StarCraft II Official! (Pictures)

[Marco]

I've been out of it for a while quite honestly.  Its like I feel the community and SC2 slipping away.  Yet I still think of ideas for my story every day.  I'm such a geek.

[Negi]

Yes. It was entitled "Warcraft: Orcs and Humans" and given an updated engine courtesy of Crytek.

QFT

[thebrowncloud]

Not particularly significant, but apparently there are two new blues on SC2GDF that are more geared towards multiplayer mechanics/gameplay (as if they talk about anything else anymore...) so hopefully we will be getting some more blue activity going on. My guess is it will be just more of the same questions getting answered over and over, though. Hopefully they'll at least be active enough to make those forums a bit less of the cluster-fuck that they are.

If you're curious, they're online names are Avarius and Zhydaris.

http://forums.battle.net/thread.html?topicId=21724987619&sid=3000

[IskatuMesk]

Karune's bios for them really make them sound like just random nobodies that no one cares about. Hey, I watch replays and try to learn how to use hotkeys! Yeah, okay...

[thebrowncloud]

Yeah, really. It's like they just took two guys attended Blizzcon and were like "hey, you wanna talk to people on teh interwebz about SC2? we'll pay you for it." They're really no different from anyone who has watched the BRs reads the wiki. Maybe they should give me that job. 

[Negi]

Imitating people in jeff k. speak is so four years ago  . 

Here's how it actually happened:

They were actually trolling a Blizzcon convention, wearing apparel related to other popular RTS and MMORPG games, and the people at Blizzard approached them and said, "Wow, you guy seem like huge assholes, but you have balls.  We need more people like you at Blizzard.  We have a new position open on the internet where you get to troll our fans while staying completely straight-faced.  Are you interested?"

[UntamedLoli]

---StarCraft II Q&A Batch 56---

Exclusive Starcraft 2 Q&A (English)

1. Are you still developing new units or are you satisfied with the amount of units for each race and, therefore, more concerned about the fine tuning and balancing?
Our philosophy has always been to keep the amount of units for each race to a certain number to keep the gameplay tight, and we are satisfied with what we have right now in terms of that number. Once we head into beta we definitely evaluate the role of each unit and will potentially add or drop units as needed based on feedback.

2. Can you explain the movements of big melee units like the Ultralisk in detail? While running through idle units smaller units tend to move away so the Ultralisk can walk in a straight line. Will that happen only in battles or while moving your whole army as well?
The way movement collision works right now is that a unit has to be idle for it to be pushed to a new location by another unit like an Ultralisk. Generally if you are controlling your forces and they are active, you will not see this behavior.

3. In the campaign of StarCraft II, there are many optional objectives to do so that the player can choose how to play through the campaign. But there are players who want to see every cinematic and play every mission. Are there missions where you have to decide, which way you go (e.g. the Terran campaign in StarCraft I, where you decide to choose nuclear weapons or Battlecruisers), or will the player be able to play the whole campaign in a linear progression? Will there be a menu were you can replay already completed missions? If so, can you also unlock new missions in that menu?
As you play through the campaign, there will be a few cases where you must make a distinct choice that could change the outcome of a certain side plot or the fate of a specific character. These choices will be made very obvious to players, and for those who want to see all the possibilities, you’ll have the ability to go back and choose the other path. We will also have a way for you to replay completed missions or cinematic cut scenes via the story mode interface as well.

4. In the single player campaign of Warcraft III, even races like the Naga are playable temporarily. Is something like that planned for StarCraft II too?
The single player campaign for StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty will focus on the Terran campaign, but there will also be a short series of missions where players take the role of Zeratul and other Protoss forces.

5. Is the range of the stalker’s blink ability limited to the distance between him and the target area or are cliffs and trees considered; so a stalker could blink farther when he’s blinking down a cliff than if he’s blinking up the cliff?
The distance you blink is the same regardless of blinking up or down a cliff.

6. Will players be able to send resources to their allies? If so, will there be a limit to the amount of resources they are able to send?
Yes, players can send and request resources among teammates but only after a few minutes into the game. The reason for this is to minimize imbalances that could be created by one player getting a massive early economic boost from his or her partner dumping resources at the outset of the game. There currently is no limit to how many resources you can share.

7. Some replays were not compatible with new patches in StarCraft I. Are you working on making replays compatible with new patches for StarCraft II?
Yes, we’re working on allowing replays from previous versions of StarCraft II be compatible with new patches as they are released.

http://starcraft2.4players.de/exclusive_qa_starcraft2_source_en.php

[thebrowncloud]

I'm surprised they actually addressed some questions about the single player campaign for once. My one concern is which of the possible side-story outcomes are going to be the canon ones if there are so many to choose from? Does he save Doctor Hanson or does he round up a crapload of artifacts? Or maybe something else? That's always the problem with multiple mission paths, but Blizz has been experimenting with that in SC since Enslavers 1.

[Lavarinth]

Blizzard mentioned ultimately- They will all lead to the same end. Most situations will be "do it now, or do it later" while I believe less than a handful will be "do it now, or never" in which case I'm sure it'd be irrelevant to the story. Such as a mission where you can recruit a mercenary gang A or B.

[WB]

true but they also mention the fate of a certain character, which could impact plot since anything character in that position is a significant character.

[IskatuMesk]

Blizzard brought up their tech support page.

Take that as you will.

[Lavarinth]

If it were "save this character" or "get minerals" it'd be funny if that character died even if you chose that mission.

[Marco]

If it were "save this character" or "get minerals" it'd be funny if that character died even if you chose that mission.

Ultimately they won't have the diversity of say a Bioware game where the outcome of your every choice affects the storyline.  They do after all have to have some kind of canon for future games, books, mmorpgs, etc. 

[wibod]

If it were "save this character" or "get minerals" it'd be funny if that character died even if you chose that mission.

Ultimately they won't have the diversity of say a Bioware game where the outcome of your every choice affects the storyline.  They do after all have to have some kind of canon for future games, books, mmorpgs, etc. 

Bioware's choices boil down to A) Give away all your money and save orphans or B) Steal all their money and eat the orphans.

[Thalraxal]

If it were "save this character" or "get minerals" it'd be funny if that character died even if you chose that mission.

Ultimately they won't have the diversity of say a Bioware game where the outcome of your every choice affects the storyline.  They do after all have to have some kind of canon for future games, books, mmorpgs, etc. 

Considering that Blizzard has proven themselves willing to retcon the bajeebers out of anything for almost any reason, I don't think they're too worried about that being a problem.  SC2 will be canon only until the SC2: Wings of Liberty novelization comes out, which will then be overridden by whatever Blizzard decides works best for SC3 or Galaxy of StarCraft's storyline.