EPTAmazing interview by kennegit, asking the hard questions and not just sucking up.
TL interviews Dustin Browder at Blizzcon - Page 22
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pezit
Sweden302 Posts
Amazing interview by kennegit, asking the hard questions and not just sucking up. | ||
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Audio
United States60 Posts
EDIT: great interview though, I mean the questions you asked basically affirmed my suspicions that blizzard is clueless.... | ||
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Zeon0
Austria2995 Posts
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Toadvine
Poland2234 Posts
On October 25 2011 18:50 m0ck wrote: This cannot be said enough: outside korea there has been no indication of protoss being the weaker race. No indication of Protoss being the weaker race outside Korea in BW? o.O In SC2 there's less and less of a division between "outside Korea" and "inside Korea" as more and more Korean players travel to international events, and more and more foreigners move to Korea to train and compete in GSL. And it's not like Protoss is doing especially well in foreign tournaments anyway. Even at Orlando like half the Top8 are Korean Terrans. | ||
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Unas84
Netherlands62 Posts
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Macabre
United States1262 Posts
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enzym
Germany1034 Posts
On October 25 2011 09:57 Pyre wrote: Good interview, worries me how clueless they act on stuff. How can you not think about how the game changes adding new units. Only adding because they are cool scares me. Yes they can be tweaked but by how much? On October 25 2011 11:12 dtvu wrote: Great Interview Kennigit. Dustin Browder sounds earnest in his attempts to make SC2 a great game. I think his points regarding the need to change the theme of each race with addition of new units to be lazy. For me Protoss should always be expensive, strong, highly technologically advanced; Terran is hard hitting, medium cost, defensive oriented; while zerg are fast, cheap and in large numbers. I agree with these posts, and what Dustin expressed in the interview is what worries me most about the direction of StarCraft. He said the following: 9:33 "You know, we don't think of the races as really tightly themed... If themes emerge, so be it." 9:53 "There's no way to add a new unit to this game without changing it, right? The race will change. It must change if we add any new units. If you want exactly the same game, please go play Brood War... By the very nature of changing units we will change the nature of the race." 10:23 "We are not as worried about specific character for the race. That's not what we're trying to do." I appreciate the honesty here, but I have numerous problems with this understanding. If races don't have a specific theme and feel to them, then what are they other than a name? What makes StarCraft other than the names in it? It loses its character. It becomes dumbed down, an empty shell. Just like dtvu said: Zerg used to be these creepy, evil aliens, but they changed into being just bug like and very superficially disgusting with WoL. They feel less alien and more like 'just bugs'. Less sinister and more like fancy toys. It changes not only the nature of the race, but the perceived atmosphere of the setting of the entire game itself. For my next criticism I would like to agree with dtvu again. Where is the reasoning demanding that the addition of new units must necessarily change the nature and concept of the race? Is that not what artists are there for - to ensure that new content does not break with the concepts and lore that was previously there? I, too, think that Blizzard is being lazy here. Of course the gameplay must change. That's uncontested. It's the purpose of new units. It keeps the content interesting if any great enough lack of interest justifies it and gives the developer better arguments to convince customers to continue to buy expansions. But the same cannot be said for the atmosphere of the game itself. They're killing their own universe, and that's fine, if that's what they want to do. But I prefer not only some consistency in setting, but I also prefer xenos over children's toys. The ease with which Blizzard seems to be able to completely disregard where their stories came from worries and disappoints me. This realization isn't entirely new, however. People have started to notice it as early as in WC3. It persisted through WoW (where countless elements of lore have been retconned for convenience as well) and has now been introduced into StarCraft, too. I just wish they'd handle their stories with more devotion and care instead of discarding them so easily. Asking people to go play Brood War instead does not address the issue, being an easy cop-out just as disregarding game history is an easy way to churn out new content. On another matter, some people have mentioned the Devs wearing Terran-shirts, proposing this as an indicator and reasoning behind balance decisions. I'd like to offer an alternative explanation. Maybe they're just wearing these because they are a Terran corporation, made up of human employees. Seriously guys, there is the possibility that it is just a t-shirt. ^^ | ||
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XsebT
Denmark2980 Posts
I especially liked the bit with: "Please go play brood war, coz it's awesome" - Dustin Browder. Of course the quote is taken a little out of context, but I actually admire that they're trying to make a new game. And considering how many people who like it, they're certainly not doing a bad job at it. | ||
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Hider
Denmark9324 Posts
Besides from that, Dustin Browder just seems like he is kinda unstructured in the way, that he has a lot of ideas, and think, "hey that could be cool, lets do that". Instead of trying to theoretize the potential drawbacks, and analyze it more indepthly. And if your profession is "starcraft 2 design", you should be able to that. But the kidna problem is that he just doesn't seem to really have a good grasp on what good design is. The only thing he seem to care about, is whether bad players can use the unit as well, but there are a lot more factors that decides whether the design is good or bad, and IMO Blizzard needs to define the factors that define good good design, and pull every unit through that list, before they add them to the expansion. If they do this intelligently, the beta of HOTS will mostly be a "balance-beta". What will happen instead, is that a lot of units will be taken out of the game, and other readded over the next months untill release, because Dustin Browder did not work systhematically (and test the units through the "good design"-conditions/definitions). And no, I dont they really have a well throught out definition of good design, because if they had so they would most likely have presented them for the community. Now they are just saying that they want to add cool units. Someone else mentioned that they did not like that Dustin Browder did not have an idea for how each race should be played, and I agree with that. I feel that each race should be kinda special in the way that "Terran immobile, but strong if well positioned". "Zerg mobile, weak/cheap units". "Toss, mediocore mobile, lots of microable units like storm"." But the problem with toss is that microable skills (like blink) doesn't make entertaining games in it self. There needs to be more than that, and their plan for toss just doesn't seem very well throught out unfortunately. | ||
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Steglich
Denmark282 Posts
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Grettin
42381 Posts
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EaryKing
Bulgaria158 Posts
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Twinmold
Sweden238 Posts
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ImustnotfeaR
United Kingdom154 Posts
thankyou for the creep tumors, the reason i picked zerg! you are a bald don | ||
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zYwi3c
Poland1811 Posts
We love you Kennigit. | ||
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Paladia
802 Posts
To return to the question, he says he wished every race was like that. However, he doesn't have to wish, as he is in charge, he can just make it happen. | ||
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Dectilon
Sweden50 Posts
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Pipeline
Sweden1673 Posts
Great interview! I got to say Im very worried about the state of zerg and protoss coming in to HOTS. I feel like zergs will have huge issues where they are all easy countered by terran. I dont like that burrow tech is becoming vital and how easy and fast terrans can counter it. Doing run-by strats will not work when you give terrans shredders (please remove them asap). It feels super weird that the two races with the least amount of units (zerg and protoss) get one or two removed and terran stays the same. As the situation is with PvT I feel its very weird and awkward by blizzard to remove the only real solid unit protoss have (Zealot), by buffing helions to some crazy shit transformer. I really don't get that. It feels again like terran is suppose to have the most units, the most army supply and the counter to everything. What stands out as the worst decision made by Browder and his team is the replicator. Who thought it was a good idea? That the counter to ghosts late game is for protoss to replicate ghosts to EMP the terrans ghosts first? Is the same logic applied to Infestors and NP? Is the counter to mass ghost late game for zerg to NP a ghost to EMP his ghost buddies to stop the massive snipes of broodlords, ultralisks, overseers, mutalisk and infestors? I don't like being negative, but I cant help to feel awfully frustrated atm. | ||
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FieryBalrog
United States1381 Posts
I really hope they get a fix on the ball vs ball problem. More importance on positioning and holding ground. | ||
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Blizzard_torments_me
Romania199 Posts
On October 25 2011 20:01 Pipeline wrote: Thanks Kennigit. Great interview! I got to say Im very worried about the state of zerg and protoss coming in to HOTS. I feel like zergs will have huge issues where they are all easy countered by terran. I dont like that burrow tech is becoming vital and how easy and fast terrans can counter it. Doing run-by strats will not work when you give terrans shredders (please remove them asap). It feels super weird that the two races with the least amount of units (zerg and protoss) get one or two removed and terran stays the same. As the situation is with PvT I feel its very weird and awkward by blizzard to remove the only real solid unit protoss have (Zealot), by buffing helions to some crazy shit transformer. I really don't get that. It feels again like terran is suppose to have the most units, the most army supply and the counter to everything. What stands out as the worst decision made by Browder and his team is the replicator. Who thought it was a good idea? That the counter to ghosts late game is for protoss to replicate ghosts to EMP the terrans ghosts first? Is the same logic applied to Infestors and NP? Is the counter to mass ghost late game for zerg to NP a ghost to EMP his ghost buddies to stop the massive snipes of broodlords, ultralisks, overseers, mutalisk and infestors? I don't like being negative, but I cant help to feel awfully frustrated atm. Stop whining you hypocrite, Zerg has the most powerful lategame atm. Ghost's are useless against ling baneling, if you'd actually get a support army for those broodlords and not make mostly broodlords you'd roll any ghost composition in late game. User was warned for this post | ||
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