Starcraft II Launched Today (goodbye free time)
us.battle.net
us.battle.net
My little brother pre-ordered with Gamestop so he could get it at midnight, and there seemed to be more than enough copies for everyone when we went last night.
I actually pre-ordered my own copy from Amazon (Conveniently, it shipped from the Amazon warehouse in Nashua, NH to my house in Nashua, NH)
Read through the manual, especially the nine (!) pages they devote to the plot in teeny tiny text. For a newcomer it's extremely confusing. The Zerg make sense, but the constant shifting of Terran allegiances and Protoss character names make my head swim. IGN's five minute video summary helped, though I had to watch it three times.
I take it Kerrigan is the anti-hero everyone loves, vaguely like FFVII's Sephiroth. And there appears to be some slight debate as to whether there's any humanity left in her, though her temporary alliances appear to be more for strategic convenience than any real compassion.
What I'd like to know from my fellow HN gamers is the emotion of it. What were the shocking moments? The tearful bits? Were there any? What would I feel about Jim Raynor if I played through Starcraft and Brood War? Am I supposed to think Kerrigan as the Queen of Blades is sexy, or am I supposed to be repulsed by the... things growing out of her back?
What made StarCraft stand out was the incredible depth of its competitive multiplayer that allowed for emergent strategies to be discovered. The map editor was also brilliant and let people create incredible new variants.
That's a rhetorical question right? :)
Still doesn't beat getting a good book at the public library, though...
Thats what got me...I would have purchased it but the pricing out for each set of missions and removal of LAN play has made me postpone purchase...Shoot, I'll try to wait till it comes out in a 'combo' release in a few years...I'll try!
When iPhone App Store came along, it brought with it its own price conventions i.e. it's normal to sell games for $0.99, or $9.99 tops. Does anyone sell games for $60, or at least $30 on iPhone? Form a developer's point of view I see no reason for iPhone games to be priced cheaper than PC or console counterparts. Development of any game doesn't become 10x cheaper because it is for iPhone, does it?
The reason I'm interested in it is the following: I am thinking about how can indie game developers get compensated for their work? There's the notion that if the game is "big and good" ("AAA" titles released by major publishers) it deserves to be paid top dollar for ($60 currently, I assume; though $60 seems to be "very top" by todays standards); indie games from obscure developers deserve much less. I don't see why the opposite couldn't be true; "big" games, though require big budgets for their production, will sell many copies anyway, while indie ones appeal for much narrower audience (that needs them nevertheless), for which they have to compensate with higher price, which said audience will have to pay. Does history have any examples of this kind? If not, maybe, as PG noted[1], we're not actually paying for content in games, not just in music and print?
[1] Paul Graham: Post-Medium Publishing http://www.paulgraham.com/publishing.html
It would be hard for any other company to have the ability to spend this much time and put this much polish into a game. Given the long development time and the relatively few changes being made from the original and thus far only the one campaign. Guess that's the luxury you get from developing the cash cow that is WoW.
Team Fortress 2 from Valve had a similar development time and has had over a hundred patches since release, in addition to a fair amount of media developed outside of the game.
It's true that both have had significant backing bankrolls. However, you can also look to some indie 'studios'. Cave Story was a one man project that took 5 years (of spare time) to complete, and is often lauded as an indie star. Dwarf Fortress has only ever had one programmer (who is now supported by user donations), and probably deserves noting even if it doesn't quite attain any significant degree of polish.
why is an oil spill related to hacker news? or why we buy airplane tickets? or wikileaks?
hell, if anything starcraft 2 is a factor of 10 more relevant than any of those, you know, because starcraft 2 is on a computer
not only will starcraft 2 reiterate what a big deal video games are, it's going to shape popular culture, it's going to be played by millions of players each and every day for the next decade or so.
starcraft 2 is a game that values practice is thinking out of the box more than anything else, I know far more starcraft players amongst startups/hackers than settlers of catan, or anything else.
hell, nothing unites startups more than a good old lan party. (i'm aware of the irony of this point)
but most importantly, its related to Hacker News because over 30 people have said it is (upvotes)
I love it when people say games value thinking out of the box. Yeah! My Zerglings can beat a Yamato Cruiser right? Because they can like jump off of a cliff onto it... or something. Every game has a tiered structure of what works and doesn't SC2 is no different. At competitive levels of play there's only a handful of strategies people use, they'll work them selves out over the next month or so and then be set in stone unless people find glitches in the game that don't get patched like the original SC. SC2 is a game of rock paper scissors at the core. Every strategy game is.
>not only will starcraft 2 reiterate what a big deal video games are, it's going to shape popular culture, it's going to be played by millions of players each and every day for the next decade or so.
You know every other pop music group is listened to by millions of people some for even 3 or 4 decades! Example Led Zeppelin, so how come Led Zeppelin posts aren't on HN? SC2 is entertainment pure and simple, essentially by posting entertainment links it's going against the spirit of the rules. It's essentially cat pictures. And you know those are big on the internet which we're on, and that argument makes as much sense as your "on a computer clause".
The classical example from Starcraft 1 is Slayers/Boxer, the Korean player who played as terran when everyone thought it was completely inferior, and developed new strategies that made him world champion.
Sure, you can snicker at it being "just a video game", but it's fundamentally no different from any other game or sport.
Even rock/paper/scissors can become quite interesting with just two more options, see: http://www.samkass.com/theories/RPSSL.html
So? Why is the topic of entertainment a bad thing for HN?
> I know it's a video game, but essentially it's no different from any other entertainment.
The only thing I can see that it shares with other forms of entertainment is that it entertains. And if we are wondering why we post things that entertain us on HN, HN itself would probably not exist.
> I mean we don't have World Cup or Superbowl Stories on HN, why have the release of Starcraft?
If you honestly can't see a difference between the release of SC2 and the Superbowl, you're purposefully being obtuse, and if you are, your comments are hurting HN much more than a post about SC2.
However, I'll assume your just ignorant, and I'll explain the difference.
First, SC2 is a game that the users of HN have a higher chance of playing than they would have of playing in the Superbowl. Indeed, I'll go so far as to suggest that no registered user, yet, has ever played in any Superbowl.
Secondly, rather than simply be passive entertainment like the Superbowl, SC2 is a game we can actually play.
Next, their is a large following, and that following essentially evolved e-sports. People can laugh at e-sports all they want, but it's no different then watching real sports. Continuing on, the launch of SC2 today means the e-sports arena is essentially being revitalized. A sizable number of individuals are looking at how to capitalize on e-sports. Indeed, their are individuals actually making money casting esport games, or startups using esports to easily market via sponsorships of tournaments.
You see, the launch of SC2 isn't just a game. Why? Mostly because of the success of SC:BW in e-sports. So, unlike just another game being release, SC2 is different. It will present more opportunities for people to explore, and see how they can capitalize on the SC2.
In short, no. SC2 isn't just like every other game, and it is different from other entertainment. Indeed, it has more relevance on HN then your comments complaining about it's inclusion.
What about Peter Norvig?
I also think Blizzard is interesting from that perspective. It's quite fascinating that they have managed to, on multiple occasions, create franchises so successful that people actually can earn a living playing them, gold farming/selling characters in the case of WoW and esports in the case of starcraft and warcraft. In that sense I think they have something in common with Apple, in that there is something intangible about what they do (quality?) that makes them extremely successful.
Sure its entertainment - entertainment created by an large group of developers/hackers/programmers; for me, thats a major delineation from other sports and entertainment.
The discussion can turn towards the high technical aptitude needed to create games (which, IMHO, is one of the areas of development pushing the bounds of computing...AI, physics, the shit-ton of math involved, balancing...etc etc.), but thats a different topic.
but most importantly, its related to Hacker News because over 30 people have said it is (upvotes)
Plus, I wonder how many people would have downvoted this to express disinterest. Flagging is extra work and pretty much pointless now, the only option is to ignore. There is no way to drown out a small, vocal group.
Take e-sports. Starcraft arguably launched e-sports and is still immensely popular, not just in Korea but around the world. The last WCG Starcraft grand final in China was apparently watched by some 10000 people who were _present_ at the match - not just watching on streams.
Even when SC2 was only in beta, tournament streams had ~5000 or more people watching live, plus countless more watching VODs later.
Can anyone see ways to monetize this? We could be on the cusp of an e-sports revolution, I'm sure there's a lot that could be done to capitalize on this. Video advertising is an obvious one, but sponsorship opportunities, premium feeds, and other possibilities abound.
Starcraft originally took off so well in Korea largely due to widely available high-speed internet access. How will the changing landscape of internet access affect it's successor?
What about emerging markets? Blizzard have launched SC2 simultaneously in 7 languages on 5 continents. They're trying out different commercialization models in markets such as South America and Russia, will these work? How will battle.net hold up, and can Blizzard succeed in driving 'hardcore' gamers towards a more connected, _social_ experience, or will people continue to complain about Facebook integration?
Even if it's not directly Hacker News, I'm sure many readers have similar fond memories of playing Starcraft in their past.
- Tournaments only allowed if you ask Blizzard kindly
- LAN play is gone
- Integration with 3rd party social network partners
It was better, back then, right? Now - was it? Or was there no way to pull off a restricted, overpriced release at that time and no way to go for the "online only" approach without broadband? Or was it impossible to create this amount of hype with TV commercials for your next big thing (tm) everywhere without having World of Warcraft to back you up?
What about "Money corrupts"? How much is WoW bringing in these days?