Starcraft 2 Beta launches -- Kiss your free time goodbye
shacknews.com
shacknews.com
In a space that's usually defined by bleeding-edge hardware, that's a strong testament to the staying power of XP (and the low adoption rates of Vista and Win7).
An example is when they launched the original Starcraft, they chose to go with sprite based graphics, at a time when realtime 3D had become the norm. This allowed them to not only produce a better looking game, but combined with the 640x480 screen resolution, run on many machines.
During this phase a Mac version will NOT be available, please check back.
Luckily some blog my friend linked me to on Facebook was giving out some invites. I thought it'd just be another scam, but I got an invite mailed to me in a couple of hours. Go figure...
Anyway here's the blog: http://starcraft2betainvites.blogspot.com
(1.6GHz C2D and X3100)
No one has gotten emails yet.
:)
Seriously, though. My account is nearly a year old, so I'll go ahead and say it: this is a Reddit thread. Stop. Now.
Here's my story:
I used to be a very avid Warcraft II player. I used KALI for the IPX over TCP/IP emulation to play online through my 14.4 modem.
Anyways, I had gotten really good at playing the game online, thanks to Schlonglor's guides along with lots of practice.
One day I had just finished playing a game, and beat the other person. I started chatting when them, when they told me that they were pretty new to Warcraft II. I asked how they got into it, and she told me, her brother was the Schlonglor! At first I was floored. I couldn't believe it. We talked for quite awhile, and then shes tells me that her brother is there. She then asked if I would like to play against him. Of course I accepted!
My hands were literally shaking at the thought of playing against one of Warcraft II idols. We start playing, and I work faster and harder that I've ever played in a game.
I instantly could tell this guy was him, because the way he played was exactly like all the screenshots I had memorized of his games. (Wayyyy before YouTube, so there were no videos.)
The game progressed, and long(ish) story short, he made some heavy attacks on me, killed my base, and assume he had won. Moments later, my real army and real base that I was hiding moved in, and crushed him.
He was asking me.. "How did you do that??" "Where did that all come from??" I had the most s$%t-eating grin on my face. I was so proud that I had beat him.
He then tells me that he hasn't play for the last few weeks, and was out of practice. I didn't care.. I had still just beaten the Schlonglor!!
Him and I proceeded to chat it up for awhile. He congratulated me on the win, we parted ways, and I never heard from him again.
Soon after I put down the game, figuring there was no way to really beat that experience.
Good memories.. Thanks for bringing them up Alex :)
Or they stole a copy of the server sw?
I reckon that anyone with a working beta key should download WireShark, and capture all network traffic for the launch and authentication of Starcraft II. That would be a great help.
Now that the most talented Korean pros are guaranteed to be in the beta, good luck out training them.