maintain the size of player base that it has the potential for:
- No universally accepted "BGH" mode (we have it now with the extension mods, but it came too late for most of it's target audience and there isn't a simple, highly advertised way to find such games)
- Abysmal, abysmal, abysmal team play maps!
- The way that smart-firing AI (no overkill), unit clumping from smart pathing, abilities like forcefield and fungal, and the bonus damage model in SC2 cause armies to disappear in a split second with little that a casual player can do to rebound from a mistake
Starcraft and Broodwar came out while I was in middle school and throughout my school years literally every one who played video games played Starcraft. Since SC2 has come out, every single person I played the game with growing up tried the game and ended up giving up on it for reasons that boil down to these same three points.
I don't think the points you raise are things that keep the casual/ less skilled gamers, who would be essential to mass success of an RTS, away from SC2. Everyone loves to complain about SC2 and argue that their main gripes are what keeps SC2 from having mass appeal. However there are far more fundamental factors that differentiate MOBAs and SC2 and make one have mass appeal and one not have mass appeal.
- not as strenuous and difficult to play
- easy to pick up
- not stressfully competitive
- team based (SC2 can potentially have this but maybe not to the same extent of teamwork that you get with a MOBA)
You can point to SC1 having a large player base as much as you want, but it was a different era of video games. Now we have casualized games for casual players, and franchises and games that are insanely popular. That's an enormous trend that has occurred since SC1 came out.
RTS and Starcraft can and will persist in some form, but my personal opinion is that there will not be mass appeal and there will not be a mainstream esport that can garner enough viewers to really be a profitable and thriving industry for all actors within it.
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On May 14 2014 05:01 urboss wrote:
Bad stuff:
- Lack of strategic depth
Stopped reading
+ Show Spoiler +play the game and get to challenger before u judge
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WC3 had no economy management per say. Starcraft also lacks economic depth compared to Age of Empires. That game you started with complete fog of war outside of your initial town center and you had to find resources by exploring. XD
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Don't forget, there are probably thousands of people that are playing SC2 for the campaign! Technically you could say they are still into the "RTS genre" - and selling a million copies in 48 hours is still a huge number
As far as "mainstream esport" goes though, yup that's a bit more complex.
I really like this quote (from here http://www.giantbomb.com/reviews/starcraft-ii-heart-of-the-swarm-review/1900-564/):
"StarCraft II might as well be two separate products in one box: the story-driven single-player RTS campaign, which is self-explanatory enough that anyone can play it, and a multiplayer mode so wildly fast-paced and complex that it's arguably the hardest video game, if not one of the hardest competitive activities period, to excel at on the planet."
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- Lack of strategic depth
Not gonna flame you but no. Drafting alone makes it strategic enough . I love both genre by the way
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But why a need to change?
I mean just because say monopoly is more popular does not mean chess should be more like monopoly. Both have their own appeal. The rts genre might be less popular now, but there's no need for it tonecome more moba like (which is kinda funny since rts is the parent of moba, which would make mobas technically a sub genre)
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On May 14 2014 13:18 levelping wrote:
But why a need to change?
I mean just because say monopoly is more popular does not mean chess should be more like monopoly. Both have their own appeal. The rts genre might be less popular now, but there's no need for it tonecome more moba like (which is kinda funny since rts is the parent of moba, which would make mobas technically a sub genre)
Oh you with your logic 
How do we get long winded threads with that bullshit?
Shush before people stop arguing about how apples aren't oranges.
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Lol. Well okay maybe to drop the dumb moba comparison and just get at his ideas for improving the rts genre:
1) single player with non-terrible story. I think sc2 has the "fun gameplay" down alright, but seriously the plot and writing seems like it came from fanfiction.net.
2) maybe a f2p model?
3) unit design - ideally units should feel interesting. One dimensional stuff like marauders and roaches should be avoided.
4) alternative economic models - Starcraft with its mining is the classic way of getting resources. However games like warhammer and command and conquer generals have all explored other ways to get resources.
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On May 14 2014 13:32 levelping wrote:
Lol. Well okay maybe to drop the dumb moba comparison and just get at his ideas for improving the rts genre:
1) single player with non-terrible story. I think sc2 has the "fun gameplay" down alright, but seriously the plot and writing seems like it came from fanfiction.net.
2) maybe a f2p model?
3) unit design - stuff
What scares people from RTS games is that there is a lot more stuff to do than that is on the screen. Its why lowbies are always taught how to "ignore the battle" to "work on mechanics" to "focus on macro."
Players who jump into an RTS they focus purely whats on the screen in front of them. The battle, the base building, etc...
However, people who LOVE playing RTS games play with the minimap in mind moreso than the screen in front of them.
To take RTS games to the next level, we need to bridge that gap between those two groups.
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On May 14 2014 12:01 frajen86 wrote:Don't forget, there are probably thousands of people that are playing SC2 for the campaign! Technically you could say they are still into the "RTS genre" - and selling a million copies in 48 hours is still a huge number As far as "mainstream esport" goes though, yup that's a bit more complex. I really like this quote (from here http://www.giantbomb.com/reviews/starcraft-ii-heart-of-the-swarm-review/1900-564/):"StarCraft II might as well be two separate products in one box: the story-driven single-player RTS campaign, which is self-explanatory enough that anyone can play it, and a multiplayer mode so wildly fast-paced and complex that it's arguably the hardest video game, if not one of the hardest competitive activities period, to excel at on the planet."
Totally agree with that quote from GB.
One of the things that the SC and SC: BW did was introduce the player to all the races and moreorless how they work. You really got to know the units in the campaign and what they were designed to be used for.
In SC2, it's not like that at all. We are being introduced to the different races in 3 separate games. They introduce a lot of units that are not used in multi-player or drastically different from what is used in multi-player. Then the fact that in Wings of Liberty you really only got to play terran, very little of protoss, and no zerg. In Heart of the Swarm, the mechanics of zerg are so drastically different from multi-player zerg and due to units having different paths they can take makes it hard to translate unit uses from single-player to multi-player.
And this is all a good and bad thing for players wanting to go from single-player to multi-player. The good thing is that this helps with single-player replayability and they get used to how some units are used. The biggest and worst part of this is not having all 3 races playable in single-player in one game. This would at least give players a chance to get familiar with units in a less stressful environment. I'd wager that in Wings of Liberty there were far more Terran and Protoss players than Zerg players in the beginning due to players being able to play those races in the campaign.
Onto the actual post, I never liked the ideas of hero units in RTS games. That was one of the main reasons why I found it so hard to enjoy WC3 multi-player. Then there's the idea of scrapping base building which for me is the one of the biggest things that make a RTS a RTS. The same goes for scrapping economy. The combination of macro-management and micro-management in my opinion is what makes RTS games so good. When one of those things is more diminished such as the macro which your idea would be taking away, I don't find it appealing.
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Waiting for the true successor to Warhammer 40,000: Soulstorm.
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On May 14 2014 13:42 Parcelleus wrote:
Waiting for the true successor to Warhammer 40,000: Soulstorm.
Sc2 is not too complicated at all.
You're mis-stating it.
SC2 is not "actually" complicated, but RTS as a genre is highly difficult to grok due to its presentation.
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On May 14 2014 13:46 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On May 14 2014 13:42 Parcelleus wrote:
Waiting for the true successor to Warhammer 40,000: Soulstorm.
Sc2 is not too complicated at all.
You're mis-stating it. SC2 is not "actually" complicated, but RTS as a genre is highly difficult to grok due to its presentation.
Yeah I deleted that line. It actually is a never ending learning process, I dont know if that called complicated tho or just plain fun which is what I find.
Sure I see where you coming from.
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On May 14 2014 13:48 Parcelleus wrote:Show nested quote +On May 14 2014 13:46 Thieving Magpie wrote:On May 14 2014 13:42 Parcelleus wrote:
Waiting for the true successor to Warhammer 40,000: Soulstorm.
Sc2 is not too complicated at all.
You're mis-stating it. SC2 is not "actually" complicated, but RTS as a genre is highly difficult to grok due to its presentation. Yeah I deleted that line. It actually is a never ending learning process, I dont know if that called complicated tho or just plain fun which is what I find. Sure I see where you coming from.
Yeah, I wasn't disagreeing with you
As someone who likes RTS games, I find it fun instead of complicated.
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i think developers have too difficult of a time monetizing the traditional RTS model with microtransations compared to mobas. if your goal is to make money then a moba is an easy choice.
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I'm worried about this now, too. I was bored and googled top rts games on google the other day. I already played all of them and they're old now. MOBAs have super taken over. There was a blog post on here a week ago saying the same thing. I've only ever played rts's and it's too bad they're on life support now.
It takes too long to get a game going on voobly and probably gameranger and steam for AoK and AoE HD. I hate the HotS units and stopped playing WoL when HotS beta came out. I would rather play bw on iccup than HotS. It's just a better and more fun game. I think a ton of other people lost interest in SC2 when HotS came out. It's too bad because WoL during beta phase I was the most fun game I've played and it's not even close.
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On May 14 2014 13:46 Thieving Magpie wrote:Show nested quote +On May 14 2014 13:42 Parcelleus wrote:
Waiting for the true successor to Warhammer 40,000: Soulstorm.
Sc2 is not too complicated at all.
You're mis-stating it. SC2 is not "actually" complicated, but RTS as a genre is highly difficult to grok due to its presentation.
BW had no trouble in Korea. We need to challenge the idea that RTS as a genre is not very audience-friendly and difficult to present. I remember the flak Husky got in the community for not being "knowledgable" enough - and yet he's the only SC2 caster who received a compliment from a family member of mine and who knows nothing about gaming. SC2 e-sports won't grow if it keeps catering to a misanthropic and socially-awkward minority.
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EPT
