Starcraft 2 (no, NOT Starcraft Ghost)

All i can say, is wow.
After 9 long, long, years, Blizzard is finally going to reward its true loyal fans with a Real sequal.

Growing up playing this game, i would just truely like to say how excited i am to see zelots smashing zerglings in 3D . This is going to be the game of the decade, for me anyways.

Here's a couple of things that is posted on the website if you dont feel like going to it. (Although, you would have to be crazy not to...)

-Starcraft 2 will still feature a Single Player mode, as well as battle net play.
-There Will still be a map editor
-There Will still be 3 races, Zerg, Protoss, and terran
-Starcraft 2 Will work on PC and Mac
-Starcraft 2 will also work with window's vista AND windows XP

For all of you that played starcraft one, i feel your joy. And for all of you that have not, you had 9 years to play it, so go out and spend 15 dollars and try it out. The art is amazing, the gameplay looks amazing. New Units, New Abilities, New ways to kill kill kill.

I will be buying this game the second it comes out, no doubt about it.

http://www.starcraft2.com/ - here it is.

for gamplay video's of starcraft 2, try http://www.gamevideos.com/

I couldnt agree anymore decius, i wish it would come out right this minute. But, knowing blizzard it will proubably be like 5 years before the frickin thing comes out.

but the funny thing is...the new Protess in Starcraft look like Scrin in Tiberium War...

Huzah for new starcraft. =]

The Rise and Fall of a Blizzard Fanboi

I know because Blizzard is so hugely succseful and loved these days, Im probably not going to be very popular for this post. But I have had this inside me for quite some time now and had to get it out. Id rather tell what's in my heart and be disked, than hide whats in my heart and be liked.

I would also like to say that Blizzard have made some kickass games and I still love those games. I may even get stracraft 2 and most definatly Diablo 3 as that looks a little truer to the original Blizzard games.



Back in the time of the dinosaurs (and the fist personal computers,) a friend of mine borrowed a copy of a game called Warcraft.

Though not the very first Real Time Strategy, it was the one that caught my eye.

I couldn't believe there was such a cool strategy game based in an entirely new genre (bearing in mind most PC games were first person shooters like Hexen, Rise of the Triad and the first Doom.) that let you play with lots of fantasy/ medieval armies.

It was so cool. I begun playing this game at about 7pm that night and come morning, when my friends got up, I was still there, hunched over their computer, laying waste to orcs with fireballs and hacking demons up with wave after wave of noble knights.

If they hadn't kicked me off the computer later that afternoon (think it was about 2pm.) I would have happily played that game till I keeled over from overexuastion.

I became addicted to that game, and a few years later when the sequel Warcraft 2 came out, I brought it.

Then came Diablo. Another pioneer game of its genre. Another I loved.

By this time Blizzard had begun to get a name for themselves.

But it wasn't until they took the whole warcraft idea into the great beyond of space with the groundbreaking Starcraft that I really became in awe of Blizzard.

I instantly fell in love with the Protoss; fierce and noble warriors, bound by honour and an intense battle lust that was unrivalled in the RTS world.

The gameplay was excellent, the races were totally balanced yet unique, storylines were brilliant, the cutscenes before their time and the characters all so well done I actually cried when the Templar Tassadar sacrificed himself to save the Protoss homeworld.

Though the term was not in use back then as far as I know, you could have called me a Blizzard fanboi and I would have had no compunction to make you eat your words.

Diablo 2 just proved once again that this company were always pushing the bar with computer games. They had the best standard of excellence and they would only bring a game out when it was going to shake up the game world.

So you can imagine that when they announced they were working on Warcrfaft3, I was ecstatic. I used to check all the fansites for the latest screenshots and news, and download any trailers I could find.

For 3 years I waited impatiently for the release of what I considered would be best game ever made.

Finally it came out. I brought the collectors edition box set for $100 AUS. I brought that sucker home. I installed the game. I was so eager to see the best game ever, I sat with my knuckle in my mouth...

and was sadly disappointed by Blizzard for the first time in history.

It wasn't that the game was bad. By the standard of the day, it was excellent. Technically.

It was just... well... childish.

I had grown up with Blizzards games and as an adult I had no problem with the visceral feel of them.

But it was the whole "look" and "feel" of warcraft 3 that really disappointed me. The anime graphics most of all. But even if it was just my not liking a graphics style, it went beyond that.

The whole feeling of the game was dumbded down. There were goblins running around using 20th century vernacular, peons making immature fart jokes and main characters acting so incredibly lowbrow it was amazing they had access to entire realms and armies.

None of what I had come to expect from games like Diablo and Starcraft.

Dont get me wrong, I still liked this game alot. I played it for almost a year. It just wasn't in the same league as the brilliant games that came before it, each one rasing the bar just that bit more, till I felt Warcrft 3 would be THE game for me.

But after much deliberation, I came to the conclusion that Blizzard had just chosen a different market to aim this particular game at.

I still had alot of faith in them as a games company.

And so when they tried their hand at the MMORPG genre, I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. After all, they were good at what they did.

And if one game doesn't manage to reach the same bar of excellence they had themselves created, who was I to complain.

When I played World of Warcraft, I was again let down.

The same lowbrow toilet humour, the gaint ears and hands and feet and over-exaggerated features, the anime graphics, the distinct lack of any gravitas in the game what so ever. It felt like playing an MMO developed by Jar Jar Binks.

And so it became sadly evident Blizzard no longer wanted to retain the adult market it had grown up with. They were rebooting. setting the clock back to zero. beginning again. And its oldest fanbois were too old to be called bois anymore, so their dollar didn't count as much.

But I guess that's their prerogative. Just like George Lucas, whose earlier work I loved, had the right to change his overall direction with the Starwars universe- so too were Blizzard allowed to change their direction with their games.

I dont begrudge them their marketing savvy. The younger market is where the dollar is.

So, for the last few years, I have let Blizzard get further from my heart. It has continued on in its direction and I have gone in mine.

And deep down I have always feared the day they release Starcraft2. That was my favourite of all their games. And I still love their characters and wonder what they will do next.

But to see them kiddified and turned anime is what I dread the most.

When I was first sent the news some part of me chose to delude itself and pretend that it was only the Warcraft universe Blizzard had changed the feel of. And when they decide to go back to the more serious Starcraft they would raise the bar once again. I was fooling myself into thinking Starcraft2 would have the amazing uber graphics of Medieval 2, with the visceral feel and groundbreaking gampley of the Dawn of War series.

I could even see it in my head.

But sadly when I checked out the site, I was again disappointed in my one time favourite game makers direction.

Not only have they chosen the anime feel (and Im sure the Disney mindset to go with it.) they haven't even improved the graphics very much.

I may not like Blizzards direction in gaming on a personal level, but I have always felt they have the best standards. And when they release a game it will be to raise the bar on computer gaming for years to come.

But sadly they no longer seem to be interested in innovation, or raising the bar and making the most best ever game out at the time. Just making money off their old titles.

And with ten years to make a new game and all the advances in graphics and technology all they seem to have done is rearranged the units and given it a higher pixel count. Im sure it has disappointed alot of fans that waited ten years and expected something more along the lines of the quality of games today. (Funny, but it seems to me that the better Blizzards cinematic trailers get, their games quality degrades by the same ratio.)


This is all fine. Their business, their money and their games. I dont have to play them as Im sure people are sayinng right now. But what really irks me, is that for the past decade all other game developers have used Blizzard as THE benchmark. They have imitated them and been innovated by them.

This means that in recent years there have been so many non blizzard titles with that "cutesy" anime feel, or a total lack of desire to make a game as good as it could be.

For me blizzard has gone from being the king in games making to the sell-outs of games making. The George Lucus of the gaming world.

SC is a classic. i dont honestly care who creates it, as long as i enjoy it. i dont see a point in criticizing the creators of the game. i say, when it comes out buy it (if you want to) and play it and see if you enjoy it. i dont think the game should be judged due to the drama stirred up about the creators of it. im also super psyched for diablo 3. i personally like blizzard and think they are geniuses.

Also- if anyone plays starcraft online (battlenet) you guys should post your account names and we can play together. my ACC's are- Hendrix(BW)
PRiMiTiVE
Valis[uK]

if you post your acc ill add you to my friend list and try to catch a game with you. i play mostly Diplomacy, i find it to be a clever advancement and embellishment on the normal game. .. i love this game....

Well I was sort of expecting a bunch of level 80 Troll Shamans to join the site just to tell me, "I iz teh suxor and a noob", but I didnt really care about that.

Personally I only really care about the long term members of this site who i have respect for and whose opinions count to me. And who, like me, many of them will be great fans of the original.

But since all systems are operational, and my shields are still at 100 percent integrity, I will continue...

I guess the problem with allot of things you like when you grow up is that it affects you on deep level. You fall in love with it and have a sentimental attachment to it.

The creators of whatever it is you grow attached to you look up to and admire.

So its kind of hard when those same people, (who are only human) change their direction in such a way they totally lose you.

We've all heard the fans of bands and musicians over the decades complain that their favorite artist has sold out.

Sometimes this is true. And sometimes its just an artistic direction which the fans don't like. Either way, it hurts the people who have committed that emotianal attachment.

And I just tend to find that so many creative geniuses, once power (wealth, fame adulation.) has had hold of them for any period of time, they tend to lose thier creative flair and thier initial hunger to inspire and be the best at what they do.

Its a bit like having a partner who you totally loved as a highschool sweetheart, going your seperate ways for 10 years and then finding them and getting back together.

Only to find that in those ten years they have totally changed. And you don't like them. They are horrible to you as they are now... but at the same time you still love them from before.

You're emotions are divided. You feel both hate and love at the same time.

This is how I feel about Blizzard.

If I didn't care about them then I wouldn't bother to have written all I have.

thats a very deep and complex relationship, especially with a video game company.

i view video games the same way i view music or any other kind of art- i dont care who created, what theyve done in their life or what they care about, all i care about is if i enjoy what im doing. if im happy and entertained then i find no reason for creating an "issue". There are sooo many better and more juicy random "issues" to satisfy my dramatic hunger.

I guess that's the difference between me and allot of people. I'm strongly emotional in what I like and dislike. If dislike it, I really put allot of feeling into it. Conversely, if I like something, I put a lot of strong feelings into that. Its called passion.

But I don't see my love turned hate relationship with Blizzard as an "issue." Just a pet grievance when it comes to the way Blizzard affects the entire game industry.

And as proof of what I said earlier about Blizzard becoming corrupted by success and greed, and being all about money first and foremost- I'm certain allot of Starcraft fans will be happy to know starcraft2 is actually going to be released as 3 SEPARATE games. For each of the races, you will have to buy a separate game to play their campaign.

And sadly, I'm certain this will become the trend with game publishers in the future.

Goodbye Zerglings, hello $tarcraft!

Decuis, you're right. I can see what you're saying. Like I said, I don't begrudge them making money. They are a company first and foremost afterall.

The two things I think they do well (apart from steal other peoples stuff as you mentioned. ) is bring out very polished games. And know their market so as to make money very well.

But perhaps if you look at it like this, then you may be able to see where im coming from:

Lets just say that U2 were so big and popular in the music industry that they crossed all genres and styles and everyone looked up to them and emulated everything they did.

Then U2 decided that there was more money to be had in the child, tween, teenage market and changed their original music to target that market.

Then imagine all the other musicians you loved who then copied them.

This is the problem I have with Blizzard. When they chose to go in another direction to what I liked I was happy to part ways with them. But there have been so many companies bring out games that should of been really enjoyable to me that weren't. Purely because they have followed Blizzards lead.

Blizzard have changed entire genres and peoples expectations of what those genres should be about. And while I don't want to turn this into an anti blizzard thread, since I still respect them as a company, (and also the regular members who like them.) there is so much that I could say about the negative effect I'm just starting to finally see them have on the gaming industry.

I guess I'm like one of those people brought up totally religious who eventually decides there is no god. They are usually the ones who are the most zealous when it comes to their ex religions faults.

But I hope people can appreciate I at least accept my tastes are different to others, and explain WHY I have had this strange relationship with a gaming company that has influenced an industry for over a decade.

If it was another company it wouldnt matter so much. But when every game I look at nowadays has this whole comparison to Blizzards games thing happening- I cant get away from them.