Starcraft Is Now Free

[Nakotsu]

https://starcraft.com/en-us/articles/20674424

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sure is im getting 1600fps+ going through campaign.... Sadly I already owned the game...

[Levyan]

wait you mean blizzard is ruining one of its IP's again? Its almost as if the company doesnt give a shit about the IPs that made it what it is today. Diablo is a travesty, they cant even update starcraft 1. Warcraft is an echo we havnt herd of in over 15 years. But hey they added a new fucking hero to overwatch [ which is just a clone of another IP].

The worst fucking thing blizzard ever did was let blizzard of the north leave. That part of the company is what manufactured greatness.

Because there are so many 20 year old games that keep getting updates? I'm not saying that I'll eat up every "remastered" thing that Blizz or other AAA companies spit out, either. The best nostalgia experiences I have had are playing old games that have had (usually unofficial) patched that allowed them to be played on something other than Windows 98 and accept the graphics as they were.

Wishing for Blizzard North back is like wanting Black Isles back. They were great in their time, but they dropped out for a reason.

[Zeta333]

Because there are so many 20 year old games that keep getting updates? I'm not saying that I'll eat up every "remastered" thing that Blizz or other AAA companies spit out, either. The best nostalgia experiences I have had are playing old games that have had (usually unofficial) patched that allowed them to be played on something other than Windows 98 and accept the graphics as they were.

Wishing for Blizzard North back is like wanting Black Isles back. They were great in their time, but they dropped out for a reason.

the team that did diablo 2 and hellgate, if they had blizzards current resources and money and backing would put out a game of the year no questions asked. it would make diablo 3 look like the expansion that diablo 1 had that no one bought. The fact that diablo 3 failed so hard to even remotly measure up to diablo 2 should be evidence that the magic that was behind 2 was no longer at blizzard when 3 was made.

[Mafic]

Starcraft reminded me of why Starcraft 2 has problems gaining traction and is losing ground to MOBAs. Starcraft requires you put your units in groupings that make sense instead of giant deathballs that Starcraft 2 promotes.

But there are improvements in Starcraft 2 that Starcraft lacks, so if they were to combine the best of Starcraft and Starcraft 2 you would have a stellar game.

[Levyan]

the team that did diablo 2 and hellgate, if they had blizzards current resources and money and backing would put out a game of the year no questions asked. it would make diablo 3 look like the expansion that diablo 1 had that no one bought. The fact that diablo 3 failed so hard to even remotly measure up to diablo 2 should be evidence that the magic that was behind 2 was no longer at blizzard when 3 was made.

Is this actually true? Did D2 generate more total revenue than D3? I mean, revenue would be facts. How much we liked the game is our opinion, even though I agree that the whole Inferno system and gearing system felt pretty bad at first in D3. I didn't play D2 when it 1st came out, so I don't know what it was like more than just before LoD really. The problem is that Blizzard is where it is today because of selling "shit like like new overwatch character". They have the money now that you want to use to back the Blizzard North developers due to their business practices. Blizzard has long since stopped being that small BGFG company and has since turned into another giant gaming corp. I mean, that's why the current rise of BGFG indie developers now.

[Zeta333]

Is this actually true? Did D2 generate more total revenue than D3? I mean, revenue would be facts. How much we liked the game is our opinion, even though I agree that the whole Inferno system and gearing system felt pretty bad at first in D3. I didn't play D2 when it 1st came out, so I don't know what it was like more than just before LoD really. The problem is that Blizzard is where it is today because of selling "shit like like new overwatch character". They have the money now that you want to use to back the Blizzard North developers due to their business practices. Blizzard has long since stopped being that small BGFG company and has since turned into another giant gaming corp. I mean, that's why the current rise of BGFG indie developers now.

i have no hard proof but i know the diablo 2 scene is still big, they still do ladder seasons and iv herd that the average population of d2 is a tad higher than d3 except when a new season starts for a few weeks on 3. Diablo 2 has survived and continued to be played almost 17 years after it was released.

[Bigbazz]

the team that did diablo 2 and hellgate, if they had blizzards current resources and money and backing would put out a game of the year no questions asked. it would make diablo 3 look like the expansion that diablo 1 had that no one bought. The fact that diablo 3 failed so hard to even remotly measure up to diablo 2 should be evidence that the magic that was behind 2 was no longer at blizzard when 3 was made.

How did D3 fail when it sold multiple times more copies than Diablo 2? Some history for you

1. Diablo 2 was not that great at launch, I have an old magazine right here with 73% review. It was very popular but didn't light the world on fire with critics.
2. Lord of Destruction massively improved the game, much like ROS improved D3.
3. Past success is no guarentee of future achievements, Hellgate London was a complete failure and Torchlight was only only a minor hit as an indy game, not exactly spectacular.

You're judging the success of Diablo 3 purely based on your personal opinion, which is no different than me making a big angry post about how Diablo 2 was a failure as if that holds any weight. Objectively the D3 sold millions of copies and is one of the best selling games on the PC, and has been receiving regular updates since it released 5 years ago, retaining a healthy playerbase with a huge market potential for future sales. So no by objective terms Diablo 3 is not a failure.

i have no hard proof but i know the diablo 2 scene is still big, they still do ladder seasons and iv herd that the average population of d2 is a tad higher than d3 except when a new season starts for a few weeks on 3. Diablo 2 has survived and continued to be played almost 17 years after it was released.

Bullshit is it still big, it has been largely bots since as far back as 2006-2007 with most players online being bots. Diablo 2 online is effectively dead, you're lucky to see a single person in the national chat channels and usually that's a bot... Back when D2 was popular those channels were breaming full of players and each national channel had multiple channels due to overflow. Diablo 2 is as good as dead as it can be while still being online.

[Deleted]

Starcraft reminded me of why Starcraft 2 has problems gaining traction and is losing ground to MOBAs. Starcraft requires you put your units in groupings that make sense instead of giant deathballs that Starcraft 2 promotes.

But there are improvements in Starcraft 2 that Starcraft lacks, so if they were to combine the best of Starcraft and Starcraft 2 you would have a stellar game.

I really like Starcraft and Starcraft 2. But they are different games, and Starcraft simply won't appeal to most modern gamers. I think what MOBAs did, was create a new genre that just brought in new players. Starcraft only was a huge deal in Korea, and Starcraft 2 is mostly Korea as well. I liked Starcraft when I was playing with my friends in a LAN, but I won't play against randoms on the internet 1v1 for matchmaking, it doesn't appeal to me. I prefer team-based games with a social element, and so do most people. Playing as a group in a LAN was the best thing, even playing in a group on the internet against randoms falls short of the magic, which is why Starcraft 2 never took off that much, we never forced ourselves to play online together against each other in-house, which was fun. Always having the opponent being random through matchmaking made it more competitive, but less social. I liked playing against friends and doing 2v4 teams or something wacky to balance things and have fun!

From a very high level, I compare MOBAs to Soccer/Football. Team sports are always more popular to play and watch, it's the social element that competitive people like as well.

Starcraft BW/2 is like your Tennis. It's a fancy pants sport, with incredible skill, but will never be that popular compared to Soccer/Football due to the singular aspect. The focus on 1v1 is great for the competitive aspect, but the team part is what is fun for most people, which is seldom the focus of the community. In-house twitch steams of 3v3 games with friends isn't a popular concept.

The analogy obviously breaks down when you look closer, but I think at a high level it's team vs. singles. Starcraft will always make sense for those who are anti-social and competitive. Maybe we should stop shoe-horning them all into the MOBAs and MMOs though