Posted by DragonQ on January 29th, 2010 @ 3:31 p.m.
A Blizzard representative has confirmed via email that the minimum system requirements for the StarCraft II beta have not yet been confirmed; the supposed leaked system requirements that have been posted on some fan sites are in fact inaccurate. They were apparently taken from a placeholder web page that should not have been made available.
A post on Battle.net by Blizzard staff Xordiah says that the installation DVD will contain both PC and Mac versions:
Also the StarCraft II installation DVD will include both PC & Mac versions of the game. Further details on digital download possibilities will be released as we get closer to the ship date.
[ Just like Warcraft III and World of WarCraft, IIRC. -Zen ]
The zerg would be in soon. They tore at the door, the walls, the ceiling. Erekul could feel the other high templar, his brothers and sisters, fighting and dying. Buying him precious seconds. He closed his eyes; the Khala pulsed within. The collective thoughts and feelings of his people were filled with chaos, terror, and pain.
The zerg had control of Erekul's beloved homeworld of Aiur. The invaders likely thought themselves ascendant; they did not know that the fight was far from over. Erekul moved through the dark chamber to the console, his hands bathed in its soft blue glow. He entered the codes with serene grace. Behind him the door began to shudder.
Blizzard has confirmed in a Battle.net forum post that there will be a Protoss mini-campaign that will tell a story and offer other fun things to do for single players. More below the fold.
Posted by DragonQ on December 21st, 2009 @ 08:13 a.m.
4players.de has an exclusive StarCraft II Q&A session, mainly focusing on units and the campaign. You can read it here and here's a preview:
Are you still developing new units or are you satisfied with the amount of units for each race and, therefore, more concerned about the fine tuning and balancing? Our philosophy has always been to keep the amount of units for each race to a certain number to keep the gameplay tight, and we are satisfied with what we have right now in terms of that number. Once we head into beta we definitely evaluate the role of each unit and will potentially add or drop units as needed based on feedback.
Also, two Blizzard employees (Samwise Didier, senior director of StarCraft II and J. Allen Brack, production director for World of Warcraft) have confirmed that Blizzard will "definitely work on a console game at some point"! You can read the entire interview here.
You can order a worker to build something, then move to a different location, then build something else, and then start to gather resources again...If you order a worker to build 5 gateways, you will have to pay for these gateways immediately.
Posted by DragonQ on December 04th, 2009 @ 05:09 a.m.
Dustin Browder, the lead designer of StarCraft II, has taken part in another interview, this time lasting 30 whole minutes! The transcript was posted last night on TeamLiquid's website and can be read here. Topics of discussion include Battle.net 2.0, balancing, influences and his experience with the Blizzard development team. Here's a nice quote that came out of the discussion:
We are trying to make this game as complete - like if nobody buys any other product, this game needs to be awesome. Like if Blizzard gets hit by a meteor tomorrow and we all die, at least Starcraft 2 was awesome - that's what it needs to be.
We also learn that the version of Battle.net 2.0 we'll see with StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty will be a "barebones", minimal rendition of what it will become in the future via patches and expansions.
Posted by DragonQ on December 01st, 2009 @ 05:31 a.m.
Sonnert, a user at Blizzard's official forum, has posted his thoughts on the game, primarily concerning the Terran race, after getting a chance to play it for a few days at DreamHack Winter 09 last week. Here's a snippet of his reactions:
However almost every time i skipped rax units and went straight for factory units i lost (and not because i was run over b4 i had gotten an army). I tried mass rush hellions. i tried tankwall&turret push. i tried thor/tank, thor/hellion, tank/hellion. i tried macro games with tank/turret def and i tried games with dual armorys for quick upps. but i almost always lost. I also know about 10 other ppl who played alot every day who said the exact same thing. We discussed ways around this but we always came to the same conclusion. However of course there is dropcheeses with hellions and stuff that would work on occasion, or if you simply were a better player, or did something they didnt see coming etc etc.
You can read the entire post here. Xordiah, Blizzard's European RTS Community Manager, replied to his thoughts stating that the build he was able to play was a few months old and so quite a lot has changed since.
Also, this video seems to prove that in the current build of StarCraft II, there are 16 player slots available in-game:
It's not clear whether this would apply to ladder games though and it could also include a minimum number of observers (e.g. 12 players + 4 observers maximum).
Posted by DragonQ on November 30th, 2009 @ 08:14 a.m.
Xzyiothe has noticed that there is another opportunity to possibly win a StarCraft II Beta key and some other goodies - via the official "Vespene Laughs" comic contest.
If you're a funny dude and know how to use Paint, why not give it a go? The competition closes at 23:00 (UTC) on 28/04/2010 and winners are chosen every month so you have plenty of chances to win! For an overview of the rules and prizes, plus examples of previous winners, check out Xzyiothe's thread in General Discussions.
