New Interesting Details on Starcraft II
July 4, 2009 by Ruibo
In an interview with German Starcraft 2 site, Starcraft II’s producer Chris Sigaty shared some details and explained some of the design decisions behind their upcoming RTS game. You can follow the link to check out the full interview, but here are the key points that were discussed in the interview.
- Replays in Single Player: Sigaty said that they are leaning away from allowing this feature. The reasoning is that in the single player game, Blizzard uses a lot of internal triggers that spawn units for storyline purposes, and so on, and allowing full view of that might really break the sense of immersion in the game. He noted that it’s an easy switch to flip, so there’s still a chance this will be possible.
- Rights of Observers: The quell concerns that observers might try and tip the scales of a battle in one direction or another, Sigaty made it clear that observers aren’t able to communicate directly with any other player. He said that Blizzard is very conscious of the potential issues of spectators, and are taking steps to ensure that it is a safe feature to include.
- Joining Games in Progress: While firm on the idea that people couldn’t join a game in progress as players, Sigaty mentioned the possibility that players might be able to “audit” games types to see if it’s something they are interested. He mentioned custom games like DoTA, where players might want to check it out and see how it’s played before joining a game of that type.
- Maximum Players: The basic maps that ship with the game will be limited to 8 players each, plus 4 spectators, in any configuration (i.e. it could be a 4 vs. 4 or 8 player free for all, and so on). For custom maps, map makers will have the ability to make maps for up to 12 players, in which case there will be no spectators.
- “Taboo League”: Sigaty mentioned the possibility of a specific game type that is catered more toward beginners. In this mode, players bases would start off blocked off from each other, so that newbie players can’t just get zerg-rushed out of the game in 3 minutes. This is one of the many ways that the dev team are trying to make SCII accessible for beginners.
Some other tidbits:
- A rematch feature is being considered
- The Battle.net is partially inspired by social networking sites, and will be directly linked to the game’s forums
- The Protoss and Zerg campaigns will be expansions, not standalone games, and will require the Wings of Liberty (Terran) campaign
- In the Terran campaign, you will play with some Protoss units, but no Zerg
- Voice chat is built-in
- There may be a demo after the game has shipped, also language packs will drop sometime after the game hits shelves
Nothing much here for those just looking for new info on units or the game’s storyline, but plenty of interesting stuff nonetheless.
Related posts:
“- The Protoss and Zerg campaigns will be expansions, not standalone games, and will require the Wings of Liberty (Terran) campaign”
Just as I thought. Money grabbers till the end eh?
“- Sigaty hinted at a new Level 80 Elite Tauren Chieftain song”
Who gives a $hit? This is Starcraft – not friekin’ WoW.
“- Voice chat is built-in”
Don’t need it. I play with people in the same room. I’ll use the downloable LAN patch please.
“- Replays in Single Player: Sigaty said that they are leaning away from allowing this feature.” “He noted that it’s an easy switch to flip, so there’s still a chance this will be possible.”
Sure…if it’s that easy then why exclude it? Are you unable to hide the triggers? How do you hide it in game then? Ah wait…you’ll have this data on a server somewhere and you can’t quite get the sync right when there’s any sort of lag…right? I know – only allow it in LAN mode (and stop trying to control everything on your server…not everyone wants to use battle.net anyway.
“The Protoss and Zerg campaigns will be expansions, not standalone games, and will require the Wings of Liberty (Terran) campaign”
All of Blizzards games have had expansions that required the original to play, why is everyone making a big deal about this one. Most likely this will make it so that blizzard will be able to charge LESS for the expansions than if they made them stand alone games.
I personally don’t mind paying for blizzard games, they are first and formost the FUNNEST games I’ve ever played and I can keep coming back to them. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve spent money on competitors games only to find out they sucked and i was sick of them after about five hours of play
Blizzard, thankyou for making wonderful games I will continue to buy your games with the understanding that I will get hundreds of hours of awesome gameplay out of each game I buy from you!
the original poster is a whiner. im guessing you never played blizzard games and only know of this company since WoW, as all your complaints about SC were lame. No one cares whether or not you “need” voicechat. get over yourself. Please disable your internet connection and buy a Wii.
by “original poster” did you mean Vix?
the comments are all valid – I don’t mind expansion packs as long as they bring something meaningful.
as for Jappre? mate get yourself an idea, don’t buy a game just because Blizzard develops it, buy it because it’s good and the gaming experience is good.
otherwise be a blind zombie.. I really don’t care.
I am still waiting for the game release date and reviews to come out – then I will look at the LAN patch and possibly the game (I don’t really care if patches void service warranty or similar – what service does anyone get unless you are in the states, who needs it?)
no LAN mode = no sale.
I think they should allow LAN cuz ppl dont like bnet when its flooded with chat bots and spam bots. That irks my nerves to no end. If blizzard doesn’t fix chat spam bots I’ll start a nationwide boycott. It’s getting way out of hand on diablo and world of warcraft and wc3.
that’s actually a pretty good point… one of my least favorite things about bnet. but it worked and was pretty stable at least, right?
Stability isn’t the issue Steve, never was – it’s about the LAN feature (or lack of).
For me (and a lot of the older gamers) it was about getting some mates around to play the game, you know being social. Not about locking yourself away in a dark room playing on some laggy server in the states.
Hope they put in Observers be super cool.
But better put like a delay of 2-5 mins on it stop people cheating.
No LAN = no sale.
Mind you if the LAN patch comes out I will buy a copy (even if the patch is not official).
I am not a thief, but who would pay for a game twice?
no be frank, your going to buy this game when all of your friends rave about how amazing it is. everyone needs to stop tooling on about how no LAN MODE!! Blizzard will listen to its buyers so everyone stfu already about NO LAN MODE = NO SALE
stfu? dream on!
Blizzard wont have the buyers if it doesn’t make a product people want..
Would you buy a car with three wheels cause some company reckons it’s a good idea? or do go buy a car with four wheels that actually goes the distance?
Get real dude – rudeness ain’t going to make me buy a crap/nerfed game – Dawn of War 2 has LAN, maybe my mates and I will go play that instead.
Get the point? NO LAN = NO SALE
What I’m concerned about, and I know what your going to say, is whether we will get totally unique heroes in every aspect of the word unique: For Example Jim Raynor cruising around in a Battlecruiser with a different model or a different texture or something! Lets give him a unique ability to boot instead of the norm…( Yamato Gun Remix! with splash effect or something) If careful innovative thinking was put into making the three races unique, then why oh why do we have a lead character Karrigen with the same psionic storm ability as the Templar from the Protoss in the original Starcraft? I’m not being negetive here and I believe that Starcraft 2 will kick ass whether or not what I’ve mentioned gets added or not. Just please make the single player campaign what it needs to be, a soap opera in space with tons of violence worth playing for another decade!
Unfortunately, people are going to buy the game, LAN or not. And we’ll have to play on battle.net every time, and get Blizzard tattoos on our foreheads.
StarCraft II Asylum Blog.
I believe that LAN is vital to the games altamite success!
It is what got me into Starcraft in the first place!
With out LAN..no sale?, or lower sales might be a truth we all have to agree upon!
I know I would like to have this feature in the Starcraft 2 offerings ….I hope someone upthere is listening!!
Cause with out LAN…it makes the product seem weaker in flexibility and over all production of the product being….”unfinished”…and we all heard what they said about not releasing the product until it was prefect/ready!
So with out the LAN feature the product is lacking a well loved feature…which by my understanding is what made Starcraft such a success!
Just my two cents…