StarCraft II Official! (Pictures)

[Legion]

The Q&A's are really just blizzard picking the worst possible questions/repeat questions and saying the same thing over and over again in some vain effort to soften the inevitable blow of "The beta won't be in 2009".

That. After just now taking the time to read through the Q&A, I feel dumber and less enthusiastic about SC2. I don't really want to hear the same gameplay questions, like "What's the status of the mothership/infestor/thor?" and gameplay number crunching crap. I just want the game. No data updates. No info on if we will have access to mundane feature ideas (a launcher unique to a custom map? But why?). I just want my fucking game.

You should've realized by now that Blizzard is desperately trying to churn out bits of 'information' to tide us over. Now why would they be doing that...

[Thalraxal]

The Q&A's are really just blizzard picking the worst possible questions/repeat questions and saying the same thing over and over again in some vain effort to soften the inevitable blow of "The beta won't be in 2009".

That. After just now taking the time to read through the Q&A, I feel dumber and less enthusiastic about SC2. I don't really want to hear the same gameplay questions, like "What's the status of the mothership/infestor/thor?" and gameplay number crunching crap. I just want the game. No data updates. No info on if we will have access to mundane feature ideas (a launcher unique to a custom map? But why?). I just want my fucking game.

You should've realized by now that Blizzard is desperately trying to churn out bits of 'information' to tide us over. Now why would they be doing that...

Whatever happened to 'The Story so Far...' and the Planet and Hero profiles?  And units.  I'm pretty sure they can atleast give us an info page on zerglings.

[thebrowncloud]

Whatever happened to 'The Story so Far...' and the Planet and Hero profiles?  And units.  I'm pretty sure they can atleast give us an info page on zerglings.

Agreed. Those were cool. They could paraphrase some of the books and w/e that we will be seeing a bit of in SC2 with more "Story so far..." And there are plenty of units and buildings to put out info for. I just feel like they're really lazy and want to tell us the same thing over and over again so they don't have to do anymore work than necessary. They might as well stop talking to us all together until the game is out if they are really that concerned about it.

[WB]

The books/manga are actually pretty cool in showing other elements of the starcraft universe.

[Falchion]

Okay people listen up, Battle Report 4 is out.  Now, it might look like BR1 for the jungle tileset, but trust me, this is the battle report 4.

NOTE:  Some of you might have to run this link on Internet Explorer.  Got somewhat buggy on my browser:

http://www.gamer.nl/video/iframe_0.2.php?video_id=12271&hd=1&fileextension=mp4

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COMMENTS:

- Lost temple map nostalgically made.  Agree with everything new, except the narrow ramps.  That way only a Terran player gets an advantage for defense.  Isn't there a chance to expand these ramps or we'll need a SCMDraft 2 for it?

- At around 04:00 we see Mesk's theory on terrain value go somewhat valid, when we see David Kim's marine running from the pursuing Zealot, unaware of the other Zealot cornering him on the other side.  Delicious use of strategy. 

- 05:09 - Hellion death sound - GAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!!!!!!!!! 

- First video glance of in-game MULE at 05:33.  Nothing new by then.

- SIEGE TANK WITH RANGE CIRCLE?????  WTF???  WHY DIDN'T WE HAVE THIS SHIT IN SC 1???  WE HAD TO LEARN JACKSHIT ON IT'S RANGE BY GUESSING, SO WHY FUCKING CARE ON RANGE CIRCLES NOW? 

- Medivac doesn't land anymore?  My impression or did Blizzard figured out landing for unload is just too over-the-top realism and too longy for that suprise attack you always wanna do? 

- Medivac portrait sounds more like a medic on a Silent Hill-ish room.  Too odd and too ugly.  Besides, ship interiors aren't so dark.  Good suit design for her, though. 

- Observer portrait - Idiot, liked the SC I version better.  Sounds like a camera staring at your front all the time.

- They've changed name from Shadow Ops to Ghost Academy.  Sounds like I'll be able to fully use the Shadow Ops name for Duality.  One point for me, hehehehe. 

- HAHAHA, funny!  We see the Stalker's portrait scratch his head with a LEG!  Here, puppy, puppy!

- Nullifier portrait.  Using same gay position as Observer's.  Please fix that Blizzard, before I got shotgunning in there.

- What the hell... a fucking quick Psi Storm, with a gay look???  Please............. 

- I've always wanted to say Blizzard must, and I mean IMMEDIATELY, remove that huge nuking alarm!  It just gives away the player's intention and striking position too quick!  Go back to the simple monochrome red dot, or better yet, make it invisible, to test player's psychology: desperation, as he/she will try to detector sweep in panic.

- Ghost portrait:  Fallout character reject. 

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My personal opinion on Starcraft II now  on the next post.

[Falchion]

FALCHION'S REPORT:  STARCRAFT II'S CURRENT DESIGNS.

Very soon, Starcraft II will be released.  That's something new for those who watched it closely, like myself.  All have seen it's current designs for three factions, the xenomorph Zerg, the mystical Protoss and the hardcored Terrans, and the improvements as well on these designs.  Well, not that I'm here to complain on Blizzard's designs, their quality has and always will surpass anything the other companies can do.

What I'm here to talk about is the design style you're heading for Starcraft II.  Let's wind the clocks to way back in 2002.  Warcraft III was released, and, with it, Blizzard made up a fantastic and huge design revolution for the fantasy series.  It's shown how greatly Blizzard has evolved in design and graphics.  But that was back then.  Now, let's come back to today, to where Diablo III and Starcraft II are being made.  What I want to mean is, sorry Blizzard and everyone, you're making only one big mistake in your successes:  You are repeating your design style, the same style you used in your Warcraft universe.

By what I mean is the designs you're making up for the Protoss and Terrans.  Indeed, you are just taking some obvious designs for Warcraft III, artwork included and merely putting them in the Starcraft universe.  I don't want to complain, but I think you don't need to "evolve" everything, for example, the Terran design.  If we look to it now, it's far more Space Siege sci-fi look compared to SC I's design:  The Terrans became design famous for their Hard Metal/Industrial appearance.  Even for an sci-fi where you go gunning aliens and such, there's little things such as laser guns, ion cannons, star destroyers and such.  Starcraft, before Brood War, brought about a band of cowboys with heavy metal, big guns, steel clad suits and liberal slang in an Alien and corny UFO sci-fi cliché universe, which made up players' interest in the human side of things.

The point is, some things just don't need to change, Blizzard.  Like life, evolving an universe needs control:  You take too long and you won't find "pasture" in time, therefore starving to death in attention.  You go to fast in these things and you'll step on a rock and fall down the abyss, in an almost fashionable manner EA is doing with the C&C series.

[WB]

What the fuck are you talking about? Terrans are still  a band of cowboys with "heavy metal, big guns, steel clad suits and liberal slang." I was totally expecting you to bitch about the zerg.

[Mucky]

You typed four paragraphs yet managed to say nothing.

[IskatuMesk]

Battles looked too A-move-and-watch-everything-shoot-each-other to me. No mines makes this matchup pretty boring to watch. Thors turning so fast looks pretty retarded, too. I liked the original thor. Now it seems like they're just trying to cling onto the unit like they cling onto the colossus when they should just replace it with something else.

Storm seems to be a bit ridiculous. There's no way to get out of it before it kills everything.

[AA7Dragoon]

I really liked watching Battle Report 4.  I think they made some good improvements on Lost Temple.  I liked how this report focused on top-tier ground tech.  The Medivac's heal technology for nuking ghosts is going to be a very effective strategy for Terrans.  Psi-Storm was great to see, but the Protoss player should have kept teching to counter those Thors/Marauders.

I still want to see some effective air strategies.  I want to know what a good dogfight in space looks like between the races.

[Negi]

Battles looked too A-move-and-watch-everything-shoot-each-other to me. No mines makes this matchup pretty boring to watch. Thors turning so fast looks pretty retarded, too. I liked the original thor. Now it seems like they're just trying to cling onto the unit like they cling onto the colossus when they should just replace it with something else.

Storm seems to be a bit ridiculous. There's no way to get out of it before it kills everything.

Agreed on Colossus and Thor.  Those units are retarded.  Why would the Protoss bother with this huge fragile weak laser unit?  The current air game is a mess, there's nothing really good.  Why is there no wraith/scout/muta class ship for each race?  Why is the hydralisk an anti-air unit?  Where did the reavers go?  Dustin browder is a huge fag.

Also, nukes seem really unbalanced in this battle report.  I don't understand how he could build that many nukes that quickly.

[WB]

Agreed on Colossus and Thor.  Those units are retarded.  Why would the Protoss bother with this huge fragile weak laser unit?

This is from what I saw at Blizzcon this year, so don't bitch about things that have changed because I don't really follow up with the Q&A sessions:
Colossi fuck everything up because they are incredibly mobile, do fucktons of damage, and outrange most things in the game. I'm pretty sure they also ignore the line of sight blocks and can see up cliffs.

Thors do not seem nearly as good though.

The current air game is a mess, there's nothing really good.  Why is there no wraith/scout/muta class ship for each race?

I think they don't each have a dedicated all-around air unit because in starcraft, each race is supposed to be very different. I don't know how much you know about Starcraft I, but even back then, the three units were quite different. The difference now is that the protoss air fighter is dedicated AA unit, the terran one doubles as a Anti-infantry mech, and the zerg one is still the same.

Why is the hydralisk an anti-air unit?  Where did the reavers go?  Dustin browder is a huge fag.

From what I saw in Blizzcon, I wouldn't consider the Hydra an AA unit. Its a lot closer to where it used to be in SC1 (i guess to appease people like you).

I love the reaver, but it really has no place in SC2. The game moves a lot faster and reavers are too goddamn slow to be of any use. Colossi are much more effective anyway.

Also, nukes seem really unbalanced in this battle report.  I don't understand how he could build that many nukes that quickly.

Nukes don't have a supply cost anymore and are built at the ghost academy. So you can build like 3 academies and just build nukes constantly. Not that hard. They aren't unbalanced so much as the protoss player never dealt with them (1 phoenix would've done fine, thats the anti-air fighter unit toss have). The toss player also never saw it coming and wasn't prepared to deal with them, which is retarded because he already had probes. Toss should've also used their transport to expand to their island, it was stupid not to.

Basically everytime I hear someone bitch (who hasn't played it at Blizzcon) its a "waaaa waaaa why isn't this starcraft 1 in 3D!!"

But I can help with that:
http://www.moddb.com/mods/project-revolution

Enjoy!

I have an idea, lets not let nostalgia dictate game balance!

[UntamedLoli]

So essentially you give up nothing but resources to spam nukes now when previously you gave up ComSat and supply for a nuke, if you really think reavers were too slow you don't know how to use them.

[thebrowncloud]

if you really think reavers were too slow you don't know how to use them.

I tend to agree with WB on this. Because of the reaver's limited mobility, the only real offensive strategy with them is a reaver drop. That's one strategy. Having increased mobility, being able to use transport, and cliff climbing/dropping makes the colossus significantly more versatile and open for new tactics than the reaver. But hey, if we ever felt like replacing the colossus with the reaver again, we can do it in the editor and host a custom game. Problem solved.

[RazorclawX]

if you really think reavers were too slow you don't know how to use them.

Let's face it, if you need to use a Shuttle to make Reavers useful, that is a pretty huge failure from a design standpoint.