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Blizzard Announces StarCraft 2
We'll be returning once again to the world of StarCraft, it appears, and not in the form of a Massively Multiplayer game. Blizzard has announced StarCraft 2 at their packed event in Seoul, South Korea. IGN is liveblogging the event, describing gameplay footage being played as well as full cinematics. From the description of ongoing events there are massive changes to the way the game plays, new units, a physics system within the game engine, and the capability to show over 100 units onscreen at a time. "Showing gameplay footage - Looks like protoss ships - floating over asteroid/ base structure - entering protoss ase - similar looking buildings - vespene gas still in the game - character pane shows up on right side - some protoss guy - shifts to terran bases floating on rockets over same type of territory - sill collecting crystals as resources - marines load out. Dustin is actually playing the game - nothing in the game is final." Additional coverage from Milky at 1up.
...welcome our new ZERGLIasddAS24Y6JNGG-G--SAD9ODASIDAS98244128990WQA
NO CARRIER
?giS
Excellent, so glad it isn't a StarCraft MMO as rumoured.
What I want to know is, will it have a Heroes model (after Warcraft III) or will it drop back to a more traditional model of RTS (just units). Or will it have an entirely new hook? I hope it follows after Warcraft III's model.
However, the reports of having hundreds of zerglings makes it seem like it might be more of a macro scale RTS.
Even SC2 beat out Duke Nukem Whenever...
I only hope that Blizzard won't try to mix&match genres in an attempt to gain wider audience. The fact that in WC3, the game degenerated into Hero rush is what kept me from playing it.
They should look at the original Ground Control for an idea of a good strategy game
A simple WOOt! is in order I believe.
They make me all jangly inside!
KEKEKEKEKE ZERG RUSH!
The Protoss mother ship (from IGN's Charles Onyett):
3:18 - warprey also very effective against structures - very vulnerable to small unit fire - shws warpreys getting wiped out by terran marines. Physics system lets debris from warpreys roll down a ramp. Showing one more unit - warped in in a serious of cubes - giant floating base - called a protoss mothership - can only have 1 at a time - cost big resources - special abilities include timebomb that slows all enemy missiles inside - shows terran missle launcher shooting in projectiles that stop in the field before they reach the ship - when field ends missiles drop the ground - planet cracker attack - giant lasers stream from ship to ground - ship can be moved around while planet cracker laser is active - the ship looks like a metallic, triangular sand dollar - mothership can create a black hole anywhere it wannts to - creates distortion that actually sucks ships in and destroys them - in the demo the black hole destroyed four terran battle cruisers in about ten seconds.
"Screw Sun, cross-platform will never work. Let's move on and steal the Java language." - Visual J++ Product Manager
....Or was that "My life for Aiur!" I could never tell what those damn zealots were saying.
If Star Trek had the internet: Captain, we've received an IM from the romulans. "Surrender or be destroyed. LOL. o.O"
P.P.S. I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
In other news, the rest of the world released a huge sigh of relief as the Doomsday Clock was turned back. A spokesman for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists was quoted as saying "A Starcraft MMO could have ended it all. We may never know how close we came to the complete and utter destruction of society as we know it."
StarCraft is back for more. Will my academic career survive this time?
Here
"Screw Sun, cross-platform will never work. Let's move on and steal the Java language." - Visual J++ Product Manager
Honestly, Blizzard could learn a lot from Relic (the developer of the games you mention). Relic somewhat quietly revolutionized the RTS seven years ago with Homeworld, only to watch the market quickly return to Warcraft mechanics, with Blizzard capping the return in 2002.
If Starcraft 2's going to be a Warcraft 3 with pylons, so be it; it'll probably sell millions in South Korea, and I don't doubt it will be a fine update of the balancing act that was Starcraft. Without something really new in the way battles are fought, though, I just can't imagine myself being that excited.
Your mind is clear / The things that you fear / Will fade with how much you / Believe what you hear
IGN has posted screenshots here.
Looks incredibly cool graphically, though at the moment it looks like the gameplay is exactly the same as StarCraft. I wonder if there'll be some gameplay announcements soon.
I was amazed at this announcement but upon closer examination of the screenshots, it looks like it doesn't have anything new over its predecessor. Buildings and units have the same size relation as before, it doesn't seem like you can zoom in/out, very similar units.
It would be disappointing it it didn't have some revolutionary features and a great story.
You're the second person who's said that but it's obviously untrue. Blizzard have now announced Starcraft 3, whereas Duke Nukem Forever was announced a long time ago. They've now showed intitial versions of the game, that are subject to change. Duke Nukem Forever did that a long time ago. Neither game has been released.
I imagine by now my post might not be read, but here goes.
I have been a fan of Blizzard for years, still am really. I put faith in the quality of their product, but I am concerned with a concept they themselves essentially created.
Custom User Interfaces. With the advent of World of Warcraft, I wonder why it had not been developed before. For those who are not quite following me yet, let me indulge you.
World of Warcraft features an almost 100% customizable User Interface via the use of XML and LUA. The only real restrictions are ones which could possibly cause you to gain an unfair advantage over your opponents. Granted, the "convenience" itself can add an advantage, but Blizzard is more concerned of causing things that were not originally intended to occur, that drastically imbalances the playing field. After using their customizable UI for years, I find myself dependant on such customization.
My concern is, will they impliment a method for customizing their UI to the degree that World of Warcraft saw? I for one would be in favour of such a design. Consider that there are little shortcuts, and little nicities that Warcraft 3 had over Starcraft 1. Things such as pressing tilde to select any idle worker, or pressing the "forward" and "back" buttons on new-er mice to cycle through different types of units. I would be eager to see how much of an impact customizing the UI in a RTS of such calibre would have.
Or at least, that's what my kids (all have played Starcraft) said when I mentioned this to them, quick to point out that the Starcraft:Ghost project was delayed so many times it eventually died.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
>>it seems that they decided not to mess with a winning combination
If it ain't broke, why fix it?
Seriously, Starcraft is an RTS, and to make it anything else in the main series (As opposed to a spin-off or a side-game)
would be an insult to the millions who play Starcraft.
I am likely going to preorder this anyway.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJB-Z54R61s
We are Turing O-Machines. The Oracle is out there.
I, for one, welcome our new Zerg overlords.
*whisper: dude, we don't have any overlords*
SPAWN MORE OVERLORDS!
Jim Raynor's end quote in Korean: "What took you so long?"
games journalism blog
I'm entering "long, pseudo-philosophical rant"-mode here, so caveat lector:
Improving StarCraft is like improving chess - arguably possible, but hardly without upsetting a lot of people. StarCraft is still being played today because as a game, it's one of the most polished and consistent experiences available. It's not truly "real-time", it has little to do with "strategy", it is certainly not trying to be realistic and the graphics suck by today's standard - but that's also true for poker and darts. I feel most of the comments calling for Blizzard to "look to Title X" for new ideas for StarCraft 2 are a little misguided. StarCraft's gameplay is in a class of it's own, people will buy it because it's StarCraft. And they will buy it because StarCraft -even in its current form- is just a damn good game in it's own right. It's just imaginable that, a hundred years from now, people will still enjoy slightly enhanced versions of exactly the same formula, just like we enjoy back gammon thousands of years after its original form was created.
That game looks totally different than the in game video release several years ago........9 6053569246
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-39801657
I fear the Y2038 bug
While I see some complain that Starcraft2 is just like Starcraft, I rather think that's just one of it's strengths. I would *hate* to have seen a completely 'revised' starcraft where one could hardly see any link with the old game. Let's face it; it may be true that Blizzard is (much like EA) a rather commercial company (well, they all are, but you know what I mean) who mainly goes for established and proven concepts, and doesn't come up with something daring or original - one must acknowledge they hit the spot with Starcraft. It was one of the best games of the genre in its time. Ah, the wee hours I spend on it (including broodwars). I'm not saying it was perfect (there were some missions who were rather tedious and boring), but all in all it was a great game - and even until this day I play it now and then (I bought it again for 6 euro or so last year; a real bargain, since it STILL looks reasonable and remains as enjoyable as when it came out).
So, yes, Blizzard isn't really an innovative company and only bets on sure moneymakers, and their Starcraft2 is much like Starcraft, only with prettier graphics, a new story, new units, new AI and physics...but really, isn't that new enough for something that already was a superb game (and, as Blizzard well knows, a huge succes)? I think *many* more would complain if Blizzard had taken Starcraft into directions that completely deviated from the old game, frankly. Imagine they made a MMOG out of it...that would have been completely awful (just as when Beth would make the next TES game into a MMOG; a big mistake - though in that case, multiplayer for 4-8 friends to play in it would be cool). All in all, Blizzard did well not to tinker too much with the concept of the game itself; a huge fanbase would be more inclined to turn their backs on them if they would be *too* cavalier in changing an already established and loved game.
That said, I would like to see Blizzard and EA try out something really innovative with a new game, though. It's a bit sad such huge companies dare less then other, often far more smaller game-developing corporations. Yeah, I know; going for the easy money is always...well, easier. But I can't imagine the game-devs themselves wouldn't like to tackle and try out something totally new too, even in those companies.
--- "To pee or not to pee, that is the question." ---
I really appreciate the fact (judging by the visuals) that they have seemingly concentrated on making things aesthetically pleasing, rather than technologically demanding, as so many new games seem to.
This means it should be fairly scalable to lower end PC's. Complete opposite to say Supreme Commander which kills even high-end computers, yet isn't exactly great looking - infact it looks worse than 10 year old TA on anything but the highest settings!.
Blizzard did the same with WC3, which ran nicely on my low end laptop back in the day and still looked nice. Kudos to them for putting gameplay, and true art ahead of 'graphics technology'.
http://www.starcraft2.com/ now up
The point about style that you made is probably why everyone remembers Starcraft, while Total Annihilation is practically unknown to most gamers today. While I'm sure most of us can agree that Starcraft was a technically inferior program, it was much more memorable for its style, appearance, and story. Total Annihilation, meanwhile, was a game far ahead of its time, and it got left in the dust because it had zero personality. Total Annihilation's gameplay was and continues to be top-notch, even surpassing Supreme Commander in a few respects. (Namely in unit diversity and pacing.) It had features most RTS games don't have now, and that was ten years ago. The problem is, there was no 'coolness hook' - no real style - to draw you in unless you really, really appreciated the gameplay and the feature-set. In today's world of pretty lights, convoluted storylines, and stylishly dressed feature characters, games like Total Annihilation and Supreme Commander are just too difficult for most gamers to appreciate.
That's not to say they're both not completely incredible games, which they are. They're just totally square in spite of being so awesome.
"Starcraft in 3d in Directx 9 with particles systems and a few minor tweaks to the gameplay."
I'd buy that for a dollar!
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
The reason though why they have been dropped is largely because it actually took a lot more time creating sprites than 3D models.
c reens looks very nice, but hasn't yet been released.
You needed to build a 3D model, animate it, render it out for every angle, then compile the sprite. A real pain in the arse.
I too though, personally, would like to see a few more sprite based RTS games. Purely for the amount of units you could have on screen at once without worrying about lag, esp on lesser PC's.
I recently discovered a game called SunAge, it's an old school sprite based RTS, but using newer rendering technologies.
The official site is here: http://www.vertex4.com/sunage/index.php?section=s
Chess is still popular, as are countless board games - all of which are positively 'ancient' - if they have got away without changing the formula, why should video games be any different? If it ain't broke don't fix it. At least video games have the ability to improve visually and evolve story wise with time, justifying fresh builds.
i'm starting grad school next semester. i hope to god that sc2 is delayed long enough for me to get my phd.
chillax137
This is simply not true. Games for Linux may be more viable than, say, 5 years ago, but it is no means a trivial endeavor to create a cross-platform game that spans Linux, Mac, and Windows. And the Linux desktop market share is still so small there is very little chance it would be profitable. I doubt the profits would even pay for writing an installer RPM, writing Linux-specific documentation, and manning the Linux support calls.
And the fact that all three OS's have x86 implementations doesn't help as you might think. Sure, you might be able to have sections written in assembly that can run in all three targets, but game developers don't need to muck nearly as much as they used to (CPU's are faster, compilers are *much* improved). On the other hand, API's and middle-ware tools are becoming more and more prominent, and depending on which ones you choose and it can have a bit impact on portability.
On the other hand, the bnetd thing *does* piss me off, and I share your frustration. At the time Bnetd was written, battle.net was a horribly broken mess. Bnetd was less of a vehicle for cheating than it was an workaround for when battle.net was down. Honestly I think that Blizzard was embarrassed at being one-upped by a group of part-time OSS hackers.
It appears the good ole days of the RTS are back. C&C 3, Supreme Commander, and now StarCraft 2. Throw in some very good newcomers like Company of Heros, and it's the best time to be an RTS gamer since the 90's.
The official site is up now too, with screenshots and movies.
(blatant plug: mirrors of the movies available here (Australian mirror))
This is not just a gimmick, it can change a lot the way you think about defenses and choke-points.
There are huge improvements in the armor/damage type that changes the balance a lot. The scale _is_ different, as you'll see that there are hugely more Zerlings and very few Battlecruiser-scale units in a scene, and it _was_ a balanced fight. You can also see at some point a four or five level see-saw when similar sized groups of a certain type of unit were slaughtered by another kind, which in turn were slaughtered by another kind (all groups of about the same size). Which means you have to think very well of tactics, too.
The difference in build strategy is significantly changed by new ways of extending the Protoss psionic matrix, and I'm convinced similar updates to the other races will make them even more different. (It's clear from the videos that the Terran buildings' move ability is used to good effect, there was nothing shown about the Zerg though.)
Granted, these are not huge, fundamental changes. It's probably on the scale of the changes between the Diablo games: nothing fundamental, but it amounts to orders of magnitude in fun and complexity.
And yes, you can zoom and apparently look around things. I for one can't wait to try the "commando" missions inside buildings and huge ships, or the RPG-like missions like the bonus maps for Warcraft III. Maybe even some planetary-scale sterilization from orbit as in the books :D
"I think I am a fallen star. I should wish on myself."
Never anticipate any dramatic changes in SC2. The reason is simple: Blizzard has little reasons to take the risk to ruin a well designed game SC1 together with its dedicated Korean players community+tournament. They would benefit more to incrementally improve on SC1 and grow the community rather than redesigning it. Besides, I think SC1's design is on the right track, so incrementally building on it wouldn't be such a bad idea.
I am still cautiously optimistic because the "wow" factor would be relatively low comparing to SC1 yet I am eager to see what changes Blizzard has/can make to the original SC1. Being one of Blizzard's most successful franchise and the 10th anniversary of SC, let's hope they deliver what SC2 deserves and not result in disgrace.
Although I have nothing to do with the torrent myself, I should note for the benefit of those who are finding starcraft2.com to be sluggishly slashdotted, all the "good stuff" from the site is available via BitTorrent.
Enjoy.
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
in the english trailer he says "Hell, it's about time"
Soon as I saw the announcements I ran to starcraft2.com and read everything as much as I could about the game. You're pretty limited at what you can see, and the only race with a wee bit of info are the Protoss. As someone who got the original the day it came out (best April Fool's day, evar!) I'm been a rabid fan for years. But looking at all the preliminary info I just get this feeling that it's SC1.5 instead of 2. Yeah it made the leap to 3D graphics (whoopty-doo) but there's still only the 3 races, no new Hybrid that I and bunches of others have been expecting. I know this is still really early to make any calls on and looks like another fantastic, awesome Blizz game, just throwing my two cents in. PS. Please Blizz, keep this as a strategy game and don't try a "RPS" or whatever WCIII is.
Yeah - I'm with you on that. The 0.8% of the market that wants their operating system for free are all going to rush out the stores to buy their $59 retail editions of the game instead of downloading the torrent 3 weeks before the game is even released.
I totally agree - Blizzard should produce a Linux version of this game, but the market just doesn't justify the expense. It's unfortunate, but true. If Propellerhead Reason, Visual Studio 2005, Half-Life 2 and Starcraft 2 all had official Linux releases, I would never touch a window's machine again. If Linux eventually manages to take a significant chunk of marketshare, like Firefox has managed to do, we'll see official Linux releases, but I can't see too many businesses putting in the effort before that happens.
I was done with PC gaming. I had picked up a Wii to satisfy any semi-casual craving for gaming. My last windows PC was transformed into a sexy Ubuntu + Beryl box. I told myself that not even Spore or Team Fortress 2 could bring me back. I was out, man. No more buying more RAM, Multi-Core CPUs, or overpriced video cards on an annual basis. But then they had to do this...
Anyone know where I can get a good price on a nvidia 8800?
i should hope that one can pick out a bunker, muta, ling, and marine. there are some units that you just can't do away in starcraft. those are some of them. and its kinda hard to make them look like something else. also if you took a look at the starcraft2 site, they have some info on new toss units up, and the way it looks, is that toss gets a shift in their style. the arbitor teleport is completely upscaled, my favorite unit has a new name, and bigger guns. I admit, my wishes for sc2 are probably diff from some others (keep population cap at 200, if it means lower the graphics, keep the game micro based, keep the 'traditiona' race roles, etc etc), but basing your crtitism on the fact that returning units look like the originals, from early screenshots, which were probably chosen for the fact that they don't too too much, and that also don't show gameplay mechanics, seems like a poor decision.
This is NOT flamebait, this is the sentiment of millions of gamers. I strongly prefer the starcraft style of gameplay to the warcraft 3 style.
I too hope it does not have the heros, they're the reason I grew weary of wc3 in a week instead of the 4 years I played sc.
I'm excited to see Blizzard do something outside of WoW again. There was a lot of skepticism as to whether they would ever do anything else again, since WoW's enough laurels for any company to rest on. Seriously, Blizzard has been the most consistent gaming company in terms of quality, it's nice to see them come back. Hopefully they still have the touch.
I have to think the game marketshare of Linux is running neck and neck with Apple systems. Blizzard is showing that it is worth it to port to MacOS, so why don't they also feel the same about Linux?
The Linux game market is *not* all those willing to buy a native Linux port of a game, it is *only* those who refuse to buy a Win32 version and dual boot or emulate. If a company does a native Linux port it needs *new* sales to justify it. Cannibalizing existing sales, having a person buy a Linux version instead of a Win32 version, does not bring in any new money. It loses money, they got the same sale but they spent more money getting it. The majority of Linux gamers dual boot or emulate, until that changes the Linux gaming market will not be viable - Linux gamers are already paying customers via the Win32 version.
Historically the Mac side was a very different story. Dual boot was not an option until recent times, and emulation was not practical for games - the CPU, not just the APIs, needed to be emulated. So Mac gamers had to have a native port. This made the Mac gaming market viable. If anything has changed, it is not Linux becoming more viable, it is Mac becoming less viable. If Mac gamers begin to dual boot or emulate, so that they more gaming options, then they will create an environment where developers will find it more profitable to reach Mac gamers via the Win32 version as well. One version (Win32) to rule them all (Win32, Linux, and Mac).
A secondary but non-trivial problem with targeting Linux, support. Targeting Linux is not like Mac where you have one platform, or two if you still want to target PowerPC. There are many Linux distribution, your code and/or installer may need to be aware of some of their subtleties, your support personnel surely will need to be aware. These support people may even need to be more technically inclined than Mac support people, on second thought that's a given isn't it? Your quality assurance testing matrix just ballooned from Win2K, WinXP, WinVista, MacOS X Intel, MacOS X PowerPC to the former plus Fedora, Debian, Ubuntu, SUSE. Doesn't seem to bad at first glance, but keep in mind the much smaller return that the latter four provide. All this support and qa effort *must* be paid for by the Linux gamer subsegment that refuses to buy the Win32 version and dual boot or emulate.
The Linux gaming market is not really viable yet, at least for large developers. I wish this were not true, but it is. Recent events like the Apple Intel migration have not really changed the situation. I'll address some good questions that came from a troll thread.
Supporting Mac OSX on X86 and not supporting Linux is nothing short of Laziness now.
You are mistaken. The migration from PowerPC to Intel has not made a Linux port one bit easier. It has made the Mac market more important as a greater percentage of Macs are now viable gaming systems, especially on the laptop side.
Mac games are not *nix based, they still use proprietary APIs like Carbon and Cocoa to some degree. Also a company like Blizzard that has been supporting Macs for over a decade surely has some internal libraries that are pretty Windows and Mac specific as well. The source code to Mac based games is not really any more compatible with Linux than it was before Apple's Intel migration. All that has happened is that assembly language / SSE from the Windows side does not have to be rewritten in PowerPC / Altivec.
I have to think the game marketshare of Linux is running neck and neck with Apple systems. Blizzard is showing that it is worth it to port to MacOS, so why don't they also feel the same about Linux?
The Linux game market is *not* all those willing to buy a native Linux port of a game, it is *only* those who refuse to buy a Win32 version and dual boot or emulate. If a company does a native Linux port it needs *new* sales to justify it. Cannibalizing existing sales, having a person buy a Linux version instead of a Win32 version, does not bring in any new money. It loses money, they got the same sale but they spent more money getting it. The majority of Linux gamers dual boot or emulate, until that changes the Linux gaming market will not be viable - Linux gamers are already paying customers via the Win32 version.
Historically the Mac side was a very different story. Dual boot was not an option until recent times, and emulation was not practical for games - the CPU, not just the APIs, needed to be emulated. So Mac gamers had to have a native port. This made the Mac gaming market viable. If anything has changed, it is not Linux becoming more viable, it is Mac becoming less viable. If Mac gamers begin to dual boot or emulate, so that they more gaming options, then they will create an environment where developers will find it more profitable to reach Mac gamers via the Win32 version as well. One version (Win32) to rule them all (Win32, Linux, and Mac).
A secondary but non-trivial problem with targeting Linux, support. Targeting Linux is not like Mac where you have one platform, or two if you still want to target PowerPC. There are many Linux distribution, your code and/or installer may need to be aware of some of their subtleties, your support personnel surely will need to be aware. These support people may even need to be more technically inclined than Mac support people, on second thought that's a given isn't it? Your quality assurance testing matrix just ballooned from Win2K, WinXP, WinVista, MacOS X Intel, MacOS X PowerPC to the former plus Fedora, Debian, Ubuntu, SUSE. Doesn't seem to bad at first glance, but keep in mind the much smaller return that the latter four provide. All this support and qa effort *must* be paid for by the Linux gamer subsegment that refuses to buy the Win32 version and dual boot or emulate.
It'd be nice to see blizzard get their act together and release for linux as well, instead of depending on WINE or chite like Cedega for us to play their games. I'm not holding my breath on this one though, they've been failing us for years.
c id=19191075. It is not the role of game developers to develop the Linux gaming market, they just follow the customers to whatever platform the customers choose and Linux gamers are largely choosing Win32. It is the role of Linux gamers to promote their preferred platform and to abstain from Win32 versions. Of course, there are also gamers who don't really give a rat's ass about operating systems and that is just fine. I have no gripe with "gamers" who dual boot or emulate, it is only those who identify themselves as "Linux gamers" that I would chastise and say put your time/money where your advocacy is.
No, Linux gamers have been failing themselves for years. The choice to dual boot or emulate undermines the Linux gaming market, more here: http://games.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=235329&
It irks me when people see a successful game and say, "Wouldn't it be better if it were totally different?"
Look at Master of Orion...Master of Orion II was a great game and Master of Orion III was a complete dog. An upgrade of AI, graphics, buildings and ship gear on MOO2 would have left them with a solid, potentially excellent game. Instead they tossed everything from MOO2 except the name, and proceeded to create one of the great flops of all time.
Judging by the Diablo->DiabloII sequel, I'll give 'em the benefit of the doubt.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
With respect to your first point, what makes you think that Blizzard is precluded from developing a SC MMO? It's been fairly common knowledge that they've been hiring on for a "next-gen" MMO and it would seem to follow that a focus on the Starcraft universe at the company for the RTS would be a great segue into an MMO. Storylines, concept artists, writers, and so on could very easily serve as a further foundation for your futuristic MMO.
Perhaps, then, instead of complaining about SC2, you might consider taking heart from the fact that Blizzard has once again turned its eye towards the universe we both appreciate and that your hopes for Worlds of Starcraft have never been closer to fruition. Starcraft players the world over have many reasons to rejoice and I'd encourage you to remember that their gain is not necessarily your loss.
cheers.
P.P.S. I'm doing Science and I'm still alive.
Yeah, but if you want cable just for one specific channel (say, sci-fi), you have to get Basic and Extended or whatever - you wind up paying extra for a bunch of channels you'll never use.
And the $20/mo online game doesn't spam three minutes of ads at me every five minutes.
I too hope it does not have the heros, they're the reason I grew weary of wc3 in a week instead of the 4 years I played sc.
you only played starcraft for 4 years? I still play it relatively frequently.
I agree with you, though. The more things you have to keep track of and manage, the more difficult the game becomes. It starts to be a chore to play rather than fun. That was the main allure of the SC- it was simple to learn and once you understood the upgrade path, it took a lifetime to master. Broodwars ruined it by adding the extra units further complicating the game. You have to worry about so much more (namely invisible units like the lurkers and the dark templars) earlier in the game.
Heroes are fine, if you don't have to worry about building. That's what I liked about Bungie's Myth games. You didn't have to build anything, you went straight into battle, and if you had a unit that made more kills, he'd get faster and more accurate. It kept gameplay simple, yet dynamic enough to stay fun.
...spike
Ewwwwww, coconut...
Even the original C&C1 had different units for each side--GDI was about powerful but slower technology while NOD was about stealthier, faster technology. Red Alert 1 separated the sides even further. I think StarCraft was the first RTS game I played that had three races, though.
Oh, man, are we remembering the same game? Hello, Zerg/tank rush.
StarCraft was fun, but it seems the lack of a sequel for the last decade has made people romanticize the game as some unbeatable classic. It was a good game, but I eventually had my fill of it and moved on. The game is very repetitive.
"Sufferin' succotash."
I think, for simple and sound business reasons, it will be quite a while before anyone major takes a risk on Linux gaming again.
During that "golden era" of Linux gaming, even id publicly stated they support Linux because they think it is a cool thing to do, not because it made business sense at the time.
How about the excuse of "I have a life and don't want to dedicate it to a video game"? I can stop playing Final Fantasy XII, or StarCraft2, and leave it sitting for a month without losing any money, and then pick it right back up. MMO's require massive time dedication. I have better things to do with my time, thank you very little. I'm looking forward to a new RTS I can play on a LAN with my friends, rather than having a revolving cycle of questing, leveling, questing, ad infinitum.
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
Please, for the good of Humanity, vote Obama.
The first thing I thought when I saw the screenshots of Starcraft II was: "The units look just like they did on the box for the original Starcraft."
I remember after playing Starcraft for a while looking at the box and thinking: "That's not how the game actually looks! Those units all have extra spiky parts and the buildings have more attachments and who the hell sends a command center into battle?!" I figured that the shots were from many months before release and they simplified the graphics and abilities as they polished the game.
Well, Starcraft 2 doesn't look exactly like those old screenshots. It's more like a beautiful, glowing, high definition revisit to the original concepts. I wonder how much Starcraft 2 is based on their original vision for Starcraft but with ten times as much computer power and a hundred times as much cash available.
Actually, that sounds like the Star Wars prequels -- an old idea returned to with new technology. Except I have some faith that Blizzard can remake an old idea without adding annoying characters, terrible acting, and boring storylines. Then again, they might add a fourth race....
AlpineR
"No, this is lame. Blizzard had the chance to redefine computer gaming by coming out with a truly great, futuristic MMO, but instead decided to do another rehash of a game from nearly ten years ago that looks exactly like the old version."
Umm... so basically you're upset that they rehashed SC2 instead of WoW. I wouldn't mind, but you only used the word 'rehash' once so I got a little confused..
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think Blizzard is looking to revamp Starcraft's game structure or type. Starcraft was always build your base(s) at the right time, upgrade your units at the right time, mass the right units to counter your enemy (that you have checked out at the right time), and manipulate your troops into the right locations to have the upper hand. It was the epic battle on a specific location: the battlefield. There was no multiple-galaxy army building, no economy or taxes or keeping the civilians happy, etc. And that's the feeling that Blizzard wants to keep, with better, smoother graphics, some balance tweaks, new troops to play with for new strategies, and some nice lookin' explosions.
Thus, Starcraft II is incomparable to Total War (with turn-based continental strategy...only some battlefield tactics, which can be skipped) and EVE (an MMO...enough said). There are a lot of types of strategy games, and even the real-time ones have different quirks. There's not enough from the screenshots to tell what these quirks in the new Starcraft may be, so I'd say: play it before you nay it.
Look at Master of Orion...Master of Orion II was a great game and Master of Orion III was a complete dog. An upgrade of AI, graphics, buildings and ship gear on MOO2 would have left them with a solid, potentially excellent game. Instead they tossed everything from MOO2 except the name, and proceeded to create one of the great flops of all time.
The trick is to improve the game by addressing its weakest points without changing its strongest. In MOO II, the least fun things about the game, IMO, were: starts were too slow (not enough to do at the beginning), micromanagement got tedious by mid-game when you had a fair number of colonies, and the game reached the tipping point too soon (the point where you knew whether you were going to ultimately win or lose came well before the end of the game, making the last few hours of play anticlimactic). If they had addressed those things (for example: by increasing the management decisions for the home world, simplifying colony management, making it easier to catch up in technology, and nerfing the most powerful weapons and defenses) and combined that with better AI and some nice shiny new graphics, it would have been great.
In Starcraft, I found the greatest weaknesses of the game to be: the difficulty in meaningfully managing hordes of troops and of coordinating a multi-pronged attack or simultaneously attacking an enemy while defending your own base and managing resource gathering, and the enemy AI in the non-campaign game which essentially made one on one fights a cakewalk but two on one fights extremely difficult, with very little in between on the difficulty scale. If those two things could be addressed, Starcraft 2 would be a great successor to the original.
Sid Meier has done a (mostly) good job in successively refining Civilization, adding new interesting features and getting rid of the stuff that didn't work so well last time, without altering the basic formula of the game.
There's no such thing as Scotchtoberfest!
why would they need a physics system? People are complaining that you had to micromanage the heros on WC3, what can realistic physics add, other than more little useless details (oh no! the Goliath tripped over a rock on the ground, I better go help him!)
I'm not a fanatic who thinks physics are just a gimmick to replace good gameplay (I loved hl2), but it should be interesting to see what they're doing with this. Otherwise it sounds like they're caving to "peer pressure" (all the cool game engines are doing it!)
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Stay tuned for some shock and awe coming right up after this messages!
I liked Starcraft and will probably like Starcraft 2 like a lot of other people...but the hype surrounding it, dancing girls, thousands of people stuffed into a stadium to see it..seems more than a bit over the top and bizzare.
It's a game, not the answer to forgoing a life.
Actually, Blizzard has said that they've learned not to announce things until they're almost done. They've said themselves the only thing left is tweaking the balance between the sides. The engine is polished, the physics are polished, they have voice acting done in at least 2 languages that I know of (Korean and English). The game has been in development for four years now, and rumor has it that we'll be seeing it either holiday season this year or early next year. Blizzard has stated SC2 will be out before the 10th anniversary of the original coming out.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.
Except that it has a physics engine. And the units are almost TOTALLY different. And the graphics are about 10 years newer. Yeah. Other than all that.
Not a Twitter sockpuppet... but I wish I was.