[O] Dustin Browder Interview - Page 3

On May 09 2009 14:00 nataziel wrote:
Awesome answers from dustin here, he seems to be finally understanding what the competitive players want. He knows what players don't like at the moment and is trying to fix them (e.g: trying to find a solution for hte gas mechanic, he knows it isn't working) This kind of stuff shows they are listening to the community, which is the best thing imo.

On May 09 2009 05:27 Aesop wrote:
Q: In paris we noticed that the AI opponents play extremely strong at the highest difficulty setting. Are they cheating?
A: Yes, on the highest setting "insane", the AI profits from additional resources. On all other settings, the opponents do not cheat. [...]

On May 09 2009 05:27 Aesop wrote:
Q: In paris we noticed that the AI opponents play extremely strong at the highest difficulty setting. Are they cheating?
A: Yes, on the highest setting "insane", the AI profits from additional resources. On all other settings, the opponents do not cheat. [...]

On May 09 2009 05:27 Aesop wrote:


Q: Apropos huge armies. In comparison to its predecessor, you are allowed to select many more units in Sc2. And that's great. But still, some game concepts seem antiquated, for example the 3D camera that does not zoom out very far. Or the production queue that can only hold five units. Why did you change unit selection but kept the other elements the same?
A: There is a quite obvious reason for the camera position. I am not a big fan of zooming out very far from battles. In other games, this might work out, but not in Starcraft. There is so much Micro that the battles would look confusing if you could zoom out further. Also the atmosphere would get lost - the units would transform into tiny symbols and you couldn't recognise anymore, how diligently they are designed. The feeling of fighting for a distinctive faction would get lost - and just in Starcraft, with its three characteristic races! Zoomed out very far, those battles would degenerate to a feud of ants. This might be appropriate for games like Supreme Commander, which are fully geared towards the zoom function, that have huge maps on which the units traverse very long distances. But Starcraft works differently: It happens faster, matches often last only half an hour. A zoom function simply wouldn't fit in.

On May 09 2009 18:00 Klockan3 wrote:
Just don't play on highest if you do not like a cheating AI, also the AI cheated in sc1 and in wc3 and in almost every RTS you ever played.

On May 09 2009 17:50 Aesop wrote:

Do you mind the AI cheating or do you find it implausible that the AI is not cheating at other difficulty settings?

On May 09 2009 18:00 Klockan3 wrote:

Just don't play on highest if you do not like a cheating AI, also the AI cheated in sc1 and in wc3 and in almost every RTS you ever played.


Do not read things out of context please, if you look you see that he discussed supreme commander just before so what he meant is that in starcraft most games ends before the 30 minute mark(Which is unlike supcom). Larger army limits as in supcom are therefore not really necessary (According to him) and might even be a bad thing since it can allow games to last even longer with people just building and building just like they do in supcom.

Q: But the day-night cycle and the weather effects wouldn't have any gameplay effects?
A: We talked about it, and even tested it, but the answer's: No. We do not want maps with differing rules. Just imagine a snowy area in which ground troops move more slowly. That would completely revert the balance. The Zerg would suffer a lot, since they are highly dependant on their speed. Or imagine rainy maps, on which the sight-range of flying units is reduced. The balance would be shaky and we would have to rebalance the races just because of the stupid rain. That might be an interesting idea for the future, but at the moment we don't want it.