StarCraft 2 A Trilogy?
KungFuDiscoMonkey
Creator of ns_altair日本福岡県 Join Date: 2003-03-15 Member: 14555Members, NS1 Playtester, Reinforced - Onos
Creator of ns_altair日本福岡県 Join Date: 2003-03-15 Member: 14555Members, NS1 Playtester, Reinforced - Onos
<a href="http://kotaku.com/5061980/starcraft-ii-single-player-is-a-trilogy" target="_blank">http://kotaku.com/5061980/starcraft-ii-sin...er-is-a-trilogy</a>
I'm not sure if I like that idea. I'm probably being cynical but it seems strange that they would split it into three games for any other reason but to get more money.
Apparently there's another clip talking about the spit.
<a href="http://kotaku.com/5062018/starcraft-ii-lead-producer-on-the-split-single-player-campaign" target="_blank">http://kotaku.com/5062018/starcraft-ii-lea...player-campaign</a>
I'm not sure if I like that idea. I'm probably being cynical but it seems strange that they would split it into three games for any other reason but to get more money.
Apparently there's another clip talking about the spit.
<a href="http://kotaku.com/5062018/starcraft-ii-lead-producer-on-the-split-single-player-campaign" target="_blank">http://kotaku.com/5062018/starcraft-ii-lea...player-campaign</a>
Comments
CRAFT
TRILOGY
STARCRAFT: PROVING GROUNDS
STARCRAFT: CRITICAL MASS
STARCRAFT: TOTAL MELTDOWN
STAR CRAFT TRILOGY
It says: "The story will stretch across three titles", but the next paragraph says: "Each campaign is treated as a fully fleshed out game, with each title ending the same way". Wat? õ_Ô
I'd interpret the first quote as "the story continues from the first to the second and to the third campaign" and the second quote as "each campaign is the same story but from a different perspective" or something like that. Please enlighten me.
Zerg's is about growing in power.
Protoss' I'm not too sure about. I know the Xel'Naga come into play at some point but I think they're going to feature in the Zerg campaign even though the Protoss made them (I think).
A thousand fanboys are currently sitting in front of their computers twitching violently and frothing at the mouth.
I've also heard that the Protoss campaign has hardly been started. Apparently each game will have the same access to multiplayer content, but there is a rumor that the different versions will allow players 'customization' options online, whatever that means. Splitting the game into three isn't too big of a deal for me. I mean, if each single player campaign is as detailed and in depth as they say then it really would be three separate games.
What is a big deal to me is how they've announced that they will soon <a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/11/blizzards-wilson-some-battle-net-features-to-be-monetized/" target="_blank">charge for battle.net</a>. They claim they need to this so they can "keep making these games and updating features. We kind of have to."
Battle.net is a ranking / matchmaking system. I cannot think of any ranking / matchmaking system that charges players. Whether those matchmaking systems are Mplayer, Gamespy, MSN Zone, Steam, or in-game systems like the Ensemble Studios Online (ESO), EA's system (for CNCG / CNC3), or even systems that much smaller companies like Stardock uses for SoaSE.
I mean, Ensemble Studios is shut down and ESO is still operating, plus Blizzard has been running battle.net free for how long... 10 years? All of a sudden they "have to" charge players? Yet they have one of the most successful video games of all time (WoW) constantly supplying them monthly payments and they're soon to release the sequel to a game that is widely considered the best RTS of all time....
I don't see it.
If not, I'll get the first and pirate the rest.
<i>Teh money's</i> defy logic!
Blizzard is a company which strives to make money, as every company should do. But I actually work for these guys and have personally met and spoken to them. Believe, nothing is further away from the truth than that they are money hungry EA types.
They do what they think needs to be done in order to keep making great games. And if you deny me that they are making great games, than I'm not taking you serious anymore.
Uh, (closed) Battle.net also hosts the games. I don't know of a single company hosting servers free of charge, except blizzard (duh)
From what I can gleam from the article, this is essential just an announcement that SC2 will only have one campaign of significantly greater lenght than normal, the other 2 sides will be touched via expansions later. I don't see the problem.
Ever hear of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_Empires_III#Multiplayer" target="_blank">ESO</a>? It operates very similar to battle.net, even storing information about each player (their home city, what cards they've unlocked, what decks they have, their win %, etc.), and it is free.
Even though ES is being shut down, it was always free and Microsoft has said they'll continue to support ESO, for free.
I do not know of any matchmaking system that charges any type of fee. Battle.net will be the first.
They can ask people not to think of it as a "split" but, it is, that reality can't be escaped. It may be absolutely warranted in terms of development time/effort, but you can't psychologically shed that perception.
In terms of charging for battle net: People won't pay, they just will stop playing blizzard games if they must pay a monthly fee to play online with other users. You can do it in the MMO genre, because it's well established, and people know the server costs are astronomical, but you can't pull it off as a method of basic multilayer functionality. There's too much competition that's already offering it for free with other titles. That being said, partial monitation schemes could be very successful, paying for tourny participation, ladder rankings, custom icons, private channels, and access to other features not strictly required to match make and play, that completely makes sense.
Even with choke points and what-not I won't beleive an RTS mission will take as long to create as an FPS level.
So there damned well better be 30-odd missions in each pack. I can see people buying one pack and pirating the rest. $150 dollars to complete an RTS storyline is extreme.
I've also heard that the Protoss campaign has hardly been started. Apparently each game will have the same access to multiplayer content, but there is a rumor that the different versions will allow players 'customization' options online, whatever that means. Splitting the game into three isn't too big of a deal for me. I mean, if each single player campaign is as detailed and in depth as they say then it really would be three separate games.
What is a big deal to me is how they've announced that they will soon <a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/11/blizzards-wilson-some-battle-net-features-to-be-monetized/" target="_blank">charge for battle.net</a>. They claim they need to this so they can "keep making these games and updating features. We kind of have to."
Battle.net is a ranking / matchmaking system. I cannot think of any ranking / matchmaking system that charges players. Whether those matchmaking systems are Mplayer, Gamespy, MSN Zone, Steam, or in-game systems like the Ensemble Studios Online (ESO), EA's system (for CNCG / CNC3), or even systems that much smaller companies like Stardock uses for SoaSE.
I mean, Ensemble Studios is shut down and ESO is still operating, plus Blizzard has been running battle.net free for how long... 10 years? All of a sudden they "have to" charge players? Yet they have one of the most successful video games of all time (WoW) constantly supplying them monthly payments and they're soon to release the sequel to a game that is widely considered the best RTS of all time....
I don't see it.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Now thats ######ing retarded. Charging for Bnet. They have to? ROFL Wow makes Millions a month, even after overhead, you cannot ever convince me that they don't turn a very, very, sexy profit.
I am now boycotting all blizzard products
I am now boycotting all blizzard products<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yeah, ######ing companies turning as much profit as they can
That being said, I don't see it either. For over a decade, bnet has been <strike>free</strike> freely available to those who had purchased a game utilizing it. I haven't seen any reason why that has to change. I doubt those other games were unprofitable moneyholes.
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE</div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->So Julian Wilson told us that you guys are looking monetize Battle.Net in some way. Is that right?
Wow, that's an evil way of putting it. Julian's turning into a business guy on me. Here's the way I would put it. We're definitely not looking at turning Diablo into a subscription based game. It's clearly not an MMO, so it's not appropriate to do a business model like that. The way we approach all of our games now, is we come up with what we think is a great game, and then we wrap the appropriate business model around it. If that's just a box price, then that's that.
With Battle.Net we're definitely looking at possible different features that we might be able to do for additional money. We're not talking about Hellgate or anything like that. We're not going to tack things on. I think World of Warcraft is a great example to look at. We charge people if they want to switch servers or if they want name changes, things that aren't core to the game experience, they're really just optional things that some people want. It takes us some development work to do it, so it makes sense to charge for it. We would never do something like say to get the full game experience, you'll have to pay extra.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
That being said, I don't see it either. For over a decade, bnet has been <strike>free</strike> freely available to those who had purchased a game utilizing it. I haven't seen any reason why that has to change. I doubt those other games were unprofitable moneyholes.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
QFT.
<!--quoteo(post=1690164:date=Oct 13 2008, 09:46 AM:name=Tyrain)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Tyrain @ Oct 13 2008, 09:46 AM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1690164"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec--><a href="http://www.joystiq.com/2008/10/13/blizzcon-2008-rob-pardo-talks-battle-net-monetizing/" target="_blank">This is your answer.</a><!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
He implies that it's only going to be for 'non-core' stuff like server and name changes which is what I expected/hoped. I'll continue to be sceptical until I see the actual list though. I don't understand why it was announced so vaguely if that's all it is going to be. Maybe judging/softening customer reactions.
B) It is VERY easy to set up your own lobby server similar to BNETEAST BNETWEST BNETEUROPE BNETASIA. This is what might happen if blizzard gets too greedy off of bnet.
Speaking of 3rd party Bnet servers, anybody here remember TPCnet or whatever it was called waaay back in the 90's? I was logging onto there after getting home from 5th grade...
And as Anytime said, Bnet doesn't actually host your games it just serves as a matchmaking service meaning the draw on their bandwidth/hardware would be minimal so charging for it seems a bit, well, evil (cough xboxlivemicrosofthalo3 cough).