Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

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UntamedLoli
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by UntamedLoli »

SC2's plot had more holes and sheer stupidity in it than any other game I've played.


Rebellion FUCK YEAH we're going to bring down Mengsk and then kill Kerrigan.

Secret artifacts that everyone but Kerrigan happens to know about with a secret fanatical protoss faction guarding them.

Oh wait heres Zeratul to tell us Kerrigan is the key to universe and killing her would cause the END OF ALL THINGS.

Overmind was actually a nice guy and Tassadar never actually died, don't forget the SLEEPING DEFENSES and DARK TEMPLAR.

NARUD.

Suddenly we can deinfest her, fuck the universe and rebellion lets go save her.

Sacrifice thousands to deinfest Kerrigan so heart broken Jimmy and Her can start over again.

Walk off into the sunset on an ASHWORLD with someone naked.


Everything else in the storyline takes a side step out of the picture and I'm expecting the entire "END OF ALL THINGS" scenario to be totally retconned.

Did i mention everything but saving Kerrigan is optional? because it is, the end of the universe was never going to happen.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by Theia_Loki »

I'm a little more astounded that Blizzard appears to have deliberately retconned the Brood War story. I mean, seriously, how can Raynor end up forgetting all about Fenix, whose death by Kerrigan's swarm is what sparked that vow of revenge in the first place? This is the only thing that bugs me way more than the scenario with Tychus (it wasn't mentioned at the start; just blatantly obvious clues that Horner and Tosh mention).
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by johnnythewolf »

Ah yes, Mass Effect: fairly good story with some memorable characters, but terrible terrible gameplay. Frankly, when it comes to games, I'd rather have the opposite.

Now shall we discuss how Castlevania Bloodlines's plot was greatly weakened from retconning Bram Stoker's Dracula? Or even better:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjYcwzodLVk&feature=related
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by IskatuMesk »

No, Bioware is just as bad as Blizzard. Let's not even go there, I wouldn't let either fucktards near anything I manage even if they offered to pay me for it. Neither of them can write, neither of them know what it takes to make a story not cliche. They need to give it up and start hiring actual writers.
I thought the Wings of Liberty was a decent and enjoyable campaign with an interesting storyline,
troll

solidified by mentioning movie plots, no one watches movies for the plot! Be less obvious next time, bro! :(
but there were more subtle "it's cheesy but hey everything else is awesome" reviews than a few honest ripping plot-analysis. -
I can tell you exactly why - everyone's a fucking fanboy. Only fanboys lack the balls to see truth. You see Johnny? He's trolling you - playing the card of the fanboy. He did it quite well, too. He's doing it because he knows everyone here is loves cinematics, everyone loves stories, but the card he's playing is the more popular one.

People are obsessed with Blizzard solely because of the logo. 90% of the high level players have told me they were bored of the game and disappointed in Blizzard's decisions behind it during beta, and many of them simply stopped playing. Those who continue to play, play only because sc2 is where the money is at. Blizzard is doing their damndest to shut down sc1 now that it competes with their new titles to force the progamers to make the move. Anyone who willingly tags along does so in the vain hope the game will improve in two expansions.

The rest are fucking fanboys. There isn't one person who will honestly tell you they enjoyed sc2's story. Not unless they are hopelessly oblivious to the billion cliches it utterly butchered, the completely braindead dialogue, the hideous carelessness in the voice acting, the confusing clusterfuck their non-linear campaign fad garbage turned it all into, and the grand finalle that left me throwing up in a ditch five miles east.

Sc2's story is fucking terrible. A ten year old will tell you that, because it's the same damn story they write in kid's movies and TV shows that people watch only to laugh. It bears all the hallmarks of laziness, fads, and westernized action-oriented condom tugging. Everything from the facepalm worthy bile-hurling PLOT TWISTS (OH MY GOD THE GHOST IS BLACK AND HAS A SILLY TROLL ACCENT) (OH MY GOD IT'S MENGSK'S KID AND HE'S BLONDE AND HE KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT WE WANT) (OH MY GOD THE ARTIFACTS TURN KERRIGAN INTO A HUMAN AGAIN SO RAYNOR CAN SQUEEZE ONE MORE OFF BEFORE THE DARK VOICE CONQUERS THE GALAXY AND STATES "I shure luv it wen a plan cums together ^___^" (NOT NECESSARILY IN THAT ORDER)), to the HORRIBLE dialogue (except for Tidus because I love his hickness), every single line Raynor said was fucking MISERABLE and it's like they had some junior high turd write their entire dialogue from the ground up with absolutely no knowledge or care of the character. OH WAIT THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT THEY DID LOL because they went around hiring complete and total nobodies to bloat their staff count with sheep.

Starcraft 2 would have bombed out in an instant if it was made by any other company and turned into the exact same thing it is now. It wouldn't have the logo brainwashing retards into thinking it's amazing just because Blizzard built it. I don't care who the fuck you are, you're a troll if you say otherwise and I will just laugh at you.

You'd think for a company raking in so much money from WoW that they could afford to put some fucking effort into their writing, but then you remember no one has put effort into their writing since Black Isle. Bioware is just the same - talentless newbies playing off of fads and tropes.

And anyone who says otherwise is simply wrong.

The fact that the majority of their audience is a bunch of pen-pushing brainless twats makes this kind of business practice possible, and until the average IQ of America raises above 50 no one else will be inclined to follow suite and realized they are getting milked like whores.

Now, I haven't played any sc1 campaigns besides the odd one. And therefore I can't agree or disagree with any opinions about LoTC or whatever. But I have played some wc3 ones, notably return of the dragon or whatever. They were all fucking terrible. I don't expect players to be able to make good stories. Hell, if I was personally given the reigns to sc2, I wouldn't be confident even I could recover from their mess without redoing the whole damned thing from the ground up! I tell you I'd definitely get some outside opinions before making a big decision!

But I will tell you this - campaign makers are more inclined to actually put effort in their story, because Blizzard doesn't give ten fucks about what John Doe thinks about their story. The fact is, Sc2 made record sales just like every other Blizzard title. As far as they care that's all that matters. Sc2 was successful, hands down, and nothing John Doe or myself can say about it will change that. Thus their practice will not change.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by johnnythewolf »

Okay.

So, are there such things as actually good game plots in your book?
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by DrumsofWar »

Off the top of my head, there's Silent Hill 2, Knights of the Old Republic (a Bioware story that wasn't pedantic), Bioshock, and Freespace 2. The utter feeling of helplessness lost in a war too huge for you to control is something I only got in that game, compared to most other war-themed games where you feel like a kid in a candy store gunning down sprites.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by johnnythewolf »

Funny how you mention BioShock's plot, considering that overrated pretentious Ayn Rand fanfic features not only about everything you guys hate about WoL's plot (no character development, goofy stereotypical characters, hammy voice-acting, poorly-told story, bigger bad guy with a totally convoluted scheme) but also some of the most overused gaming tropes of all time (mute protagonist, yet another would-be utopia that has gone wrong, retarded monsters hiding in closets, and so on).
Last edited by johnnythewolf on Sat Nov 06, 2010 2:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by Alevice »

You cant disucss good plot without mentioning Planesacpe: Torment. And funny how you disregarded all other games mentioned by dow.

CLiches arent bad anyway, it is how you execute them.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by IskatuMesk »

why on earth would you bring that overhyped pos bioshock into this discussion I am going to SLAP you over and over and over. Never played kotor or silent hill, but in my personal experience good game plots ended with black isle.
You cant disucss good plot without mentioning Planesacpe: Torment.
this is a good place to start
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by Alevice »

Silent Hill 2 and 3 had great subjects and motifs, but I didnt like the actual plot per se.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by DrumsofWar »

Bioshock didn't have the most stellar story but it did the same thing that Starcraft 1 did, arrange and actually polish those cliches to where it was something unique and distinct from other stuff. Most of the cliches were thing we saw before but it wasn't as blatant or careless as we saw in Starcraft 2.

I recommend playing through Freespace 2 with stereo speakers, a good widescreen, and a joystick to crap your pants a few times. Anyway, one game people mention that I never played was Deus Ex.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by Meta »

The best game plots in my opinion are those found in Silent Hill 2 and 4. One could argue that the storytelling techniques weren't quite the best - specially if you don't pay attention to details that might seem to be background or simply irrelevant in the long run - but in the end everything is quite impressive, up to the point that not even converting it to a movie would work better.

KotOR and Vampire: Bloodlines were also very immersive and just awesome overall, and are, to date, the only true videogame RPGs I can think of: the only ones where your actions, even subtle ones, actually count and may change the ending and all that; the only ones where you can actually roleplay a character instead of simply advancing the story. This is something I intend to feature in my SC2 project if proper campaign support is ever introduced.

I haven't played Planescape Torment but I've heard that the storyline is fantastic there as well.

Among older games you have the Wing Commander series, Out of this World, TIE Fighter and Super Metroid as games with great plots - or, even more important, great storytelling made possible by fantastic immersion, a sense of belonging in the game's universe instead of having NPCs conveniently discussing their personal lives or matters of state with you, who's quite the complete stranger to them. :P

As a side note, it's relevant to point that none of these games featured a badass protagonist: to me the best stories feature overwhelmed underdogs involved in a mess featuring much more powerful and cunning villains, and sometimes the only reward the "hero" gets is the right to remain alive. If you want badass protagonists, go ahead and play Resident Evil and tell me what you think of its story. Yeah.

Now, on to Blizzard's games, Starcraft foremost among them, Blizzard's plots were never awesome to start with IMO, but they worked really well due to the huge polishment and spectacular cutscenes. In my opinion Blizzard makes its best stories when it keeps them somewhat simple: Diablo, Diablo 2, vanilla Starcraft and vanilla WC3 are good examples of that. A straightforward threat, and in the end the good guys overwhelm their issues and end up saving the universe. SC2 with its non-linear storytelling was just a slap in the face of the players, ignoring previous lore and introducing pointless characters and branching that wasn't really branching since, whatever you do, you get the same result all the same. And in the end everything felt underwhelming to me - HKs and Mesk pointed the reasons why. There was just no direction to the plot.

And fuck Blizzard if I have to read their books to understand SC2. That is a failure in itself, no matter how good the books may be.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by IskatuMesk »

starcraft didn't polish shit. Kerrigan was fatal to the game from the start. Brood war had already defecated on the body before SC2 came along with a shiv and shanked it.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by DrumsofWar »

You just hate strong female characters.
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Re: Ret-Conning Greatly Weakens SC2 Story

Post by SaintKerrigan »

SC2 had so much potential, and Blizzard fucked it up. That's all I have to say about that.

As far as good plots go, Freespace 2 definitely has one. It was the best execution of the cog-in-the-machine viewpoint that I've ever seen, at least in a game. Assassin's Creed II was very engrossing, to the point where when I picked it up, I spent every moment of free time playing it until I'd beaten. Can't ask much more from a game than that. The plot for HL2 was very immersing, but a lot of that probably comes from playing with the music off and letting the sound design do its job.

Personally, I think the best stories in video games are the ones that are told in a linear fashion. Choice is great and all, but it can backfire when you can have the player do whatever, whenever.

(Speaking of FS2, I really wish the space sim would come back into vogue.)
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